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• Collecting a Motion-Capture Corpus of American Sign Language for Data-Driven Generation Research

  Pengfei Lu, Matt Huenerfauth · 2010 · Proceedings of the NAACL HLT 2010 Workshop on Speech and Language Processing for Assistive Technologies (SLPAT '10)

  This workshop paper describes the first year of a multi-year project at CUNY to build a motion-capture corpus of American Sign Language (ASL) specifically intended to support data-driven ASL animation and machine-translation research. The authors argue that current ASL animation…

  American Sign Language · ASL animation · motion capture · sign language corpus · deaf accessibility

• A Comparison of Features for Automatic Readability Assessment

  Lijun Feng, Martin Jansche, Matt Huenerfauth, Noémie Elhadad · 2010 · Proceedings of the 23rd International Conference on Computational Linguistics (COLING '10), Posters

  Feng et al. (2010) is a computational-linguistics paper that compares a wide variety of text features for automatically predicting the grade level of reading material aimed at primary-school students. The motivation is both intrinsic — traditional readability formulas such as…

  readability · automatic readability assessment · text simplification · plain language · cognitive accessibility

• Being Old Doesn't Mean Acting Old: How Older Users Interact with Spoken Dialog Systems

  Maria Wolters, Kallirroi Georgila, Johanna D. Moore, Sarah E. MacPherson · 2009 · ACM Transactions on Accessible Computing

  This study challenges the common practice of designing voice interfaces based on assumed age-related characteristics. Using a bottom-up approach rather than top-down age comparisons, the researchers analyzed 447 appointment scheduling dialogs between 50 users (26 older, aged…

  aging · voice interface · spoken dialog systems · cognitive aging · user diversity

• Comparing Evaluation Techniques for Text Readability Software for Adults with Intellectual Disabilities

  Matt Huenerfauth, Lijun Feng, Noémie Elhadad · 2009 · Proceedings of the 11th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '09)

  This paper investigates how to properly evaluate text simplification software designed for adults with mild intellectual disabilities (ID). The authors are developing a system that automatically simplifies news articles, displays them, and reads them aloud using text-to-speech —…

  intellectual disability · text simplification · readability · natural language processing · evaluation methodology

• Cognitively Motivated Features for Readability Assessment

  Lijun Feng, Noémie Elhadad, Matt Huenerfauth · 2009 · Proceedings of the 12th Conference of the European Chapter of the Association for Computational Linguistics (EACL 2009)

  Feng, Elhadad, and Huenerfauth (2009) develop and evaluate an automatic readability-assessment tool targeted specifically at adults with intellectual disabilities (ID) — people in the 'mild' category (IQ 55-70), who comprise roughly 3% of the U.S. population. Rather than reusing…

  readability · automatic readability assessment · cognitive accessibility · intellectual disability · mild intellectual disability

• MySpeechWeb: software to facilitate the construction and deployment of speech applications on the web

  Richard A. Frost, Ali Karaki, David A. Dufour, Josh Greig, Rahmatullah Hafiz, Yue Shi, Shawn Daichendt, Shahriar Chandon, Justin Barolak, Randy J. Fortier · 2008 · Proceedings of the 10th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '08)

  This short paper presents MySpeechWeb, an open-source platform for creating and deploying voice-in/voice-out speech applications on the web. The authors identify a significant gap: despite the potential of speech interfaces to improve web access for people with visual,…

  speech interfaces · voice interaction · web accessibility · open source · assistive technology

• Adapting Word Prediction to Subject Matter without Topic-Labeled Data

  Keith Trnka · 2008 · Proceedings of the 10th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '08)

  This paper proposes a method for adapting word prediction systems to the current topic of discourse without requiring human-labeled topic categories in the training data. Word prediction is a key feature of Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) devices, where it…

  word prediction · AAC · language model · topic modeling · natural language processing

• Enhancing Accessibility through Correction of Speech Recognition Errors

  John-Mark Bell · 2007 · SIGACCESS Accessibility and Computing

  This paper investigates methods for automatically correcting errors in speech recognition-generated captions of university lectures, aiming to improve accessibility for hearing-impaired students. The author notes that while ASR-based captioning can make lectures accessible by…

  automatic speech recognition · captioning · deaf and hard of hearing · higher education · natural language processing

• The HearSay Non-Visual Web Browser

  Yevgen Borodin, Jalal Mahmud, I. V. Ramakrishnan, Amanda Stent · 2007 · Proceedings of the 2007 International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility (W4A)

  This paper presents the original HearSay non-visual web browser (version 1/2), developed at Stony Brook University in collaboration with the Helen Keller Services for the Blind. HearSay is a free, open-source, cross-platform browser written in Java that uses Mozilla for web…

  non-visual web browser · screen readers · blind users · web accessibility · natural language processing

• (Natural Language) Interaction with Graphical Representations of Statistical Data

  Leo Ferres, Petro Verkhogliad, Louis Boucher · 2007 · Proceedings of the 2007 International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility (W4A)

  This paper from Carleton University and Statistics Canada presents iGraph-Lite, a system that makes statistical graphs published in "The Daily" (Statistics Canada's main dissemination publication) accessible to blind and visually impaired users through natural language…

  data visualization · blind users · visual impairment · natural language processing · web accessibility

• Corpus Studies in Word Prediction

  Keith Trnka, Kathleen F. McCoy · 2007 · Proceedings of the 9th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '07)

