When Language Evolution Meets Multimodality: Current Status and Challenges Toward Multimodal Computational Models

Computational models can be considered human-designed computing models inspired by the processes observed in the natural world, which allow simulating and understanding these processes. Computational modelling is notably applied to simulate the behaviour and long-term dynamics of human Language. The research effort made so far in computational modelling of language evolution considers predominantly one modality by arguing for a unimodal origin of Language. This article extends this paradigm to a new perspective that integrates into its structure and learning algorithms principles from multimodal communication. This article gives an overview of the current language evolution models. It discusses the key challenges towards multimodal language evolution modelling by envisioning a conceptual framework to design the multimodal grounding and the language learning processes, as well as their realisation through a multi-agent multimodal referential game. This framework is valuable for many researchers working on language evolution to reveal the key questions they should address and integrate for pursuing a holistic vision that combines all modalities in a multimodal language evolution model

Pan European Voice Conference - PEVOC 11

The Pan European VOice Conference (PEVOC) was born in 1995 and therefore in 2015 it celebrates the 20th anniversary of its establishment: an important milestone that clearly expresses the strength and interest of the scientific community for the topics of this conference. The most significant themes of PEVOC are singing pedagogy and art, but also occupational voice disorders, neurology, rehabilitation, image and video analysis. PEVOC takes place in different European cities every two years (www.pevoc.org). The PEVOC 11 conference includes a symposium of the Collegium Medicorum Theatri (www.comet collegium.com

Speech Production as State Feedback Control

Spoken language exists because of a remarkable neural process. Inside a speaker's brain, an intended message gives rise to neural signals activating the muscles of the vocal tract. The process is remarkable because these muscles are activated in just the right way that the vocal tract produces sounds a listener understands as the intended message. What is the best approach to understanding the neural substrate of this crucial motor control process? One of the key recent modeling developments in neuroscience has been the use of state feedback control (SFC) theory to explain the role of the CNS in motor control. SFC postulates that the CNS controls motor output by (1) estimating the current dynamic state of the thing (e.g., arm) being controlled, and (2) generating controls based on this estimated state. SFC has successfully predicted a great range of non-speech motor phenomena, but as yet has not received attention in the speech motor control community. Here, we review some of the key characteristics of speech motor control and what they say about the role of the CNS in the process. We then discuss prior efforts to model the role of CNS in speech motor control, and argue that these models have inherent limitations – limitations that are overcome by an SFC model of speech motor control which we describe. We conclude by discussing a plausible neural substrate of our model

Evolutionary and Cognitive Approaches to Voice Perception in Humans: Acoustic Properties, Personality and Aesthetics

Voices are used as a vehicle for language, and variation in the acoustic properties of voices also contains information about the speaker. Listeners use measurable qualities, such as pitch and formant traits, as cues to a speaker’s physical stature and attractiveness. Emotional states and personality characteristics are also judged from vocal stimuli. The research contained in this thesis examines vocal masculinity, aesthetics and personality, with an emphasis on the perception of prosocial traits including trustworthiness and cooperativeness. I will also explore themes which are more cognitive in nature, testing aspects of vocal stimuli which may affect trait attribution, memory and the ascription of identity. Chapters 2 and 3 explore systematic differences across vocal utterances, both in types of utterance using different classes of stimuli and across the time course of perception of the auditory signal. These chapters examine variation in acoustic measurements in addition to variation in listener attributions of commonly-judged speaker traits. The most important result from this work was that evaluations of attractiveness made using spontaneous speech correlated with those made using scripted speech recordings, but did not correlate with those made of the same persons using vowel stimuli. This calls into question the use of sustained vowel sounds for the attainment of ratings of subjective characteristics. Vowel and single-word stimuli are also quite short – while I found that attributions of masculinity were reliable at very short exposure times, more subjective traits like attractiveness and trustworthiness require a longer exposure time to elicit reliable attributions. I conclude with recommending an exposure time of at least 5 seconds in duration for such traits to be reliably assessed. Chapter 4 examines what vocal traits affect perceptions of pro-social qualities using both natural and manipulated variation in voices. While feminine pitch traits (F0 and F0-SD) were linked to cooperativeness ratings, masculine formant traits (Df and Pf) were also associated with cooperativeness. The relative importance of these traits as social signals is discussed. Chapter 5 questions what makes a voice memorable, and helps to differentiate between memory for individual voice identities and for the content which was spoken by administering recognition tests both within and across sensory modalities. While the data suggest that experimental manipulation of voice pitch did not influence memory for vocalised stimuli, attractive male voices were better remembered than unattractive voices, independent of pitch manipulation. Memory for cross-modal (textual) content was enhanced by raising the voice pitch of both male and female speakers. I link this pattern of results to the perceived dominance of voices which have been raised and lowered in pitch, and how this might impact how memories are formed and retained. Chapter 6 examines masculinity across visual and auditory sensory modalities using a cross-modal matching task. While participants were able to match voices to muted videos of both male and female speakers at rates above chance, and to static face images of men (but not women), differences in masculinity did not influence observers in their judgements, and voice and face masculinity were not correlated. These results are discussed in terms of the generally-accepted theory that masculinity and femininity in faces and voices communicate the same underlying genetic quality. The biological mechanisms by which vocal and facial masculinity could develop independently are speculated

Classification of pig calls produced from birth to slaughter according to their emotional valence and context of production

