1 Doctoral Student position on the project “Computational modeling of language acquisition” in Finland | Aalto University

The Department of Signal Processing and Acoustics at the Aalto University School of Electrical Engineering is presently seeking to hire outstanding individual for

DOCTORAL STUDENT POSITION

in the Speech Technology Team of Aalto University in an interdisciplinary speech technology project “computational modeling of language acquisition”. Those who wish to do their master’s thesis on the topic and are willing to pursue post-graduate studies after their graduation are also welcome to apply.

Main tasks and requirements

The high-level goal of the research project is to understand how human children learn to understand and produce speech, and how computers could be programmed with similar learning skills in order to outperform the classical manually engineered speech recognition systems. In short-term, the focus is on the development of ecologically plausible computational models of different aspects of human language processing (perception, production, multimodal interactions) and evaluating these models with respect to data from behavioural studies. The research is simultaneously concerned with the development and application of low-level machine learning and signal processing algorithms and on the development of high-level models of language learning, making the work highly interdisciplinary, diverse and challenging.

The more specific content of the current position is not fixed in advance, but will be planned together with a successful applicant. The focus can be more on the technical side (machine learning/signal processing algorithm development), on the behavioural side (collecting and modelling behavioural data), or both.

Due to the interdisciplinary nature of the work, we are looking for an applicant with a strong background, skills and a burning interest in one or more of the following fields: speech/signal processing, auditory modeling, speech acoustics, machine learning, cognitive science, cognitive psychology, computational linguistics, artificial intelligence, or mathematics.

A successful applicant will have a M.Sc. (tech.) or an equivalent degree in a relevant field or has nearly completed the degree, has good programming skills (e.g., MATLAB, Java or C) and is a fluent user of English (both written and verbal). Capability for self-driven independent and productive work is a must. Basic or advanced knowledge in signal processing, machine learning, and/or statistics are a significant advantage.

Salary, contract and place of work

Aalto University follows the salary system of Finnish universities. The first contract will be a 6–month for doctoral students. Extension up to a total of 2.5 years is envisioned upon successful performance. For a M.Sc. thesis worker, the initial contract will be 6 months. In addition to the salary, the contract includes occupational health benefits, and Finland has a comprehensive social security system. The Department is located at Otaniemi campus in Espoo, Finland.