Research Proposal

Intelligent Bengali Social Virtual Assistant (IBSVA)

In this modern age, intelligent virtual assistants (IVA) are in a high favor social service to interact
with humans via voice command. Google Assistant (Allo and Google Home), Alexa, Siri or
Cortana intelligent assistant, however, have not yet been able to adapt complete human nature in
answering questions and neither detect sentiment or emotion [1-6]. On the other hand, social humanoid
robots e.g. Sophia, Pepper, Nao are still unable to analyze sentiment [7-9].

The proposed IVA will be able to communicate naturally with the users in Bengali. Additionally, it will be
able to detect sentiment from users during communication and provide counseling to users based on their
conversation. It would be able to provide condolences to the user which will make users feel better
eventually.

In the following Figure 1, The proposed system has illustrated the target of my research area. Firstly, The
system will suppress the real-time noise from the input using Deep Learning. Secondly, the signal will be
analyzed into two groups: (i) Automatic Speech Recognition and (ii) Sentiment Analysis using Natural
Language Processing (NLP). Finally, the system will be able to make a decision based on the user's
behavior. Our specific focus of this research work is Noise Suppression and Decision making.

Figure 1: A workflow diagram of the IBSVA system

Since the research project will work base on Deep learning and Natural Language Processing. We need
huge data to operate it. I think this project doesn't take more than one year.
Reference:
1. Using intelligent personal assistants to assist the elderlies An evaluation of Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant,
Microsoft Cortana, and Apple Siri, Published in: 2018 2nd International Conference on Technology and
Innovation in Sports, Health and Wellbeing (TISHW), Location: Thessaloniki, Greece
Available from: https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/8559503
2. Reis A., Paulino D., Paredes H., Barroso J. (2017) Using Intelligent Personal Assistants to Strengthen the
Elderlies’ Social Bonds. In: Antona M., Stephanidis C. (eds) Universal Access in Human –Computer
Interaction. Human and Technological Environments. UAHCI 2017. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol
10279. Springer, Cham
Available from: https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-319-58700-4_48
3. Google Assistant. Google. 2018. Accessed 20 February 2018,
Available from: https://assistant.google.com
4. Amazon Alexa. Amazon. 2018. Accessed 20 February 2018,
Available from: http://alexa.amazon.com/spa/index.html
5. iOS - Siri. Apple Inc. 2018. Accessed 20 February 2018,
Available from: http://www.apple.com/ios/siri/
6. Cortana | Your Intelligent Virtual & Personal Assistant | Microsoft. Microsoft. 2018. Accessed 20 February
2018,
Available from: https://www.microsoft.com/en/mobile/experiences/cortana
7. Robot Sophia | social humanoid robot | Hanson Robotics| Accessed 2016
Available from: https://www.hansonrobotics.com/sophia/
8. Pepper| semi-humanoid robot | SoftBank Robotics| Accessed 2014 prototype
Available from:
https://www.softbankrobotics.com/emea/en/pepper#:~:text=Pepper%20is%20the%20world's%20first,toda
y%20for%20businesses%20and%20schools.

9. Robot Nao| social humanoid robot | Aldebaran Robotics| Accessed 2008

Available from: https://www.hansonrobotics.com/sophia/