Vocal expression of emotions has been observed across species and could provide a non-invasive and reliable means to assess animal emotions. We investigated if pig vocal indicators of emotions revealed in previous studies are valid across call types and contexts, and could potentially be used to develop an automated emotion monitoring tool. We performed an analysis of an extensive and unique dataset of low (LF) and high frequency (HF) calls emitted by pigs across numerous commercial contexts from birth to slaughter (7414 calls from 411 pigs). Our results revealed that the valence attributed to the contexts of production (positive versus negative) affected all investigated parameters in both LF and HF. Similarly, the context category affected all parameters. We then tested two different automated methods for call classification; a neural network revealed much higher classification accuracy compared to a permuted discriminant function analysis (pDFA), both for the valence (neural network: 91.5%; pDFA analysis weighted average across LF and HF (cross-classified): 61.7% with a chance level at 50.5%) and context (neural network: 81.5%; pDFA analysis weighted average across LF and HF (cross-classified): 19.4% with a chance level at 14.3%). These results suggest that an automated recognition system can be developed to monitor pig welfare on-farm.publishedVersio

Early and Late Stage Mechanisms for Vocalization Processing in the Human Auditory System

The human auditory system is able to rapidly process incoming acoustic information, actively filtering, categorizing, or suppressing different elements of the incoming acoustic stream. Vocalizations produced by other humans (conspecifics) likely represent the most ethologically-relevant sounds encountered by hearing individuals. Subtle acoustic characteristics of these vocalizations aid in determining the identity, emotional state, health, intent, etc. of the producer. The ability to assess vocalizations is likely subserved by a specialized network of structures and functional connections that are optimized for this stimulus class. Early elements of this network would show sensitivity to the most basic acoustic features of these sounds; later elements may show categorically-selective response patterns that represent high-level semantic organization of different classes of vocalizations. A combination of functional magnetic resonance imaging and electrophysiological studies were performed to investigate and describe some of the earlier and later stage mechanisms of conspecific vocalization processing in human auditory cortices. Using fMRI, cortical representations of harmonic signal content were found along the middle superior temporal gyri between primary auditory cortices along Heschl\u27s gyri and the superior temporal sulci, higher-order auditory regions. Additionally, electrophysiological findings also demonstrated a parametric response profile to harmonic signal content. Utilizing a novel class of vocalizations, human-mimicked versions of animal vocalizations, we demonstrated the presence of a left-lateralized cortical vocalization processing hierarchy to conspecific vocalizations, contrary to previous findings describing similar bilateral networks. This hierarchy originated near primary auditory cortices and was further supported by auditory evoked potential data that suggests differential temporal processing dynamics of conspecific human vocalizations versus those produced by other species. Taken together, these results suggest that there are auditory cortical networks that are highly optimized for processing utterances produced by the human vocal tract. Understanding the function and structure of these networks will be critical for advancing the development of novel communicative therapies and the design of future assistive hearing devices

Models and Analysis of Vocal Emissions for Biomedical Applications

The International Workshop on Models and Analysis of Vocal Emissions for Biomedical Applications (MAVEBA) came into being in 1999 from the particularly felt need of sharing know-how, objectives and results between areas that until then seemed quite distinct such as bioengineering, medicine and singing. MAVEBA deals with all aspects concerning the study of the human voice with applications ranging from the newborn to the adult and elderly. Over the years the initial issues have grown and spread also in other fields of research such as occupational voice disorders, neurology, rehabilitation, image and video analysis. MAVEBA takes place every two years in Firenze, Italy. This edition celebrates twenty-two years of uninterrupted and successful research in the field of voice analysis

A Biopsychological Foundation for Linguistics

In this dissertation, I defend the view that natural languages are concrete biopsychological phenomena to be studied empirically. In Section One, I begin with an historical explanation. Some analytic philosophers, I argue, misapply formal logic as an analysis of natural language, when it was in fact originally developed as an alternative to natural language, employed for scientific purposes. Abstract, quasi-mathematical philosophies of language, I argue, are partially a result of this misunderstanding. I respond to Jerrold Katz’ argument that a proper understanding of analytic truth requires this quasi-mathematical philosophy of language through a model-theoretical analysis of analytic truth in modal and intuitionist logics. In Section Two, I offer a positive argument for a biopsychological philosophy of language. While Chomsky and others have emphasized the metaphysical basis of natural languages in psychological representations, I further contribute to understanding by emphasizing the basis of natural language in psychological representations of relevant properties of a specifically constrained biological implementation base. I defend this ontological perspective through a thorough engagement with the subfield of linguistic phonology and its important relations to physiological articulation and perception, along with an analysis of crucial interface relations among phonology, morphology and syntax. In the final section, I engage with the objections to this biopsychological philosophy of language stemming from concerns related to linguistic normativity and communication. If natural language is based metaphysically in the biopsychological representations of individuals, there are apparent paradoxes in the notion of public rules for language use, and in the notion of shared content for the purpose of communication. Drawing on David Forrest Wallace’s pragmatic conception of linguistic prescription, together with analogies from anti-realist metaethical systems, I defend the intelligibility of public linguistics norms without the need for abstract ontological commitment. Drawing on Ray Jackendoff’s internalist semantic and metasemantic analysese, together with Burtrand Russell’s analogy argument on other minds, I also defend intelligibility of linguistic communication equally without need for abstract ontological commitment

Origins of Human Language

This book proposes a detailed picture of the continuities and ruptures between communication in primates and language in humans. It explores a diversity of perspectives on the origins of language, including a fine description of vocal communication in animals, mainly in monkeys and apes, but also in birds, the study of vocal tract anatomy and cortical control of the vocal productions in monkeys and apes, the description of combinatory structures and their social and communicative value, and the exploration of the cognitive environment in which language may have emerged from nonhuman primate vocal or gestural communication