Negation Handling in Machine Learning-Based Sentiment Classification for Colloquial Arabic

One crucial aspect of sentiment analysis is negation handling, where the occurrence of negation can flip the sentiment of a review and negatively affects the machine learning-based sentiment classification. The role of negation in Arabic sentiment analysis has been explored only to a limited extent, especially for colloquial Arabic. In this paper, the authors address the negation problem in colloquial Arabic sentiment classification using the machine learning approach. To this end, they propose a simple rule-based algorithm for handling the problem that affects the performance of a machine learning classifier. The rules were crafted based on observing many cases of negation, simple linguistic knowledge, and sentiment lexicon. They also examine the impact of the proposed algorithm on the performance of different machine learning algorithms. Furthermore, they compare the performance of the classifiers when their algorithm is used against three baselines. The experimental results show that there is a positive impact on the classifiers when the proposed algorithm is used compared to the baselines.