FLEXICON: an evaluation of a statistical ranking model adapted to intelligent legal text management

ABSTRACT

The FLEXICON system was designed to provide legal professionals with an effective and easy-to-use legal text management tool. This paper discusses the structured knowledge representation model designed for the FLEXICON system serving both as an internal knowledge representation scheme, in conjunction with statistical ranking, and as an external representation used to summarize legal text for rapid evaluation of the search results. The model is evaluated and compared to alternative information retrieval models. Experimental test data is presented to demonstrate the model's retrieval effectiveness in comparison to boolean search.

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INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  I. Computing Methodologies
  I.2 ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
      I.2.1 Applications and Expert Systems
          Subjects: Law

Additional Classification:
  I. Computing Methodologies
  I.2 ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
      I.2.4 Knowledge Representation Formalisms and Methods
          Subjects: Representations (procedural and rule-based)
      I.2.7 Natural Language Processing
          Subjects: Text analysis

General Terms:
Design, Documentation, Experimentation, Languages, Legal Aspects