16,185 research outputs found

    Audio-Visual Automatic Speech Recognition Towards Education for Disabilities

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    Education is a fundamental right that enriches everyone’s life. However, physically challenged people often debar from the general and advanced education system. Audio-Visual Automatic Speech Recognition (AV-ASR) based system is useful to improve the education of physically challenged people by providing hands-free computing. They can communicate to the learning system through AV-ASR. However, it is challenging to trace the lip correctly for visual modality. Thus, this paper addresses the appearance-based visual feature along with the co-occurrence statistical measure for visual speech recognition. Local Binary Pattern-Three Orthogonal Planes (LBP-TOP) and Grey-Level Co-occurrence Matrix (GLCM) is proposed for visual speech information. The experimental results show that the proposed system achieves 76.60 % accuracy for visual speech and 96.00 % accuracy for audio speech recognition

    Validity of the Emotional Attachment Zones Evaluation (EA-Z): Assessing Attachment Style Across a Developmental Spectrum

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    Sensitive, consistent caregiving and a secure attachment style are important to healthy child development. However, the lack of continuity in measures from infancy into adulthood limits conclusions regarding the stability of attachment styles across the lifespan. A new measure, the Emotional Attachment Zones Evaluation (EA-Z), derived from the Emotional Availability Scales (Biringen, 2008; Biringen, Robinson, & Emde, 1998), offers a tool to assess attachment style across a broad developmental spectrum. In order to validate this measure as an attachment style measure, we used three studies to compare the EA-Z to empirically validated attachment tools. In study 1, we compared the EA-Z to the Strange Situation Procedure. There was moderate concordance between these two measures for both mother and infant. In study 2, we compared the EA-Z to the Attachment Q-Sort in an infant/toddler childcare setting. Child EA-Z scores related to child attachment security, whereas teacher EA-Z scores did not relate to child attachment security. Finally, in study 3, we compared the EA-Z to the mother’s Adult Attachment Interview. Results indicated moderate concordance between these measures, both for the adult mother and the preschool child. All three of these studies offer promising evidence for the validity of the EA-Z as an attachment tool, as well as future directions for research and practice using the EA System

    Interpolating Discriminant Functions in High-Dimensional Gaussian Latent Mixtures

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    This paper considers binary classification of high-dimensional features under a postulated model with a low-dimensional latent Gaussian mixture structure and non-vanishing noise. A generalized least squares estimator is used to estimate the direction of the optimal separating hyperplane. The estimated hyperplane is shown to interpolate on the training data. While the direction vector can be consistently estimated as could be expected from recent results in linear regression, a naive plug-in estimate fails to consistently estimate the intercept. A simple correction, that requires an independent hold-out sample, renders the procedure minimax optimal in many scenarios. The interpolation property of the latter procedure can be retained, but surprisingly depends on the way the labels are encoded

    Airportscape and its Effect on Airport Sense of Place and Destination Image Perception

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    Purpose – This study aims to validate a conceptual definition of airportscape and develop a multidimensional scale that integrates servicescape and service quality dimensions in order to comprehensively investigate airport service management. In addition, the study examines the structural relationships amongst airportscape, sense of place, airport image and destination image. Design/methodology/approach – Covariance-based structural equation modelling has been employed. This study has collected the responses from 1,189 Thai respondents who had their experience in an international airport in the past 12 months. Findings – Key findings reveal the set of three airportscape attributes which positively influenced the air traveller’s perceived sense of place. Four other dimensions were found to positively influence the airport image. The results also suggested the positive relationships amongst sense of place, airport image and destination image. Sense of place strongly predicted the destination image and airport image, and was found to be an important mediator of the relationship between airportscape dimension and perceived image variables Originality/value – The study validates the airportscape scale and introduces “sense of place”, a concept that has not been objectively investigated in the airport context, and in relation to tourism. The findings provide insights to airport managers and tourism authorities by examining areas that highlight an airport’s sense of place and representation of the destination. The study also strengthens the theoretical link between airport and tourism knowledge, by showing that the airport’s sense of place can strongly influence airport image and destination image. The result ascertains that the airport can be a representative of a destination through the creation of a sense of place

