Decomposing dependency analysis: revisiting the relation between annotation scheme and structure-based textual measures

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F00216208%3A11320%2F26%3ARRQ4WCKM" target="_blank" >RIV/00216208:11320/26:RRQ4WCKM - isvavai.cz</a>

Result on the web

<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/llc/fqaf003" target="_blank" >http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/llc/fqaf003</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/llc/fqaf003" target="_blank" >10.1093/llc/fqaf003</a>

Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Decomposing dependency analysis: revisiting the relation between annotation scheme and structure-based textual measures

Original language description

Standardized quantitative measurement of texts lies at the heart of digital approaches to humanities. Structure-based textual measures are known to be influenced by the choice of syntactic annotation schemes. Building on previous research, the present article further explores the relation between annotation schemes and the index of mean dependency distance (MDD) by comparing the treebanks of seventeen languages, respectively, within a tree representation (basic universal dependencies, BUD) and within a graphic representation (enhanced universal dependencies, EUD). Following the idea of decomposing annotation schemes into the combinations of analyses of specific constructions (coordinate structures, control constructions, and relative clauses), we design algorithms to identify them in the CoNLL-U format treebanks and explore their influences. It is found that the overall MDD of the EUD representation is statistically higher than that of BUD at corpus level, primarily affected by the coordinate structure due to its high frequency. At sentence level, all three constructions might contribute to either increased or decreased MDD, with stochastically intervening words and word order being two important determinants of the values of the measure. Finally, we propose and argue for the view that MDDs calculated under different annotation schemes should be regarded as different textual measures in nature. In sum, the present study provides another case study to deepen our understanding of the nature of syntactic annotation schemes and its relation with textual indices, which paves the way for standard measurement of texts in future humanities research. © The Author(s) 2025. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of EADH. All rights reserved.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

J_SC - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the SCOPUS database

CEP classification

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OECD FORD branch

10201 - Computer sciences, information science, bioinformathics (hardware development to be 2.2, social aspect to be 5.8)

Project

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Continuities

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Publication year

2025

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Name of the periodical

Digital Scholarship in the Humanities

ISSN

2055-7671

e-ISSN

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Volume of the periodical

40

Issue of the periodical within the volume

1

Country of publishing house

US - UNITED STATES

Number of pages

19

Pages from-to

400-418

UT code for WoS article

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EID of the result in the Scopus database

2-s2.0-105001965945