Ensemble Classifiers for Arabic Sentiment Analysis of Social Network (Twitter Data) towards COVID-19-Related Conspiracy Theories

Sentiment analysis has recently become increasingly important with a massive increase in online content. It is associated with the analysis of textual data generated by social media that can be easily accessed, obtained, and analyzed. With the emergence of COVID-19, most published studies related to COVID-19’s conspiracy theories were surveys on the people's sentiments and opinions and studied the impact of the pandemic on their lives. Just a few studies utilized sentiment analysis of social media using a machine learning approach. These studies focused more on sentiment analysis of Twitter tweets in the English language and did not pay more attention to other languages such as Arabic. This study proposes a machine learning model to analyze the Arabic tweets from Twitter. In this model, we apply Word2Vec for word embedding which formed the main source of features. Two pretrained continuous bag-of-words (CBOW) models are investigated, and Naïve Bayes was used as a baseline classifier. Several single-based and ensemble-based machine learning classifiers have been used with and without SMOTE (synthetic minority oversampling technique). The experimental results show that applying word embedding with an ensemble and SMOTE achieved good improvement on average of F1 score compared to the baseline classifier and other classifiers (single-based and ensemble-based) without SMOTE.

Mental Health Prediction Using Machine Learning: Taxonomy, Applications, and Challenges

The increase of mental health problems and the need for effective medical health care have led to an investigation of machine learning that can be applied in mental health problems. This paper presents a recent systematic review of machine learning approaches in predicting mental health problems. Furthermore, we will discuss the challenges, limitations, and future directions for the application of machine learning in the mental health field. We collect research articles and studies that are related to the machine learning approaches in predicting mental health problems by searching reliable databases. Moreover, we adhere to the PRISMA methodology in conducting this systematic review. We include a total of 30 research articles in this review after the screening and identification processes. Then, we categorize the collected research articles based on the mental health problems such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, anxiety and depression, posttraumatic stress disorder, and mental health problems among children. Discussing the findings, we reflect on the challenges and limitations faced by the researchers on machine learning in mental health problems. Additionally, we provide concrete recommendations on the potential future research and development of applying machine learning in the mental health field.

Proposing Algorithm Using YOLOV4 and VGG-16 for Smart-Education

In this paper, we propose an algorithm to identify and solve systems of high-order equations. We rely on traditional solution methods to build algorithms to solve automated equations based on deep learning. The proposal method includes two main steps. In the first step, we use YOLOV4 (Kumar et al. 2020; Canu, 2020) to recognize equations and letters associated with the VGG-16 network (Simonyan and Zisserman, 2015) to classify them. We then used the SymPy model to solve the equations in the second step. Data are images of systems of equations that are typed and designed by ourselves or handwritten from other sources. Besides, we also built a web-based application that helps users select an image from their devices. The results show that the proposed algorithm is set out with 95% accuracy for smart-education applications.

Novel Metaheuristic Based on Iterated Constructive Stochastic Heuristic: Dhouib-Matrix-3 (DM3)

This paper presents a new metaheuristic named Dhouib-Matrix-3 (DM3) inspired by our recently developed constructive stochastic heuristic Dhouib-Matrix-TSP2 (DM-TSP2) and characterized by only one parameter: the number of iterations. The proposed metaheuristic DM3 is an iterative algorithm in which every iteration is based on two relay hybridization techniques. At first, the constructive stochastic heuristic DM-TSP2 starts by generating a different initial basic feasible solution and then each solution is intensified by the novel procedure Far-to-Near which exchanges far cities by closer ones using three perturbation techniques: insertion, exchange, and 2-opt. Experimental results carried out on the classical travelling salesman problem using the well-known TSP-LIB benchmark instances demonstrate that our approach DM3 outclasses the simulated annealing algorithm, the genetic algorithm, and the cellular genetic algorithm. Furthermore, the proposed DM3 is statistically concurrent to the hybrid simulated annealing cellular genetic algorithm. Nevertheless, DM3 is easier to implement and needs only one parameter to identify (the maximum number of iterations).

Multi-Attribute Decision-Support System Based on Aggregations of Interval-Valued Complex Neutrosophic Hypersoft Set

Hypersoft set is an emerging field of study that is meant to address the insufficiency and the limitation of existing soft-set-like models regarding the consideration and the entitlement of multi-argument approximate function. This type of function maps the multi-subparametric tuples to the power set of the universe. It focuses on the partitioning of each attribute into its attribute-valued set that is missing in existing soft-set-like structures. This study aims to introduce novel concepts of complex intuitionistic fuzzy set and complex neutrosophic set under the hypersoft set environment with interval-valued settings. Two novel structures, that is, interval-valued complex intuitionistic hypersoft set (IV-CIFHS-set) and interval-valued complex neutrosophic hypersoft set (IV-CNHS-set), are developed via employing theoretic, axiomatic, graphical, and algorithmic approaches. After conceptual characterization of essential elementary notions of these structures, decision-support systems are presented with the proposal of algorithms to assist the decision-making process. The proposed algorithms are validated with the help of real-world applications. A comprehensive inter-cum-intra comparison of proposed structures is discussed with the existing relevant models, and their generalization is elaborated under certain evaluating features.

