Unifying dimensions in coherence relations: How various annotation frameworks are related

Abstract

In this paper, we show how three often used and seemingly different discourse annotation frameworks – Penn Discourse Treebank (PDTB), Rhetorical Structure Theory (RST), and Segmented Discourse Representation Theory – can be related by using a set of unifying dimensions. These dimensions are taken from the Cognitive approach to Coherence Relations and combined with more fine-grained additional features from the frameworks themselves to yield a posited set of dimensions that can successfully map three frameworks. The resulting interface will allow researchers to find identical or at least closely related relations within sets of annotated corpora, even if they are annotated within different frameworks. Furthermore, we tested our unified dimension (UniDim) approach by comparing PDTB and RST annotations of identical newspaper texts and converting their original end label annotations of relations into the accompanying values per dimension. Subsequently, rates of overlap in the attributed values per dimension were analyzed. Results indicate that the proposed dimensions indeed create an interface that makes existing annotation systems “talk to each other.”

Domains and Functions: A Two-Dimensional Account of Discourse Markers

“…Such a unifying goal (cf. also Sanders et al, 2018) may seem idealistic, but we certainly hope that the present proposal, with its independent dimensions, constitutes a useful addition and complements previous frameworks which share the same goals of interoperability and large coverage of linguistic phenomena, albeit within the range of their own theoretical possibilities. Other-repair, the reparandum is produced by the other speaker.…”

Multiple Signals of Coherence Relations

“…In RST, for instance, relations are grouped into two main categories: subject matter and presentational (see Section 5). In the Cognitive approach to Coherence Relations or CCR (Sanders et al, 2018;Sanders et al, 1992), as we will also see in Section 5, parameters of relations include the order of segments, the source of coherence or the polarity of the relation. We explore whether such parameters contribute to differences in signalling of different types of relations.…”

“…This is because DMs appear to vary with respect to the relations they prototypically signal (if as a signal for a Condition relation, or since as a signal for a Causal relation) and also with respect to the degree of being ambiguous (while can signal both a Temporal and a Comparison relation). On the other hand, the latter perspective examines whether the use of multiple signals arises from the relations themselves, since relations are considered to vary with respect to parameters such as intentionality (Mann & Thompson, 1988) or strength (Sanders et al, 2018;Sanders et al, 1992).…”

“…(1) relations that are in general signalled by DMs (regardless of whether any other signal is present or not), such as List and Contrast, and (2) relations that generally do not contain a DM, but when they do have a DM, they also include some other signals, such as Elaboration-additional, Comparison and Interpretation-s. We examine the semantics of these relations with respect to two parameters: (i) intended effect, as postulated in RST (Mann & Thompson, 1988), and (ii) basic operation, as postulated in the CCR (Sanders et al, 2018;Sanders et al, 1992).…”

“…This may imply that the signalling of relations by multiple markers is an independent phenomenon, and it does not correlate with the intended effects borne out by the relations in any way 18 . The CCR (Sanders et al, 2018;Sanders et al, 1992) provides a psychological account of coherence relations. It characterizes relations in terms of four cognitively basic features or primitives: (1) basic operation, (2) source of coherence 19 , (3) order of segments and (4) polarity.…”