Human Factors Guidelines for the use of Word Recognition Devices

Abstract

Speech recognition devices are finding increasing use in industrial environments, and continue to receive interest for military and data processing applications. In the ten year commercial history of word recognition devices, a small but valuable body of literature has developed which can assist the human factors engineer in making best use of this technology. Similarly, an even larger, though less well structured body of informed experience with these devices has also been accumulated. Sufficient data therefore, exists to permit development of a preliminary set of human factors guidelines for the use of speech recognition devices. To be discussed will be: (1) procedures for training word recognition devices; (2) guidelines for vocabulary selection; (3) methods for evaluating the performance of word recognition devices; (4) criteria for selecting applications for word recognition. The emphasis will be on detailed factors which affect recognition accuracy in application environments, e.g., effects of noise, parameters of training and acoustic-phonetic aspects of vocabulary selection.