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On May 6-10, 2007
Neodialog SpeechHelper >> was successfully presented at 8th World Congress for People Who Stutter in Croatia (Cavtat - Dubrovnik).
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The 30-min presentation and 1,5 hour workshop were devoted to this new technology for improvement the communication skills in PWS. The Neodialog SpeechHelper >> raised a great interest among the leading experts and other participants.
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NEODIALOG SPEECHHELPER – communication skills training for PWS!
In the basic NEODIALOG SPEECHHELPER is NEODIALOG >> technology.
The principles of NEODIALOG SPEECHHELPER training are simple: thanks to “virtual communication”, the user is able to drop or let down his/her defenses and develop his/her non-verbal communication skills. A model is created for verbal communication – the user listens to his/her “virtual partner” (green graph) as the partner says the phrases from the speech pattern database which are designed to model a variety of situations: dissatisfaction, conflict, request, friendship, irritation, envy and others which are recorded by professional actors and stored in the database.
Two types of replies are possible with this program: the user can reply on his/her own or can read the recommended reply given by the program. In this way, the program provides you with behavioral training.
After each reply, the following indicators will automatically appear on the monitor:
Reaction time: how quickly after hearing a phrase do you answer your “virtual partner”.
Tempo-rhythm (Ň) is measured from 0.1 to 25 and the fluidity of speech is measured, namely the presence and expressiveness of pauses. The higher the result, the fewer pauses the user is making.
Intonation (Intoning) is measured as a percentage. This indicator determines your attitude towards your conversational partner as well as, psychological distance. Results of 50% or less: fairly monotone speech. This kind of intonation usually appears when the speaker is calm, tired, in a bad mood, is peaking very quickly or is screaming or expressing anger. Your attitude towards your conversational partner is negative or indifferent. Result of 60-75%: average level of intonation for conversational speech. Attitude towards conversational partner: more relaxed, closer to friendship. This kind of result is representative of your desire to transfer your thoughts and emotions to your conversational partner. Results of more than 90%: very expressive speech.
% NVC (non-verbal communication): is the result of a comparison of tempo-rhythm and the level of intonation used when repeating or answering the “virtual partner”. This indicator also measures the user’s ability to mimic the non-verbal patterns of his/her “virtual partner” and maintain psychological distance with intonation. It is important to NOT CONFUSE non-verbal mimicking with imitation of speech pattern or emotion!
When replying, the user should determine the tempo-rhythm (correlation of the length of the phonal segment to the length of the pause) and level of intonation (how monotone is the speech) in the speech pattern. It is this that the user should repeat in his/her reply (the blue graph) to establish, in accordance with NLP, contact with the “virtual partner”.
Result of 75-90%: contact is good but there is room for improvement and you should click REPEAT. Result of 60-75%: contact is OK but the user needs to make use of the program’s recommendations for improvement for tempo-rhythm and intonation. Results of less than 60%: you are pushing your conversational partner away. The program’s recommendations will indicate how much a difference there is between tempo-rhythm and intonation and, will provide advice on how to correct the problem.
Result of 90% or higher – contact is great! You can move on to the next speech pattern by clicking NEXT.
NEODIALOG SPEECHHELPER has an automatically controlled system for tasks and statistics. Each task is set for the user - the date, time and length of task, average performance for the task. By clicking DETAILS the user can open any task and listen to his/her replies, which is extremely important for the development of effective communication skills.
NEODIALOG SPEECHHELPER includes: installation CD with PLANTRONICS, USB dongle and manual.
Cost - 260 euro
You can place an order by using our online order form:
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