Getting to the Heart of the Matter; Speech is More than Just the Expression of Text or Language

This talk addresses the current needs for so-called emotion in speech, but points out that the issue is better described as the expression of relationships and attitudes rather than the currently held raw (or big-six) emotional states. From an analysis of more than three years of daily conversational speech, we find the direct expression of emotion to be extremely rare, and contend that when speech technologists say that what we need now is more ‘emotion’ in speech, what they really mean is that the current technologies are too text-based, and that more expression of speaker attitude, affect, and discourse relationships is required.