BabyTalk-Clan

First Year Presentation

Wendy Moncur

Universities of Aberdeen & Dundee

Supervisors: Ehud Reiter & Judith Masthoff

BabyTalk-Clan

Introduction Summary of Research Areas Current Research Research Direction

Who is this research about?

BabyTalk: Tailoring reports about babies in Neonatal Intensive Care

Sensor readings

Event records

Data about the baby

Data Interpretation

& NLG processing

Heart rate, breathing,…

Medication, lab results, equipment settings.

Tailored reports

Medical staff

Parents, friends & family

BabyTalk: Tailoring reports about babies in Neonatal Intensive Care

Sensor readings

Event records

Data about the baby

Heart rate, breathing,…

Medication, lab results, equipment settings.

Tailored reports

Medical staff

Parents, friends & family

Web/ mob phone text

Data Interpretation

& NLG processing

BabyTalk-Clan (BT-Clan) Objectives Part of the BabyTalk project

Communicate tailored updates about the baby to family & friends- Mobilise emotional support for parents

- Parents may be too busy /upset to communicate info themselves

NLG application• Adaptation to recipient

• Adaptation to parents’ requirements

• Deliver web/ mobile phone texts to friends & family

The Problem: Mobilising Emotional Support in a Crisis

The newborn baby is the parents’ priority.

Parents benefit from the emotional support of friends and family.

If they are to give support, friends and family first need to know that something is wrong.

BT-Clan can mobilise support.

BabyTalk-Clan

Introduction Summary of Research Areas

• Social networks

• Affective NLG

• Personalisation for eHealth Current Research Research Direction

Research Area: Social Networks

Describe relationships between people or groups (Churchill et al, 2005)

Applications • Social - Friendster, FlickR

• Business – LinkedIn

• Psychology – social support

Research Area: Social Networks

Describe relationships between people or groups

Applications • Social - Friendster, FlickR

• Business – LinkedIn

• Psychology – social support

But ... • Don’t map social closeness.

• Don’t know how to acquire this data

Node Tie

Hi Sam, I’ll meet you at 8, ok?Flow

Research Area: Social Networks Social Networks studied by psychologists

“…provision of psychological and material resources intended to benefit an individual’s ability to cope with stress.” (Cohen 2004).

Social support can be :• Instrumental – provision of material aid• Informational – advice, guidance• Emotional – empathy, caring, chance to express feelings

Emotional support reduces stress

Most effective when provided by friends and family, rather than clinicians or support groups.

BT-Clan aims to mobilise emotional support in the social network

Research Area: Affective NLG

NLG (Natural Language Generation) • Tailored, comprehensible text from underlying

knowledge base

Affective NLG:• Portrays emotional state of interlocutor

• Induces emotional effect on hearer

• Goal = believability

• Early days as a research area

Research Area: Affective NLGResearch Directions: Detect the emotional state of the user(de Rosis, Mellish 2007)

• Physiological tests – cortisol, electromyography, heart rate, …• Validated questionnaires – Big 5, PANAS, HADS, EPDS…

• Only detect relevant emotions/ traits

• We will use questionnaires - EPDS & HADS - to establish degree of depression of parents: this affects how they communicate.

Research Area: Affective NLG

Research Directions: Develop goals involving emotional state (de Rosis, Mellish 2007)

• Advice-giving. E.g. - STOP tailored letters for smoking cessation (Reiter, Robertson et al. 2003)

• Intelligent tutoring (Lester et al, 2000).

• Adaptation to anxiety and belief state (Hudlicka, McNeese M.D. 2002; Fleischman, Hovy 2002).

• Social interaction and amusement (Binsted, Bergen et al. 2006; Sundström 2005)

• BT-Clan: Tailor information appropriately for recipients according to social closeness.

Research Area: Affective NLG

George has been changed from nasal CPAP to ventilation. He has been in oxygen between 25 and 40%. George has been given a dose of replacement surfactant. He has been started on morphine to keep him comfortable.

He has been started on vecuronium to keep him from moving and fighting the ventilator.

He has been started on dopamine to help his blood pressure.

Medical summary report on ‘test’ baby George, supplied by current system.

(Links to glossary underlined).

