Scientific reference style using rule-based machine learning

Abstract

Regular Expressions (RegEx) can be employed as a technique for supervised learning to define and search for specific patterns inside text. This work devised a method that utilizes regular expressions to convert the reference style of academic papers into several styles, dependent on the specific needs of the target publication or conference. Our research aimed to detect distinctive patterns of reference styles using RegEx and compare them with a dataset including various reference styles. We gathered a diverse range of reference format categories, encompassing seven distinct classes, from various sources such as academic papers, journals, conference proceedings, and books. Our approach involves employing RegEx to convert one referencing format to another based on the user's specific preferences. The proposed model demonstrated an accuracy of 57.26% for book references and 57.56% for journal references. We used the similarity ratio and Levenshtein distance to evaluate the dataset's performance. The model achieved a 97.8% similarity ratio with a Levenshtein distance of 2. Notably, the APA style for journal references yielded the best results. However, the effectiveness of the extraction function varies depending on the reference style. For APA style, the model showed a 99.97% similarity ratio with a Levenshtein distance of 1. Overall, our proposed model outperforms baseline machine learning models in this task. This study introduces an automated program that utilizes regular expressions to modify academic reference formats. This will enhance the efficiency, precision, and adaptability of academic publishing.