Toward Widely-Available and Usable Multimodal Conversational Interfaces
Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 2009.
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| Format: | Thesis |
| Language: | eng |
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Massachusetts Institute of Technology
2010
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| Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/53272 |
| _version_ | 1826211546498334720 |
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| author | Gruenstein, Alexander |
| author2 | Stephanie Seneff. |
| author_facet | Stephanie Seneff. Gruenstein, Alexander |
| author_sort | Gruenstein, Alexander |
| collection | MIT |
| description | Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 2009. |
| first_indexed | 2024-09-23T15:07:43Z |
| format | Thesis |
| id | mit-1721.1/53272 |
| institution | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| language | eng |
| last_indexed | 2024-09-23T15:07:43Z |
| publishDate | 2010 |
| publisher | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | mit-1721.1/532722019-04-12T09:27:17Z Toward Widely-Available and Usable Multimodal Conversational Interfaces Gruenstein, Alexander Stephanie Seneff. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 2009. Cataloged from PDF version of thesis. Includes bibliographical references (p. 159-166). Multimodal conversational interfaces, which allow humans to interact with a computer using a combination of spoken natural language and a graphical interface, offer the potential to transform the manner by which humans communicate with computers. While researchers have developed myriad such interfaces, none have made the transition out of the laboratory and into the hands of a significant number of users. This thesis makes progress toward overcoming two intertwined barriers preventing more widespread adoption: availability and usability. Toward addressing the problem of availability, this thesis introduces a new platform for building multimodal interfaces that makes it easy to deploy them to users via the World Wide Web. One consequence of this work is City Browser, the first multimodal conversational interface made publicly available to anyone with a web browser and a microphone. City Browser serves as a proof-of-concept that significant amounts of usage data can be collected in this way, allowing a glimpse of how users interact with such interfaces outside of a laboratory environment. City Browser, in turn, has served as the primary platform for deploying and evaluating three new strategies aimed at improving usability. The most pressing usability challenge for conversational interfaces is their limited ability to accurately transcribe and understand spoken natural language. The three strategies developed in this thesis - context-sensitive language modeling, response confidence scoring, and user behavior shaping - each attack the problem from a different angle, but they are linked in that each critically integrates information from the conversational context. by Alexander Gruenstein. Ph.D. 2010-03-25T15:24:03Z 2010-03-25T15:24:03Z 2009 2009 Thesis http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/53272 547193270 eng M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission. http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582 166 p. application/pdf Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
| spellingShingle | Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. Gruenstein, Alexander Toward Widely-Available and Usable Multimodal Conversational Interfaces |
| title | Toward Widely-Available and Usable Multimodal Conversational Interfaces |
| title_full | Toward Widely-Available and Usable Multimodal Conversational Interfaces |
| title_fullStr | Toward Widely-Available and Usable Multimodal Conversational Interfaces |
| title_full_unstemmed | Toward Widely-Available and Usable Multimodal Conversational Interfaces |
| title_short | Toward Widely-Available and Usable Multimodal Conversational Interfaces |
| title_sort | toward widely available and usable multimodal conversational interfaces |
| topic | Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. |
| url | http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/53272 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT gruensteinalexander towardwidelyavailableandusablemultimodalconversationalinterfaces |