Research Directions: use language in a directed way to achieve goals involving emotional state (de Rosis, Mellish 2007)

Research Area: Personalisation for eHealth Patients prefer personalised information (Cawsey, Jones

et al. 2000)

Personalised information seen as more relevant (Bental 1998)

Affective NLG can be used to tailor info in the health domain (Grasso,Cawsey et al. 2005).

No work on patients’ supporters yet, but ….“…the caregiver is no longer a bystander in ….care, but is

an actual or potential ‘co-user’ or 'co-client’ of services.” (O'Mara 2005)

BT-Clan considers personalisation for patient supporters

BabyTalk-Clan

Introduction Summary of Research Areas Current Research Research Direction

Initial Research

Prototyped a simple modelling tool to capture social closenesss.

Tested with parents who have had babies in NICU in the past. N=7 (2 male, 5 female).

Simplified for usability

Button for baby at centre

Explored how these dynamics influenced information transmission from parents.

A mother’s social network

* Note: Photos are not of the real individuals concerned.

Husband. He’s been keeping everyone up-to-date about Emma.

Our beautif ul baby, Emma , born 10 weeks premature.

Friends across the country. They’ve all been phoning, asking how me & Emma are doing.

Me, J ane. Anxious. Too tired to phone anyone right now.

Brother. Single, lives in Australia.

My mum. I tell her everything.

My mother-in-law. Housebound. Worries a lot.

Colleagues. I went into labour at work. They are worried about me & the baby.

Friend. She doesn’t have kids, and is always busy.

Figure 1: “My social network” by Jane, mother of Baby Emma

Husband’s best f riend.

Husband. He’s been keeping everyone up-to-date about Emma.

Our beautif ul baby, Emma , born 10 weeks premature.

Friends across the country. They’ve all been phoning, asking how me & Emma are doing.

Me, J ane. Anxious. Too tired to phone anyone right now.

Brother. Single, lives in Australia.

My mum. I tell her everything.

My mother-in-law. Housebound. Worries a lot.

Colleagues. I went into labour at work. They are worried about me & the baby.

Friend. She doesn’t have kids, and is always busy.

Figure 1: “My social network” by Jane, mother of Baby Emma

Husband’s best f riend.

Possible report tailoring by band of social networkBand Report content Recipient

A Detailed report

Current photos of baby.

B Mildly summarized version of report, avoiding medical terminology.

Current photos of baby.

NICU visiting times.

C Extensively summarized version of report, avoiding medical terminology.

NICU visiting times.

D New developments, but no serious bad news.

NICU visiting times.

E One-off communication to say that the baby has been born & is in NICU.

Option to get Band D information on request.

Results: Factors that affected information dissemination.

Social closeness affected by:• Circumstances

• Ability to cope

“My husband’s mum is elderly & house bound. We didn’t tell her too much. We didn’t want to worry her.” Mother

of twins

Results: Factors that affected information dissemination.

“She’s his godmother, but she wasn’t interested.” Mother of boy born with operative condition

• Demand for news

• Time

Results: Effect of gender

Small study More work needed Men’s maps simpler –

consistent with psychology findings

“You know how it is with men… they don’t tell you anything.”Mother of baby born

at 36 weeks gestation

Results: ‘Information brokers’

“…she phoned everyone for us.” Father of baby born at 36 weeks

Nominated by the mother. Responsible for communication. Know her social network intimately. Make judgements on what information to give.

Discussion of Research

Uniqueness of individual social network

Autonomy for parents

Encourage contact - Information push & pull

Relevance

Consistency of findings • Education, employment, etc

• People set boundaries according to closeness

• Correlation between social closeness and information given

BT-Clan will use this model in further research – focus groups and diaries.

BabyTalk-Clan

IntroductionSummary of Research AreasCurrent ResearchResearch Direction

• Mobilising emotional support through affective NLG.

• Generalisability of approach

Research Direction

Data gathering - Focus groups,

Diaries

NLG Prototyping

Evaluate accuracy with clinicians

User testing – parents, clan.

Sample data about babies

Generalisation We all edit information according to the recipient.

Possible applications:

• Health: an adult Intensive care patient struggles to communicate for themself.

• Industry: Dissemination of corporate information to management hierarchy & staff

• Social: University students updating family and friends on personal news.

Thank-you