An integrated analysis of speech and gestural characteristics in conversational child–computer interactions

Abstract

Understanding the fine details of children’s speech and gestural characteristics helps, among other things, in creating natural computer interfaces. We analyze the acoustic, lexical/non-lexical and spoken/gestural discourse characteristics of young children’s speech using audio-video data gathered using a Wizard of Oz technique from 4 to 6 year old children engaged in resolving a series of age-appropriate cognitive challenges. Fundamental and formant frequencies exhibited greater variations between subjects consistent with previous results on read speech [Lee et al., J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 105, 1455–1468 (1999)]. Also, our analysis showed that, in a given bandwidth, phonemic information contained in the speech of young child is significantly less than that of older ones and adults. To enable an integrated analysis, a multi-track annotation board was constructed using the ANVIL tool kit [M. Kipp, Eurospeech 1367–1370 (2001)]. Along with speech transcriptions and acoustic analysis, non-lexical and discourse characteristics, and child’s gesture (facial expressions, body movements, hand/head movements) were annotated in a synchronized multilayer system. Initial results showed that younger children rely more on gestures to emphasize their verbal assertions. Younger children use non-lexical speech (e.g., um, huh) associated with frustration and pondering/reflecting more frequently than older ones. Younger children also repair more with humans than with computer.