A case-based reasoning approach to zero anaphora resolution in Chinese texts

Abstract

Anaphora is a common phenomenon in discourses as well as an important research issue in the applications of natural language processing. In this paper, both intra-sentential and inter-sentential zero anaphora in Chinese texts are addressed. Unlike general rule-based approaches, our resolution method is embedded with a case-based reasoning mechanism which has the benefit of knowledge acquisition if the case size varies. In addition, the presented approach employs informative features with the help of two outer knowledge resources. Compared to rule-based approaches, our resolution to 1047 zero anaphora instances achieved 82% recall and 77% precision.