Article
Article
Natural language processing
Article By:
Mata-Toledo, Ramon A. Department of Computer Science, Rollins College, Winter Park, Florida.
Last reviewed:January 2020
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1036/1097-8542.444850
The term natural language processing (NLP) can be subdivided into two terms: natural language, and the processing of this language. The term “natural language” refers to any language spoken by humans, such as English, Spanish, or French. The “processing” part of NLP refers to a computer system that, after accepting as input sentences articulated in a natural language, analyzes the sentences, usually within a context, and shows “understanding” of these sentences by performing some action. The actions performed by the computer may be as simple as producing a report or as complex as providing a medical diagnosis, maintaining a dialog with a user, or answering questions of diverse nature.
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