Model Calibration and Validation for the Fuzzy-EGARCH-ANN Model

This work shown as the fuzzy-EGARCH-ANN (fuzzy-exponential generalized autoregressive conditional heteroscedastic-artificial neural network) model does not require continuous model calibration if the corresponding DE algorithm is used appropriately, but other models such as GARCH, EGARCH, and EGARCH-ANN need continuous model calibration and validation so they fit the data and reality very well up to the desired accuracy. Also, a robust analysis of volatility forecasting of the daily S&P 500 data collected from Yahoo Finance for the daily spanning period 1/3/2006 to 20/2/2020. To our knowledge, this is the first study that focuses on the daily S&P 500 data using high-frequency data and the fuzzy-EGARCH-ANN econometric model. Finally, the research finds that the best performing model in terms of one-step-ahead forecasts based on realized volatility computed from the underlying daily data series is the fuzzy-EGARCH-ANN (1,1,2,1) model with Student’s t-distribution.

A Generalized Method for Sentiment Analysis across Different Sources

Sentiment analysis is widely used in a variety of applications such as online opinion gathering for policy directives in government, monitoring of customers, and staff satisfactions in corporate bodies, in politics and security structures for public tension monitoring, and so on. In recent times, the field met with new set of challenges where new algorithms have to contend with highly unstructured sources for sentiment expressions emanating from online social media fora. In this study, a rule and lexical-based procedure is proposed together with unsupervised machine learning to implement sentiment analysis with an improved generalization ability across different sources. To deal with sources devoid of syntactic and grammatical structure, the approach incorporates a ruled-based technique for emoticon detection, word contraction expansion, noise removal, and lexicon-based text preprocessing using lexical features such as part of speech (POS), stop words, and lemmatization for local context analysis. A text is broken into number of tokens with each representing a sentence and then lexicon-dependent features are extracted from each token. The features are merged together using a combining function for a given text before being used to train a machine learning classifier. The proposed combining functions leverage on averaging and information gain concepts. Experimental results with different machine leaning classifiers indicate that improved performance with great deal of generalization capacity across both structured and nonstructured sources can be realized. The finding shows that carefully designed lexical features reinforce learning process in unsupervised learning more than using word embeddings alone as the features. Obtained experimental results from movie review dataset (recall = 74.9%, precision = 70.9%, F1-score = 72.9%, and accuracy = 72.0%) and twitter samples’ datasets (recall = 93.4%, precision = 89.5%, F1-score = 91.4%, and accuracy = 91.1%) show the efficacy of the proposed approach in comparison with other state-of-the-art research studies.

Comparative Study on Heart Disease Prediction Using Feature Selection Techniques on Classification Algorithms

Heart disease is recognized as one of the leading factors of death rate worldwide. Biomedical instruments and various systems in hospitals have massive quantities of clinical data. Therefore, understanding the data related to heart disease is very important to improve prediction accuracy. This article has conducted an experimental evaluation of the performance of models created using classification algorithms and relevant features selected using various feature selection approaches. For results of the exploratory analysis, ten feature selection techniques, i.e., ANOVA, Chi-square, mutual information, ReliefF, forward feature selection, backward feature selection, exhaustive feature selection, recursive feature elimination, Lasso regression, and Ridge regression, and six classification approaches, i.e., decision tree, random forest, support vector machine, K-nearest neighbor, logistic regression, and Gaussian naive Bayes, have been applied to Cleveland heart disease dataset. The feature subset selected by the backward feature selection technique has achieved the highest classification accuracy of 88.52%, precision of 91.30%, sensitivity of 80.76%, and f-measure of 85.71% with the decision tree classifier.

An Improved EDAS Method Based on Bipolar Neutrosophic Set and Its Application in Group Decision-Making

The bipolar neutrosophic set is a suitable instrument to tackle the information with vagueness, complexity, and uncertainty. In this study, we improved the original EDAS (the evaluation based on distance from average solution) with bipolar neutrosophic numbers (BNNs) for a multiple-criteria group decision-making (MCGDM) problem. We calculated the average solution under all the criteria by two existing aggregation operators of BNNs. Then, we computed the positive distance and the negative distance from each alternative to the average ideal solution and determined the appraisal score of alternatives. Based on these scores, we obtained the ranking result. Finally, we demonstrated the practicability, stability, and capability of the improved EDAS method by analyzing the influence parameters and comparing results with an extended VIKOR method.

Machine Learning Classification Techniques for Detecting the Impact of Human Resources Outcomes on Commercial Banks Performance

The banking industry is a market with great competition and dynamism where organizational performance becomes paramount. Different indicators can be used to measure organizational performance and sustain competitive advantage in a global marketplace. The execution of the performance indicators is usually achieved through human resources, which stand as the core element in sustaining the organization in the highly competitive marketplace. It becomes essential to effectively manage human resources strategically and align its strategies with organizational strategies. We adopted a survey research design using a quantitative approach, distributing a structured questionnaire to 305 respondents utilizing efficient sampling techniques. The prediction of bank performance is very crucial since bad performance can result in serious problems for the bank and society, such as bankruptcy and negative influence on the country’s economy. Most researchers in the past adopted traditional statistics to build prediction models; however, due to the efficiency of machine learning algorithms, a lot of researchers now apply various machine learning algorithms to various fields, including performance prediction systems. In this study, eight different machine learning algorithms were employed to build performance models to predict the prospective performance of commercial banks in Nigeria based on human resources outcomes (employee skills, attitude, and behavior) through the Python software tool with machine learning libraries and packages. The results of the analysis clearly show that human resources outcomes are crucial in achieving organizational performance, and the models built from the eight machine learning classifier algorithms in this study predict the bank performance as superior with the accuracies of 74–81%. The feature importance was computed with the package in Scikit-learn to show comparative importance or contribution of each feature in the prediction, and employee attitude is rated far more than other features. Nigeria’s bank industry should focus more on employee attitude so that the performance can be improved to outstanding class from the current superior class.