ASSESSMENT OF PALANTYPE TRANSCRIPTION AS AN AID FOR THE DEAF

This paper discusses the development of a simultaneous speech transcription system for the deaf based upon a Palantype shorthand machine. An initial investigation of such a system presented in an earlier paper is summarized and development stemming from this work is detailed. The design considerations of 2 hard-wired logical transcription systems are discussed and the results of trials of these systems with deaf subjects under practical conditions presented. Methods of improving the output text quality by the application of dictionary search techniques are also discussed. The results of emulations of several possible systems using limited dictionaries are presented and compared with the results obtainable using a very large dictionary. The text quality produced by these emulations is illustrated by transcripts of each emulation produced from a single recording of a text from Hansard. Finally, design criteria for a portable and relatively inexpensive microprocessor-based transcription system which would provide a good quality transcript are specified. © 1979, Academic Press Inc. (London) Limited. All rights reserved.