Assigning sentiment to themes

• US 8,918,312 B1
• Filed: 03/15/2013
• Issued: 12/23/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 06/29/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Reputation.com, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Reputation.com, Inc.
• Inventors: Rehling, John Andrew, Dignan, Thomas Gerardo
• Primary Examiner(s): ADESANYA, OLUJIMI A
• Application Number:
  US13/842,159
• Time in Patent Office: 648 Days
• Field of Search: 704/9
• US Class Current: 704/9
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/3326 using relevance feedback from the user, e.g. relevance feedback on documents, documents sets, document terms or passages
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/3334 Selection or weighting of terms from queries, including natural language queries
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/3344 using natural language analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/295 Named entity recognition
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 40/30 Semantic analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0282 Rating or review of business operators or products

Abstract

Assigning sentiment to themes is disclosed. Reputation data extracted from at least one data source is received. The reputation data includes user-authored reviews. The user-authored reviews include text and at least one rating. For a first review included in the reputation data, at least one keyword is determined using the first review'"'"'s text. A sentiment is assigned for a theme associated with the keyword based at least in part on the first review'"'"'s rating.

Claims

1. A system, comprising:

a processor configured to;

receive reputation data extracted from at least one data source, wherein the reputation data includes user-authored reviews pertaining to an entity and wherein a review comprises text and an accompanying rating;

for a first review included in the reputation data, identify a theme in the first review that is associated with an aspect of the entity at least in part by determining at least one keyword using the first review'"'"'s text;

assign a first sentiment for the identified theme at least in part by using the first review'"'"'s accompanying rating;

assign a sentiment for a parent theme of the identified theme at least in part by using the first review'"'"'s accompanying rating;

for a second review included in the reputation data that includes the determined at least one keyword and in which the theme is identified, assign a second sentiment for the identified theme based at least in part on the second review'"'"'s accompanying rating; and

provide as output a report that includes the identified theme, a combination of the respective first and second sentiments for that identified theme, the parent theme, and the sentiment for the parent theme; and

a memory coupled to the processor and configured to provide the processor with instructions.

2. The system of claim 1 wherein assigning the first sentiment for the identified theme includes assigning a sentiment for the determined at least one keyword.

3. The system of claim 1 wherein the combination comprises an aggregation.

4. The system of claim 1 wherein the at least one keyword determined included in the first review is a first keyword and wherein, for a third review that includes a second keyword that is associated with the identified theme and is included in the reputation data, the processor is configured to:

assign a third sentiment for the identified theme based at least in part on the third review'"'"'s accompanying rating, wherein the report includes a combination of the respective first, second, and third sentiments for the identified theme.

5. The system of claim 1 wherein the processor is further configured to detect whether the review data includes cloned reviews.

6. The system of claim 5 wherein the detection is based at least in part on a determination that the first review and a second review include an identical clause.

7. The system of claim 1 wherein determining the at least one keyword includes applying a blacklist filter.

8. The system of claim 1 wherein the processor is further configured to generate a report that indicates, for a given entity, a set of keywords present in a plurality of user-authored reviews.

9. The system of claim 1 wherein the processor is further configured to generate a report that indicates, for the entity, a comparison of a sentiment score for a given keyword compared against an industry average sentiment score for the keyword.

10. The system of claim 1 wherein the processor is further configured to generate a report that indicates, for the entity, a comparison of the entity'"'"'s score for a given keyword against a score of a competitor for the keyword.

11. The system of claim 1 wherein the processor is further configured to generate a report that indicates, for two locations associated with the entity, a comparison of the first location'"'"'s score for a given keyword against the second locations'"'"' score for the keyword.

12. The system of claim 1 wherein the processor is further configured to locate the determined at least one keyword within a hierarchy of keywords and to assign a sentiment to at least one parent of the keyword in the hierarchy based at least in part on the first review'"'"'s accompanying rating.

13. The system of claim 1 wherein the processor is further configured to perform positivity smoothing prior to generating a report.

14. The system of claim 1 wherein assigning a first sentiment includes assigning a sentiment score.

15. The system recited in claim 1, wherein assigning the sentiment includes assigning a value to the identified theme, the value corresponding at least in part to the first review'"'"'s accompanying rating.

16. A method, comprising:

receiving reputation data extracted from at least one data source, wherein the reputation data includes user-authored reviews pertaining to an entity and wherein a review comprises text and an accompanying rating;

for a first review included in the reputation data, identifying a theme in the first review that is associated with an aspect of the entity at least in part by determining, using a processor, at least one keyword using the first review'"'"'s text;

assigning a first sentiment for the identified theme at least in part by using the first review'"'"'s accompanying rating;

assigning a sentiment for a parent them of the identified theme at least in part by using the first review'"'"'s accompanying rating;

for a second review included in the reputation data that includes the determined at least one keyword and in which the theme is identified, assigning a second sentiment for the identified theme based at least in part on the second review'"'"'s accompanying rating; and

providing as output a report that includes the identified theme, a combination of the respective first and second sentiments for that identified theme, the parent theme, and the sentiment for the parent theme.

17. A computer program product embodied in a non-transitory tangible computer readable storage medium and comprising computer instructions for:

receiving reputation data extracted from at least one data source, wherein the reputation data includes user-authored reviews pertaining to an entity and wherein a review comprises text and an accompanying rating;

for a first review included in the reputation data, identifying a theme in the first review that is associated with an aspect of the entity at least in part by determining at least one keyword using the first review'"'"'s text;

assigning a first sentiment for the identified theme at least in part by using the first review'"'"'s accompanying rating;

assigning a sentiment for a parent theme of the identified theme at least in part by using the first review'"'"'s accompanying rating;

for a second review included in the reputation data that includes the determined at least one keyword and in which the theme is identified, assign a second sentiment for the identified theme based at least in part on the second review'"'"'s accompanying rating; and

providing as output a report that includes the identified theme, a combination of the respective first and second sentiments for that identified theme, the parent theme, and the sentiment for the parent theme.