An evaluation paradigm for spoken dialog systems based on crowdsourcing and collaborative filtering.

Yang, Zhaojun.Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2011.Includes bibliographical references (p. 92-99).Abstracts in English and Chinese.Chapter 1 --- Introduction --- p.1Chapter 1.1 --- SDS Architecture --- p.1Chapter 1.2 --- Dialog Model --- p.3Chapter 1.3 --- SDS Evaluation --- p.4Chapter 1.4 --- Thesis Outline --- p.7Chapter 2 --- Previous Work --- p.9Chapter 2.1 --- Approaches to Dialog Modeling --- p.9Chapter 2.1.1 --- Handcrafted Dialog Modeling --- p.9Chapter 2.1.2 --- Statistical Dialog Modeling --- p.12Chapter 2.2 --- Evaluation Metrics --- p.16Chapter 2.2.1 --- Subjective User Judgments --- p.17Chapter 2.2.2 --- Interaction Metrics --- p.18Chapter 2.3 --- The PARADISE Framework --- p.19Chapter 2.4 --- Chapter Summary --- p.22Chapter 3 --- Implementation of a Dialog System based on POMDP --- p.23Chapter 3.1 --- Partially Observable Markov Decision Processes (POMDPs) --- p.24Chapter 3.1.1 --- Formal Definition --- p.24Chapter 3.1.2 --- Value Iteration --- p.26Chapter 3.1.3 --- Point-based Value Iteration --- p.27Chapter 3.1.4 --- A Toy Example of POMDP: The NaiveBusInfo System --- p.27Chapter 3.2 --- The SDS-POMDP Model --- p.31Chapter 3.3 --- Composite Summary Point-based Value Iteration (CSPBVI) --- p.33Chapter 3.4 --- Application of SDS-POMDP Model: The Buslnfo System --- p.35Chapter 3.4.1 --- System Description --- p.35Chapter 3.4.2 --- Demonstration Description --- p.39Chapter 3.5 --- Chapter Summary --- p.42Chapter 4 --- Collecting User Judgments on Spoken Dialogs with Crowdsourcing --- p.46Chapter 4.1 --- Dialog Corpus and Automatic Dialog Classification --- p.47Chapter 4.2 --- User Judgments Collection with Crowdsourcing --- p.50Chapter 4.2.1 --- HITs on Dialog Evaluation --- p.51Chapter 4.2.2 --- HITs on Inter-rater Agreement --- p.53Chapter 4.2.3 --- Approval of Ratings --- p.54Chapter 4.3 --- Collected Results and Analysis --- p.55Chapter 4.3.1 --- Approval Rates and Comments from Mturk Workers --- p.55Chapter 4.3.2 --- Consistency between Automatic Dialog Classification and Manual Ratings --- p.57Chapter 4.3.3 --- Inter-rater Agreement Among Workers --- p.60Chapter 4.4 --- Comparing Experts to Non-experts --- p.64Chapter 4.4.1 --- Inter-rater Agreement on the Let's Go! System --- p.65Chapter 4.4.2 --- Consistency Between Expert and Non-expert Annotations on SDC Systems --- p.66Chapter 4.5 --- Chapter Summary --- p.68Chapter 5 --- Collaborative Filtering for Performance Prediction --- p.70Chapter 5.1 --- Item-Based Collaborative Filtering --- p.71Chapter 5.2 --- CF Model for User Satisfaction Prediction --- p.72Chapter 5.2.1 --- ICFM for User Satisfaction Prediction --- p.72Chapter 5.2.2 --- Extended ICFM for User Satisfaction Prediction --- p.73Chapter 5.3 --- Extraction of Interaction Features --- p.74Chapter 5.4 --- Experimental Results and Analysis --- p.76Chapter 5.4.1 --- Prediction of User Satisfaction --- p.76Chapter 5.4.2 --- Analysis of Prediction Results --- p.79Chapter 5.5 --- Verifying the Generalibility of CF Model --- p.81Chapter 5.6 --- Evaluation of The Buslnfo System --- p.86Chapter 5.7 --- Chapter Summary --- p.87Chapter 6 --- Conclusions and Future Work --- p.89Chapter 6.1 --- Thesis Summary --- p.89Chapter 6.2 --- Future Work --- p.90Bibliography --- p.9

Usability engineering of interactive voice responsive (IVR) systems in oral users of Southern Africa

Includes bibliographical references (p. 96-109).This research study focuses on the feasibility of using the telephone as a tool for information access in the oral communities of Southern Africa. The OpenPhone and BGR systems are used as case studies and their designs have been influenced by field studies with the targeted users. The OpenPhone project aims to design an Interactive Voice Response (IVR) health information system that enables people who are caregivers for HIV/AIDS infected children to access relevant care-giving information by using a telephone in their native language of Setswana in Botswana, Southern Africa. The BGR system allows soccer fans to access results of recently played matches in Premier Soccer League (PSL) of South Africa

Communication competences of managers in the twenty first century

Communication competences of a manager in the 21st century have a significant effect on the creation of a competitive advantage of an organization. They compose an immanent part of behaviours of all persons in an organization responsible for producing the pro-effective culture. They create efficacy, that is effectiveness and efficiency in the realization of its basic aims targets. They affect proper functions of all essential structural units of organizations. Their implementation requires inter alia a heuristic approach to interpersonal communication processes in an organization. Therefore, they can be guided by the following principles: 1. principle of communication dualism – awareness of process ephemerality and multithreading, 2. principle of communication intelligence – adaptiveness of communication, 3. principle of taking into account situational and socio-cultural contexts, 4. principle of individual personality features of partners in the communication process, 5. principle of skilful usage and reading of verbal expressions and non-verbal signals, 6. principle of utilization of knowledge and experience adequately to the situation, 7. principle of high-level ethical behaviours, 8. and principle of self-control