Model variational consumer preferences based on online reviews using sentiment analysis and PSO-based DENFIS approaches

Abstract

Previous studies developed consumer preference models mainly through customer surveys, ignoring the variability of consumer preferences over time. In addition, it is difficult to obtain time series data based on the customer surveys. In recent years, some previous studies tried to analyse consumer preferences based on online reviews. However, they have not solved the problems of modelling variational consumer preference based on time series data with the consideration of the ambiguity of emotions expressed by customers in online reviews. To solve the above problems, this article proposes the particle swarm optimization (PSO) based dynamic evolving neural-fuzzy inference system (DENFIS) method to model variational consumer preferences based on online customer reviews. Using the time series data mined by the sentiment analysis method and the product attribute settings of the review products, the PSO-based DENFIS method is offered to dynamically model consumer preferences, in which PSO is used to adjust DENFIS parameters adaptively.