A comparison of language processing techniques for a constrained speech translation system
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Date
2003Author
Lincoln, Michael
Cox, Stephen
Metadata
Abstract
A system designed to allow Post Office counter clerks to communicate
with deaf customers by translating speech into sign language
is described. The system uses approximately 370 pre-stored
phrases which may be signed to the customer using a specially
designed avatar. The clerk is unable to memorise this number of
phrases and therefore the system attempts to map from their input
speech to the semantically equivalent pre-stored phrase. We
describe a number of language processing techniques developed
to perform the mapping, and give results obtained using alternative
formulations of the phrases from a number of speakers. We
then give results for recognised speech input and show how misrecognitions
effect the mapping system. Best performance is obtained
using a mapping system based on an entropy weighted, vector
based distance measure between the test phrase and each of the
signed phrases