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AI to identify types of help-seekers based on vocal quality

Lifeline, a not-for-profit organisation which started in 1963, have reached and benefited the mental health of hundreds of thousands of Australians.

About 1 million calls each year are made to its national telephone hotline, wherein, according to research, an estimated 3% – 5% of the Australian population has called at some point.

However, few studies have been undertaken to identify the outcomes achieved for callers to the service in the half a century of its operations.

Was the people who used the service able to derive help appropriate to their needs?

According to a recent report, a grant from the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) is about to change all that.

More than A$ 1.1 million has been set aside for a 5-year study that will enable a multi-institutional, multi-disciplined analysis of the organisation’s crisis support services, both telephone and online, and the impact they make for those who use them.

A team from the University of New South Wales  Faculty of Engineering will be looking at how machine learning can be used to analyse the vocal tone of people calling in to identify the kind of help they need.

Artificial intelligence (AI) methods will be used to automatically identify different types of help-seekers based on their vocal qualities.

Moreover, AI will also be able to examine written communication in cases of online chat and SMS text.

The analysis of acoustic and linguistic information from the speech of crisis callers is a highly novel research area, where there is significant potential for new technology to contribute.

While this is still somewhat speculative, machine learning could be ever-present, listening in to calls to triage them while contributing to the organisation’s long-term strategies for supporting help-seekers.

Most probably, the crisis supporter will be the first responder, but the machine learning will contribute by cueing other specialists to get involved part-way through the call.

It will also help assess how many distressing calls a crisis supporter has had to handle.

Analysis was made on voice samples of people who are depressed and compared them with those who are not, focusing exclusively on the acoustic qualities of the voice.

As a person speaks, the qualities being observed include the way it sounded, the timbre, and the prosody, which is the intonation and changes in energy.

The results have been quite striking. There are tell-tale characteristics of a depressed person’s speech, such as flatness in tone, low energy and lack of expressiveness.

These characteristics can be automatically extracted using signal processing methods.

The tests so far were conducted mainly in controlled laboratory conditions with high-end audio equipment.

The research challenge is whether the same patterns can be detected using the audio conditions of a telephone call.

Researchers are confident that machine learning in the call centre conditions will be up to the task based on experience working with a smartphone app start-up, doing something similar to this.

Academics with backgrounds in psychiatry, psychology, sociology and engineering from eight Australian universities and one in the US will be contributing to the study.

Lifeline has moved into the digital age and offers crisis support via online chat and soon via SMS text messaging.

This research is expected to enable crisis supports to be able to better meet the needs of community members in crisis, by using advanced technology and research methods.

The project will directly impact help-seekers by ensuring they are provided the most appropriate crisis support at the time they need it most.

In all ways, the focus on outcomes and the monitoring service performance is a way of putting the person first, something that is deep within the tradition and culture of the organisation.

PARTNER

Qlik’s vision is a data-literate world, where everyone can use data and analytics to improve decision-making and solve their most challenging problems. A private company, Qlik offers real-time data integration and analytics solutions, powered by Qlik Cloud, to close the gaps between data, insights and action. By transforming data into Active Intelligence, businesses can drive better decisions, improve revenue and profitability, and optimize customer relationships. Qlik serves more than 38,000 active customers in over 100 countries.

PARTNER

CTC Global Singapore, a premier end-to-end IT solutions provider, is a fully owned subsidiary of ITOCHU Techno-Solutions Corporation (CTC) and ITOCHU Corporation.

Since 1972, CTC has established itself as one of the country’s top IT solutions providers. With 50 years of experience, headed by an experienced management team and staffed by over 200 qualified IT professionals, we support organizations with integrated IT solutions expertise in Autonomous IT, Cyber Security, Digital Transformation, Enterprise Cloud Infrastructure, Workplace Modernization and Professional Services.

Well-known for our strengths in system integration and consultation, CTC Global proves to be the preferred IT outsourcing destination for organizations all over Singapore today.

PARTNER

Planview has one mission: to build the future of connected work. Our solutions enable organizations to connect the business from ideas to impact, empowering companies to accelerate the achievement of what matters most. Planview’s full spectrum of Portfolio Management and Work Management solutions creates an organizational focus on the strategic outcomes that matter and empowers teams to deliver their best work, no matter how they work. The comprehensive Planview platform and enterprise success model enables customers to deliver innovative, competitive products, services, and customer experiences. Headquartered in Austin, Texas, with locations around the world, Planview has more than 1,300 employees supporting 4,500 customers and 2.6 million users worldwide. For more information, visit www.planview.com.

SUPPORTING ORGANISATION

SIRIM is a premier industrial research and technology organisation in Malaysia, wholly-owned by the Minister​ of Finance Incorporated. With over forty years of experience and expertise, SIRIM is mandated as the machinery for research and technology development, and the national champion of quality. SIRIM has always played a major role in the development of the country’s private sector. By tapping into our expertise and knowledge base, we focus on developing new technologies and improvements in the manufacturing, technology and services sectors. We nurture Small Medium Enterprises (SME) growth with solutions for technology penetration and upgrading, making it an ideal technology partner for SMEs.

PARTNER

HashiCorp provides infrastructure automation software for multi-cloud environments, enabling enterprises to unlock a common cloud operating model to provision, secure, connect, and run any application on any infrastructure. HashiCorp tools allow organizations to deliver applications faster by helping enterprises transition from manual processes and ITIL practices to self-service automation and DevOps practices. 

PARTNER

IBM is a leading global hybrid cloud and AI, and business services provider. We help clients in more than 175 countries capitalize on insights from their data, streamline business processes, reduce costs and gain the competitive edge in their industries. Nearly 3,000 government and corporate entities in critical infrastructure areas such as financial services, telecommunications and healthcare rely on IBM’s hybrid cloud platform and Red Hat OpenShift to affect their digital transformations quickly, efficiently and securely. IBM’s breakthrough innovations in AI, quantum computing, industry-specific cloud solutions and business services deliver open and flexible options to our clients. All of this is backed by IBM’s legendary commitment to trust, transparency, responsibility, inclusivity and service.

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