Faster responses are better responses: Introducing incrementality into sociable virtual personal assistants

Vivian Tsai; Timo Baumann; Florian Pecune; Justine Cassell

doi:10.1007/978-981-13-9443-0_10

Faster responses are better responses: Introducing incrementality into sociable virtual personal assistants

Vivian Tsai^*, Timo Baumann, Florian Pecune, Justine Cassell

^*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference contribution

8 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Speech-based interactive systems, such as virtual personal assistants, inevitably use complex architectures, with a multitude of modules working in series (or less often in parallel) to perform a task (e.g., giving personalized movie recommendations via dialog). Add modules for evoking and sustaining sociability with the user and the accumulation of processing latencies through the modules results in considerable turn-taking delays. We introduce incremental speech processing into the generation pipeline of the system to overcome this challenge with only minimal changes to the system architecture, through partial underspecification that is resolved as necessary. A user study with a sociable movie recommendation agent objectively diminishes turn-taking delays; furthermore, users not only rate the incremental system as more responsive, but also rate its recommendation performance as higher.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	9th International Workshop on Spoken Dialogue System Technology, IWSDS 2018
Editors	Luis Fernando D’Haro, Rafael E. Banchs, Haizhou Li
Publisher	Springer
Pages	111-118
Number of pages	8
ISBN (Print)	9789811394423
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-9443-0_10
Publication status	Published - 2019
Externally published	Yes
Event	9th International Workshop on Spoken Dialogue System Technology, IWSDS 2018 - Singapore, Singapore Duration: 2018 Apr 18 → 2018 Apr 20

Publication series

Name	Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering
Volume	579
ISSN (Print)	1876-1100
ISSN (Electronic)	1876-1119

Conference

Conference	9th International Workshop on Spoken Dialogue System Technology, IWSDS 2018
Country/Territory	Singapore
City	Singapore
Period	18/4/18 → 18/4/20

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Access to Document

10.1007/978-981-13-9443-0_10

Cite this

Tsai, V., Baumann, T., Pecune, F., & Cassell, J. (2019). Faster responses are better responses: Introducing incrementality into sociable virtual personal assistants. In L. F. D’Haro, R. E. Banchs, & H. Li (Eds.), 9th International Workshop on Spoken Dialogue System Technology, IWSDS 2018 (pp. 111-118). (Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering; Vol. 579). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-9443-0_10

Faster responses are better responses: Introducing incrementality into sociable virtual personal assistants. / Tsai, Vivian; Baumann, Timo; Pecune, Florian et al.
9th International Workshop on Spoken Dialogue System Technology, IWSDS 2018. ed. / Luis Fernando D’Haro; Rafael E. Banchs; Haizhou Li. Springer, 2019. p. 111-118 (Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering; Vol. 579).

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference contribution

Tsai, V, Baumann, T, Pecune, F & Cassell, J 2019, Faster responses are better responses: Introducing incrementality into sociable virtual personal assistants. in LF D’Haro, RE Banchs & H Li (eds), 9th International Workshop on Spoken Dialogue System Technology, IWSDS 2018. Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering, vol. 579, Springer, pp. 111-118, 9th International Workshop on Spoken Dialogue System Technology, IWSDS 2018, Singapore, Singapore, 18/4/18. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-9443-0_10

Tsai V, Baumann T, Pecune F, Cassell J. Faster responses are better responses: Introducing incrementality into sociable virtual personal assistants. In D’Haro LF, Banchs RE, Li H, editors, 9th International Workshop on Spoken Dialogue System Technology, IWSDS 2018. Springer. 2019. p. 111-118. (Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering). doi: 10.1007/978-981-13-9443-0_10

Tsai, Vivian ; Baumann, Timo ; Pecune, Florian et al. / Faster responses are better responses : Introducing incrementality into sociable virtual personal assistants. 9th International Workshop on Spoken Dialogue System Technology, IWSDS 2018. editor / Luis Fernando D’Haro ; Rafael E. Banchs ; Haizhou Li. Springer, 2019. pp. 111-118 (Lecture Notes in Electrical Engineering).

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abstract = "Speech-based interactive systems, such as virtual personal assistants, inevitably use complex architectures, with a multitude of modules working in series (or less often in parallel) to perform a task (e.g., giving personalized movie recommendations via dialog). Add modules for evoking and sustaining sociability with the user and the accumulation of processing latencies through the modules results in considerable turn-taking delays. We introduce incremental speech processing into the generation pipeline of the system to overcome this challenge with only minimal changes to the system architecture, through partial underspecification that is resolved as necessary. A user study with a sociable movie recommendation agent objectively diminishes turn-taking delays; furthermore, users not only rate the incremental system as more responsive, but also rate its recommendation performance as higher.",

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Faster responses are better responses: Introducing incrementality into sociable virtual personal assistants

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