  This paper from the University of Delaware investigates how the choice and combination of training corpora affects the performance of statistical word prediction systems for Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) devices. The fundamental challenge is that AAC users…

  word prediction · AAC · language model · natural language processing · corpus linguistics

• Semantic & syntactic context-aware text entry methods

  Jun Gong · 2007 · Proceedings of the 9th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '07)

  Jun Gong's Assets '07 demonstration paper proposes a context-aware extension to the dictionary-based predictive disambiguation (DBPD) text-entry methods — the family that included the once-ubiquitous T9 on mobile phone keypads. DBPD methods let users press each multi-letter key…

  text entry · motor impairment · visual impairment · predictive text · T9

• SIBYLLE: a system for alternative communication adapting to the context and its user

  Tonio Wandmacher, Jean-Yves Antoine, Franck Poirier · 2007 · Proceedings of the 9th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS '07)

  This paper describes the latest version of SIBYLLE, an augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) system developed at the Université François Rabelais and the Université Européenne de Bretagne for users with severe motor and speech impairments — including cerebrally and…

  augmentative and alternative communication · AAC · word prediction · virtual keyboard · single switch

• Helping Aphasic People Process Online Information

  Siobhan Devlin, Gary Unthank · 2006 · Proceedings of the 8th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '06)

  This short paper from the University of Sunderland describes the HAPPI (Helping Aphasic People Process Information) project, a web-based text simplification system designed to help people with aphasia access online content such as news stories. Aphasia is a language disorder…

  aphasia · text simplification · cognitive accessibility · lexical simplification · natural language processing

• South African Sign Language Machine Translation Project

  Lynette van Zijl · 2006 · Proceedings of the 8th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '06)

  This paper describes the South African Sign Language Machine Translation (SASL-MT) project at Stellenbosch University, aimed at increasing the South African Deaf community's access to information by automatically translating English text into South African Sign Language (SASL).…

  sign language · machine translation · deaf · South Africa · natural language processing

• Semantic Knowledge in Word Completion

  Jianhua Li, Graeme Hirst · 2005 · Proceedings of the 7th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '05)

  This paper proposes an integrated word-completion system that combines semantic knowledge with traditional n-gram statistical models to produce more contextually appropriate predictions for users with linguistic or physical disabilities. Standard word-completion systems use…

  word prediction · word completion · natural language processing · text entry · AAC

• Representing Coordination and Non-Coordination in an American Sign Language Animation

  Matt Huenerfauth · 2005 · Proceedings of the 7th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (Assets '05)

  This paper introduces the Partition/Constitute (P/C) Formalism, a new computational representation for encoding the multichannel structure of American Sign Language (ASL) performances to support English-to-ASL machine translation and animation. ASL is a full natural language…

  American Sign Language · sign language animation · machine translation · natural language processing · deaf accessibility

• A Predictive Blissymbolic to English Translation System

  Annalu Waller, Kris Jack · 2002 · Proceedings of the Fifth International ACM Conference on Assistive Technologies (Assets '02)

  This paper addresses a fundamental limitation of Blissymbolics in electronic AAC: while Blissymbol users can compose messages by selecting symbols, converting those symbol sequences into grammatically correct English is non-trivial. Blissymbolics is a semantic graphic language…

  AAC · Blissymbolics · natural language processing · symbol communication · predictive text

• The Development of Language Processing Support for the ViSiCAST Project

  R. Elliott, J. R. W. Glauert, J. R. Kennaway, I. Marshall · 2000 · Proceedings of the Fourth International ACM Conference on Assistive Technologies (Assets '00)

  This paper from the University of East Anglia describes early work on the ViSiCAST project (Virtual Signing, Animation, Capture, Storage and Transmission), a 3-year EU-funded initiative to provide improved access to services for Deaf citizens through sign language presented by a…

  sign language · sign language avatar · virtual signing · British Sign Language · machine translation

• An Intelligent Tutoring System for Deaf Learners of Written English

  Lisa N. Michaud, Kathleen F. McCoy, Christopher A. Pennington · 2000 · Proceedings of the Fourth International ACM Conference on Assistive Technologies (Assets '00)

  This paper from the University of Delaware describes ICICLE (Interactive Communication and Correction of Language Errors), an intelligent tutoring system designed to improve written English literacy among deaf students who are native or near-native signers of American Sign…

  deaf literacy · intelligent tutoring system · American Sign Language · English literacy · second language acquisition

• Toward the Use of Speech and Natural Language Technology in Intervention for a Language-Disordered Population

  Jill Fain Lehman · 1998 · Proceedings of the Third International ACM Conference on Assistive Technologies (Assets '98)

  This paper from Carnegie Mellon University describes the design of Simone Says, an interactive software environment for language remediation in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). The system brings together speech recognition, natural language processing, and…

  autism spectrum disorder · language remediation · speech recognition · natural language processing · computer-aided instruction

• A communication tool for people with disabilities: lexical semantics for filling in the pieces

  Kathleen F. McCoy, Patrick W. Demasco, Mark A. Jones, Christopher A. Pennington, Peter B. Vanderheyden, Wendy M. Zickus · 1994 · Proceedings of the First Annual ACM Conference on Assistive Technologies (Assets '94)

  This paper presents a prototype communication tool designed to reduce the input burden for people with severe speech and motor impairments (SSMI) who use word-based augmentative communication systems. The core problem addressed is that even with word-prediction and word-based…

  augmentative and alternative communication · natural language processing · lexical semantics · text generation · motor impairment