    Learning disentangled speech representations

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    A variety of informational factors are contained within the speech signal and a single short recording of speech reveals much more than the spoken words. The best method to extract and represent informational factors from the speech signal ultimately depends on which informational factors are desired and how they will be used. In addition, sometimes methods will capture more than one informational factor at the same time such as speaker identity, spoken content, and speaker prosody. The goal of this dissertation is to explore different ways to deconstruct the speech signal into abstract representations that can be learned and later reused in various speech technology tasks. This task of deconstructing, also known as disentanglement, is a form of distributed representation learning. As a general approach to disentanglement, there are some guiding principles that elaborate what a learned representation should contain as well as how it should function. In particular, learned representations should contain all of the requisite information in a more compact manner, be interpretable, remove nuisance factors of irrelevant information, be useful in downstream tasks, and independent of the task at hand. The learned representations should also be able to answer counter-factual questions. In some cases, learned speech representations can be re-assembled in different ways according to the requirements of downstream applications. For example, in a voice conversion task, the speech content is retained while the speaker identity is changed. And in a content-privacy task, some targeted content may be concealed without affecting how surrounding words sound. While there is no single-best method to disentangle all types of factors, some end-to-end approaches demonstrate a promising degree of generalization to diverse speech tasks. This thesis explores a variety of use-cases for disentangled representations including phone recognition, speaker diarization, linguistic code-switching, voice conversion, and content-based privacy masking. Speech representations can also be utilised for automatically assessing the quality and authenticity of speech, such as automatic MOS ratings or detecting deep fakes. The meaning of the term "disentanglement" is not well defined in previous work, and it has acquired several meanings depending on the domain (e.g. image vs. speech). Sometimes the term "disentanglement" is used interchangeably with the term "factorization". This thesis proposes that disentanglement of speech is distinct, and offers a viewpoint of disentanglement that can be considered both theoretically and practically

    Designing Caring and Informative Decision Aids to Increase Trust and Enhance the Interaction Atmosphere

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    Decision aids have enjoyed extensive use in various domains. While decision aid research and practice have largely focused on making these aids more functional and utilitarian, we propose that one should also purposefully design them as effective interaction partners, especially when one deploys them in contexts that require a “human touch”, such as finance or healthcare. In this paper, we report on the results from an experiment we conducted on the effects that designing caring and informative decision aids have on how users evaluate them and, subsequently, their satisfaction with them. Our results show that using explanations and expressive speech acts can enhance the extent to which users perceive decision aids as informative and caring. These strengthened beliefs subsequently enhance the extent to which users view decision aids as competent and as having integrity and improve the interaction atmosphere, which, in turn, increases users’ satisfaction with their overall interaction with the decision aid. We discuss the study’s contributions to theory and practice

    Internal audit value-added a link between knowledge management and service quality

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    Dissertation presented as the partial requirement for obtaining a Master's degree in Information Management, specialization in Knowledge Management and Business IntelligenceThe purpose of internal audit (IA) is to add value and improve an organization's operation by supporting management and the Board to execute their functions. Given the importance of IA and knowledge management, our study explores this relationship. We applied a service quality measurement instrument (SERVPERF) to assess IAÂŽs knowledge creation and determine if the knowledge created and transferred by IA influences its value-added, considering the influence of cultural aspects on this relationship. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first empirical research that applies the service quality dimensions (responsiveness; assurance; tangibles; empathy; reliability) to assess the value-added of IA, relating it with the knowledge management phases of knowledge creation and transfer. We used a quantitative approach and surveyed 126 users who had already interacted with the IA team. We applied SEM-PLS to analyse our theoretical model's relationships. Our results show that empathy and tangibles are important dimensions influencing knowledge creation. We confirmed that IA teams add value when they create and transfer knowledge to the organization, facilitated in a cultural context of low uncertainty avoidance

    Sexual violence as a form of social control : the role of hostile and benevolent sexism

