ESSLLI2015
Advanced Course on
Computational Models of Grounding in Dialogue
Abstract
Grounding is the process by which participants in a
conversation establish new common ground. This process includes not
just transmission of declarative utterances, but inferential and
feedback processes. This process is also of critical importance to
artificial dialogue systems, which include additional challenges of
more limited input recognition, ontologies and inferential
abilities. In this course we will review models and uses for common
ground in pragmatics and computational agent theories, and then
examine a variety of proposals of how common ground can be
established. These proposals include both descriptive analyses of
behavior, as well as generative proposals that can be used by
computational systems engaged in dialogue to decide on next moves. We
will also look at multimodal grounding, and advanced topics, including
multiparty grounding, incremental grounding and degrees of grounding,
as well as how grounding models have been used for studying other
social phenomena.
Pre-Requisites
No formal pre-requisites, but some
familiarity with dialogue and pragmatics will be helpful.
Approximate Syllabus (Lecture Notes available after each class)
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