History and Development of Speech Recognition -- Challenges in Speech Synthesis -- Spoken Language Dialogue Models -- The Industry of Spoken-Dialog Systems and the Third Generation of Interactive Applications -- Deceptive Speech: Clues from Spoken Language -- Cognitive Approaches to Spoken Language Technology -- Expressive Speech Processing and Prosody Engineering: An Illustrated Essay on the Fragmented Nature of Real Interactive Speech -- Interacting with Embodied Conversational Agents -- Multimodal Information Processing for Affective Computing -- Spoken Language Translation -- Application of Speech Technology in Vehicles -- Spoken Dialogue Application in Space: The Clarissa Procedure Browser -- Military Applications: Human Factors Aspects of Speech-Based Systems -- Accessibility and Design for All Solutions Through Speech Technology -- Assessment and Evaluation of Speech-Based Interactive Systems: From Manual Annotation to Automatic Usability Evaluation.

In recent years, spoken language research has successfully developed several practical applications, as well as brought forward advanced novel topics to investigate further. Speech Technology: Theory and Applications collects interesting research and development results and provides an overview of selected challenges still to be resolved. The book is organized along two main themes: research on enabling technology and applications that exemplify the use of this technology. Each chapter is an independent review of a specific topic, covering research problems and possible solutions. The basic technology development covers areas such as automatic speech recognition and speech synthesis, spoken dialogue systems and dialogue modeling, expressive speech synthesis, emotions and affective computing, multimodal communication and animated agents. The applications include speech translation, in-car, space, and military applications as well as those for special user groups. Discussion of general evaluation methodologies is also included. Speech Technology: Theory and Applications should be a useful reference for researchers, engineers and students in the field of speech technology.