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    This thesis examines the feminist hypothesis that rape functions as a tool of social control through which women are kept in subordinate social positions (Brownmiller, 1975). In examining this hypothesis, the current thesis explores the role of benevolent and hostile sexism in accounting for people's responses to different types of rape (i.e. stranger vs. acquaintance rape). An examination of the literature suggests that there are general societal beliefs in the distinction between "good" and "bad" rape victims (Pollard, 1992). Interestingly, researchers have observed that benevolent sexism (BS) is related to the idealisation of women in traditional gender roles (i.e. "good" women; Glick et aI., 2000). It is, therefore, argued that individuals who idealise women in traditional roles (i.e. high BS individuals) are more likely to negatively evaluate rape victims who can be perceived as violating these norms. Nine empirical studies are presented in this thesis. Study 1 examines the potential role of BS in accounting for previously observed differences in the amount of blame attributed to stranger and acquaintance rape victims (e.g. Pollard, 1992). Studies 2 and 3 examine the psychological mechanisms that underlie the relationship between BS and victim blame in acquaintance rape situations. Studies 2 and 4 also explore the psychological mechanisms that underlie the relationship between hostile sexism (HS) and self reported rape proclivity in acquaintance rape situations (c.f. Viki, 2000). In Study 5, the relationship between BS and paternalistic chivalry (attitudes that are simultaneously courteous and restrictive to women) is examined. Studies 6 and 7 examine the role of BS in accounting for participants' responses to stranger vs. acquaintance rape perpetrators. The last two studies (Studies 8 and 9) examine the potential role of legal verdicts in moderating the relationship between BS and victim blame in acquaintance rape cases. Taken together, the results support the argument that BS provides a psychological mechanism through which differences in the amount of blame attributed to stranger and acquaintance rape victims can be explained. In contrast, HS provides a mechanism for explaining differences in self-reported proclivity to commit stranger and acquaintance rape. The thesis concludes with a summary of the findings, a discussion of the methodological limitations of the studies and suggestions of directions for future research

    Investigating and mitigating the role of neutralisation techniques on information security policies violation in healthcare organisations

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    Healthcare organisations today rely heavily on Electronic Medical Records systems (EMRs), which have become highly crucial IT assets that require significant security efforts to safeguard patients’ information. Individuals who have legitimate access to an organisation’s assets to perform their day-to-day duties but intentionally or unintentionally violate information security policies can jeopardise their organisation’s information security efforts and cause significant legal and financial losses. In the information security (InfoSec) literature, several studies emphasised the necessity to understand why employees behave in ways that contradict information security requirements but have offered widely different solutions. In an effort to respond to this situation, this thesis addressed the gap in the information security academic research by providing a deep understanding of the problem of medical practitioners’ behavioural justifications to violate information security policies and then determining proper solutions to reduce this undesirable behaviour. Neutralisation theory was used as the theoretical basis for the research. This thesis adopted a mixed-method research approach that comprises four consecutive phases, and each phase represents a research study that was conducted in light of the results from the preceding phase. The first phase of the thesis started by investigating the relationship between medical practitioners’ neutralisation techniques and their intention to violate information security policies that protect a patient’s privacy. A quantitative study was conducted to extend the work of Siponen and Vance [1] through a study of the Saudi Arabia healthcare industry. The data was collected via an online questionnaire from 66 Medical Interns (MIs) working in four academic hospitals. The study found that six neutralisation techniques—(1) appeal to higher loyalties, (2) defence of necessity, (3) the metaphor of ledger, (4) denial of responsibility, (5) denial of injury, and (6) condemnation of condemners—significantly contribute to the justifications of the MIs in hypothetically violating information security policies. The second phase of this research used a series of semi-structured interviews with IT security professionals in one of the largest academic hospitals in Saudi Arabia to explore the environmental factors that motivated the medical practitioners to evoke various neutralisation techniques. The results revealed that social, organisational, and emotional factors all stimulated the behavioural justifications to breach information security policies. During these interviews, it became clear that the IT department needed to ensure that security policies fit the daily tasks of the medical practitioners by providing alternative solutions to ensure the effectiveness of those policies. Based on these interviews, the objective of the following two phases was to improve the effectiveness of InfoSec policies against the use of behavioural justification by engaging the end users in the modification of existing policies via a collaborative writing process. Those two phases were conducted in the UK and Saudi Arabia to determine whether the collaborative writing process could produce a more effective security policy that balanced the security requirements with daily business needs, thus leading to a reduction in the use of neutralisation techniques to violate security policies. The overall result confirmed that the involvement of the end users via a collaborative writing process positively improved the effectiveness of the security policy to mitigate the individual behavioural justifications, showing that the process is a promising one to enhance security compliance
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