The University of Sheffield
Department of Human Communication Sciences

Jobs and Studentships

PhD Scholarship - PIPIN Network - Interaction with PALS - Personal Adaptive Listening Systems

The University of Sheffield is funding an interdisciplinary scholarships network which is concerned with how 21st century computing can be harnessed to improve the lives of older and disabled people.

Three studentships are available spanning health research, engineering, computer science and sociology, with significant opportunities for cross discipline working.

The following core themes will underpin network activities:

A network of three PhD scholarships is being funded for 3 years, providing each student with a stipend at the standard Research Council rate (£13,590 in 2011-12), UK/EU fees and a research training grant of £1,000 p.a.

Project 2: Interaction with PALS - Personal Adaptive Listening Systems

Project 2 Supervisors

PIPIN is closely associated with a major EPSRC programme grant in Natural Speech Technology (NST, www.natural-speech-technology.org/), in which we collaborate with the Universities of Edinburgh and Cambridge. Within NST Sheffield leads the homeService project, which will build the first generation of Personal Adaptive Listeners (PALs). A PAL is a portable, perhaps wearable, device that belongs to an individual and adapts to the speech communication characteristics and preferences of its owner. Like human listeners, it does this whilst in use, does it quickly and extends its utility over time. A PAL is somewhat akin to a human valet: it understands the owner´s needs, carries out their wishes and sometimes acts on their behalf. The technology adapts to its user, rather than the other way round. In homeService we are trying to help people who have difficulties in using conventional interfaces: because they are disabled, or have speech disorders, or simply dislike computers, keyboards and screens. For these clients, the PAL will provide control of assistive technology and connection to the digital world (shopping, banking, booking..) by voice. The relationship between owner and PAL should develop over a long period, and homeService is based around a 3-year longitudinal study, During this time the PAL will improve its accuracy and its range of capabilities as it learns more about its owner´s voice and use of language.

This studentship will focus on the dialogues between a PAL and its owner. These dialogues may be spoken: the PAL will have a personalised voice generated by new speech synthesis techniques being developed within NST (Edinburgh lead this theme). Initially the dialogues will be simple and formulaic, restricted to issuing and confirming commands and perhaps correcting errors. As the PAL expands its capabilities, the dialogues should become richer and their content and style should adapt to the owner´s preferences, just as having a conversation with someone you know well is quite different from communicating with a stranger.

Spoken dialogue systems have been researched for some time but the idea of personalising them is new. Anyone who has used telephone-based systems which deploy speech technology (for instance to book cinema tickets) will appreciate how unnatural and tedious current dialogue systems can be. Speaking with a PAL has several interesting aspects: the growth in the interaction with time, the opportunities for personalisation and, perhaps most importantly, the idea that the owner should be able to explicitly teach the PAL : `these are the names of my friends, this is what I´ll say when you´ve made a mistake..´ The owner-PAL relationship we are trying to establish through dialogue is somewhat akin to training a dog, or teaching a young child, making this project a challenge for linguists interested in Human Speech Communication as well as researchers in speech technology.

The successful candidate must be able to work across the traditional boundaries between speech science and speech technology: the PALs project offers challenges in Phonetics, Linguistics and Computer Science. We are seeking to recruit someone with a background in one of these fields and some knowledge of the others. It will also involve working with homeService clients, and user-facing skills are therefore important.

How to Apply

Applicants are advised to contact the project supervisors as above to discuss their application in the first instance.

Applicants should then apply for admission to the University online via the University website (http://www.shef.ac.uk/postgraduate/online.html) and then complete a short form specific to this network which is available at:
www.shef.ac.uk/postgraduate/research/scholarships/pipinapplication

Applicants may also be asked to attend an interview to assess their suitability for the project.

Closing date: Friday 24th June, 2011