Passage retrieval: A probabilistic technique

This paper presents a probabilistic technique to retrieve passages from texts having a large size or heterogeneous semantic content. The proposed technique is independent on any supporting auxiliary data, such as text structure, topic organization, or pre-defined text segments. A Bayesian framework implements the probabilistic technique. We carried out experiments to compare the probabilistic technique to one based on a text segmentation algorithm. In particular, the probabilistic technique is more effective than, or as effective as the one based on the text segmentation to retrieve small:passages. Results show that passage size affects passage retrieval performance. Result; do also suggest that text organization and query generality may have an impact on the difference in effectiveness between the two techniques. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.