1,723 research outputs found
Transfer Learning for Speech and Language Processing
Transfer learning is a vital technique that generalizes models trained for
one setting or task to other settings or tasks. For example in speech
recognition, an acoustic model trained for one language can be used to
recognize speech in another language, with little or no re-training data.
Transfer learning is closely related to multi-task learning (cross-lingual vs.
multilingual), and is traditionally studied in the name of `model adaptation'.
Recent advance in deep learning shows that transfer learning becomes much
easier and more effective with high-level abstract features learned by deep
models, and the `transfer' can be conducted not only between data distributions
and data types, but also between model structures (e.g., shallow nets and deep
nets) or even model types (e.g., Bayesian models and neural models). This
review paper summarizes some recent prominent research towards this direction,
particularly for speech and language processing. We also report some results
from our group and highlight the potential of this very interesting research
field.Comment: 13 pages, APSIPA 201
One Model to Rule them all: Multitask and Multilingual Modelling for Lexical Analysis
When learning a new skill, you take advantage of your preexisting skills and
knowledge. For instance, if you are a skilled violinist, you will likely have
an easier time learning to play cello. Similarly, when learning a new language
you take advantage of the languages you already speak. For instance, if your
native language is Norwegian and you decide to learn Dutch, the lexical overlap
between these two languages will likely benefit your rate of language
acquisition. This thesis deals with the intersection of learning multiple tasks
and learning multiple languages in the context of Natural Language Processing
(NLP), which can be defined as the study of computational processing of human
language. Although these two types of learning may seem different on the
surface, we will see that they share many similarities.
The traditional approach in NLP is to consider a single task for a single
language at a time. However, recent advances allow for broadening this
approach, by considering data for multiple tasks and languages simultaneously.
This is an important approach to explore further as the key to improving the
reliability of NLP, especially for low-resource languages, is to take advantage
of all relevant data whenever possible. In doing so, the hope is that in the
long term, low-resource languages can benefit from the advances made in NLP
which are currently to a large extent reserved for high-resource languages.
This, in turn, may then have positive consequences for, e.g., language
preservation, as speakers of minority languages will have a lower degree of
pressure to using high-resource languages. In the short term, answering the
specific research questions posed should be of use to NLP researchers working
towards the same goal.Comment: PhD thesis, University of Groninge
SkillNet-X: A Multilingual Multitask Model with Sparsely Activated Skills
Traditional multitask learning methods basically can only exploit common
knowledge in task- or language-wise, which lose either cross-language or
cross-task knowledge. This paper proposes a general multilingual multitask
model, named SkillNet-X, which enables a single model to tackle many different
tasks from different languages. To this end, we define several
language-specific skills and task-specific skills, each of which corresponds to
a skill module. SkillNet-X sparsely activates parts of the skill modules which
are relevant either to the target task or the target language. Acting as
knowledge transit hubs, skill modules are capable of absorbing task-related
knowledge and language-related knowledge consecutively. Based on Transformer,
we modify the multi-head attention layer and the feed forward network layer to
accommodate skill modules. We evaluate SkillNet-X on eleven natural language
understanding datasets in four languages. Results show that SkillNet-X performs
better than task-specific baselines and two multitask learning baselines (i.e.,
dense joint model and Mixture-of-Experts model). Furthermore, skill
pre-training further improves the performance of SkillNet-X on almost all
datasets. To investigate the generalization of our model, we conduct
experiments on two new tasks and find that SkillNet-X significantly outperforms
baselines
Personalized Acoustic Modeling by Weakly Supervised Multi-Task Deep Learning using Acoustic Tokens Discovered from Unlabeled Data
It is well known that recognizers personalized to each user are much more
effective than user-independent recognizers. With the popularity of smartphones
today, although it is not difficult to collect a large set of audio data for
each user, it is difficult to transcribe it. However, it is now possible to
automatically discover acoustic tokens from unlabeled personal data in an
unsupervised way. We therefore propose a multi-task deep learning framework
called a phoneme-token deep neural network (PTDNN), jointly trained from
unsupervised acoustic tokens discovered from unlabeled data and very limited
transcribed data for personalized acoustic modeling. We term this scenario
"weakly supervised". The underlying intuition is that the high degree of
similarity between the HMM states of acoustic token models and phoneme models
may help them learn from each other in this multi-task learning framework.
Initial experiments performed over a personalized audio data set recorded from
Facebook posts demonstrated that very good improvements can be achieved in both
frame accuracy and word accuracy over popularly-considered baselines such as
fDLR, speaker code and lightly supervised adaptation. This approach complements
existing speaker adaptation approaches and can be used jointly with such
techniques to yield improved results.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figures, published in IEEE ICASSP 201
Multilingual Multi-Figurative Language Detection
Figures of speech help people express abstract concepts and evoke stronger
emotions than literal expressions, thereby making texts more creative and
engaging. Due to its pervasive and fundamental character, figurative language
understanding has been addressed in Natural Language Processing, but it's
highly understudied in a multilingual setting and when considering more than
one figure of speech at the same time. To bridge this gap, we introduce
multilingual multi-figurative language modelling, and provide a benchmark for
sentence-level figurative language detection, covering three common figures of
speech and seven languages. Specifically, we develop a framework for figurative
language detection based on template-based prompt learning. In so doing, we
unify multiple detection tasks that are interrelated across multiple figures of
speech and languages, without requiring task- or language-specific modules.
Experimental results show that our framework outperforms several strong
baselines and may serve as a blueprint for the joint modelling of other
interrelated tasks.Comment: Accepted to ACL 2023 (Findings
Multilingual Multi-Figurative Language Detection
Figures of speech help people express abstract concepts and evoke stronger emotions than literal expressions, thereby making texts more creative and engaging. Due to its pervasive and fundamental character, figurative language understanding has been addressed in Natural Language Processing, but it's highly understudied in a multilingual setting and when considering more than one figure of speech at the same time. To bridge this gap, we introduce multilingual multi-figurative language modelling, and provide a benchmark for sentence-level figurative language detection, covering three common figures of speech and seven languages. Specifically, we develop a framework for figurative language detection based on template-based prompt learning. In so doing, we unify multiple detection tasks that are interrelated across multiple figures of speech and languages, without requiring task- or language-specific modules. Experimental results show that our framework outperforms several strong baselines and may serve as a blueprint for the joint modelling of other interrelated tasks.</p
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