Over 15 years ago, psychology professor Dr. Dom Massaro and his research associate Dr. Michael Cohen were wondering... How do people perceive and recognize speech by eye? How do listeners combine visual perceptions of speakers with what they hear to infer meaning? In pursuit of answers, this academic team spent over four years videotaping people as they talked. They converted the videotape into digital images and reassembled those segments in a computer program that converted typewritten words into a computer-generated talking head, Baldi®, whose facial muscles, jaw, and tongue moved with unprecedented accuracy.
When Dr. Massaro received a grant from the National Science Foundation to apply pedagogy to his research he chose to focus on deaf and hard-of-hearing children because they can't overhear conversations, which places them at a disadvantage in language development. During this phase of his research, he realized that Baldi® had the potential to help children with autism and other language challenges as well. That's how he came to give a talk at a "Cure Autism Now" conference.
In the audience, Lisa Reed was extremely excited to hear about his work. As the mother of an autistic son, she instantly understood the far-reaching implications and potential benefits that autistic children could receive from interacting with Baldi. When Lisa told husband Dan Feshbach about Baldi, he picked up the phone and called Dr. Massaro right away and offered to partner with him. That's when Animated Speech Corporation was conceived.
Massaro was delighted because it gave him a chance to get Baldi out of the lab and onto the computers of those who need him most. "Oddly enough," says Massaro, "there is money to support empirical and theoretical research in academic settings. But there is rarely money to make the outcome of the research available to people out in the world." That was the primary motivation for starting Animated Speech Corporation. By commercializing the technology, the company could make Baldi's language tutoring talents available to families, schools, and speech pathologists everywhere.
"Before Dom and Baldi came along," says Feshbach, "Lisa and I were tearing our hair out regarding our son's language issues. He was seven at the time, and he liked to use computers. Lots of autistic kids do. But while some of the available software helped him increase his vocabulary, it also taught him some bizarre social behaviors."
Feshbach's own motivation in partnering with Massaro centered on using computers to create lessons that can be tailored to fit individual children's unique needs. Feshbach hopes that passionate parents, teachers, and therapists will use Timo's Lesson Creator to create and exchange lessons in an online community.
Ultimately, Feshbach is driven to produce world-class software that children really enjoy. "I want to see language development lessons that are entertaining," says Feshbach, "lessons that get kids' creative juices flowing. There's no reason that using the software has to feel like a trip to the dentist. Instead, I want to provide a digital environment where the experience of learning is equal to the experience of engaging play."