Older adults' comprehension of speech as interactive domestic alarm system output: A field study

Please contact the publisher for further reprinting or re-use.A rapidly ageing population has led to the development of Interactive Domestic Alarm Systems (IDASs) to assist older adults with independent living. This research considers the use of speech as IDAS output and the impact the domestic environment may have on older adults’ comprehension of speech outputs. This paper introduces IDASs, the benefits of employing speech as a mode of system output and the critical design issue of user comprehension. Extending previous laboratory studies (see Lines & Hone, 2002a, Lines & Hone, 2002b, Lines & Hone, 2002c) a field investigation is reported that considers older adults’ comprehension of speech gender and speech type [natural/synthetic] within the domestic environment. The main findings are discussed and future research directions explored

Convolutional Radio Modulation Recognition Networks

We study the adaptation of convolutional neural networks to the complex temporal radio signal domain. We compare the efficacy of radio modulation classification using naively learned features against using expert features which are widely used in the field today and we show significant performance improvements. We show that blind temporal learning on large and densely encoded time series using deep convolutional neural networks is viable and a strong candidate approach for this task especially at low signal to noise ratio

Aerospace Medicine and Biology: A continuing bibliography, supplement 191

A bibliographical list of 182 reports, articles, and other documents introduced into the NASA scientific and technical information system in February 1979 is presented

Comparing verbal media for alarm handling: Speech versus textual displays

The rise of computers in command and control domains has meant that control operations can be performed via desk-based visual display terminals. This trend has also produced the potential to display information to operators in a variety of formats. Of particular interest has been the use of text-based displays for alarm presentation. There are possible limitations to the use of text for alarm presentation, not least of which is the need for a dedicated alarms display screen (or, at least, a display page). Given the capability of computers to synthesize speech, it is possible that speech-based alarms could generate the same information as text-based displays without the need for dedicated screen space. In this paper an experimental comparison of speech-based and text-based displays for presentation of alarms is reported. The findings show that speech leads to longer response times than text displays, but that it has minimal effect on the efficacy of fault handling. The results are discussed within the alarm initiated activities framework and implications for alarm system design are outlined