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Alexandria K. Vail

curriculum vitae

contact

avail@cs.cmu.edu

I am currently a postdoctoral research fellow at the Human Sensing Lab in the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, where I have the opportunity to work under the supervision of Dr. Fernando De la Torre and Dr. Lori Holt.

I completed my Ph.D. and M.S. degrees at the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University. During my time there, I had the privilege of being advised by Dr. Louis-Philippe Morency as part of the MultiComp Lab in the Language Technologies Institute. My dissertation focused on multimodal and intra-/interpersonal modeling and analysis of the social interactions between therapists and their clients.

Prior to my graduate studies, I earned a B.S. in Mathematics and a B.S. in Computer Science from North Carolina State University, with minor concentrations in cognitive science and physics. Throughout most of my program, I was an active undergraduate researcher under the guidance of Dr. Kristy Boyer from the LearnDialogue Group and Dr. James Lester from the Intellimedia Group, both located within the Center for Educational Informatics.

My research interests include user modeling, affective computing, and multimodal behavior analysis, particularly within the context of healthcare and learning technologies.

Dissertation

  • A. Vail, Multimodal and Dyadic Modeling of Client-Therapist Interaction.
    15 December 2023. [pdf]

Journal Publications

  • J. Girard*, A. Vail*, E. Liebenthal, K. Brown, C. Kilciksiz, L. Pennant, E. Liebson, D. Öngür, L.-P. Morency, J. Baker. Computational Analysis of Spoken Language in Acute Psychosis and Mania. Schizophrenia Research, 2021.
    (*equal contribution)
    [journal article] [doi] [psyarxiv] [pdf]

Conference Publications

  • A. Vail, J. Girard, L. Bylsma, J. Fournier, H. Swartz, J. Cohn, L.-P. Morency. Representation Learning for Interpersonal and Multimodal Behavior Dynamics: A Multiview Extension of Latent Change Score Models. Proceedings of the Twenty-Fifth International Conference on Multimodal Interaction (ICMI 2023), Paris, France, 2023.
    [long paper] [doi] [pdf]
  • A. Vail, J. Girard, L. Bylsma, J. Cohn, J. Fournier, H. Swartz, L.-P. Morency. Toward Causal Understanding of Therapist-Client Relationships: A Study of Language Modality and Social Entrainment. Proceedings of the Twenty-Fourth International Conference on Multimodal Interaction (ICMI 2022), Bangalore, India, 2022.
    [long paper] [doi] [pdf]
  • A. Vail, J. Girard, L. Bylsma, J. Cohn, J. Fournier, H. Swartz, L.-P. Morency. Goals, Tasks, and Bonds: Toward the Computational Assessment of Therapist Versus Client Perception of Working Alliance. Proceedings of the Sixteenth International Conference on Automatic Face and Gesture Recognition (FG 2021), Jodhpur, India, 2021.
    [long paper] [doi] [pdf]
  • A. Vail, E. Liebson, J. Baker, L.-P. Morency. Toward Objective, Multifaceted Characterization of Psychotic Disorders: Lexical, Structural, and Disfluency Markers of Spoken Language. Proceedings of the Twentieth International Conference on Multimodal Interaction (ICMI 2018), Boulder, Colorado, 2018.
    [long paper] [doi] [pdf]
  • A. Vail, T. Baltrušaitis, L. Pennant, E. Liebson, J. Baker, L.-P. Morency. Visual Attention in Schizophrenia: Eye Contact and Gaze Aversion during Clinical Interactions. Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference on Affective Computing and Intelligent Interaction (ACII 2017), San Antonio, Texas, 2017.
    [long paper] [doi] [pdf]
  • A. Vail, J. Grafsgaard, K. Boyer, E. Wiebe, J. Lester. Gender Differences in Facial Expressions of Affect During Learning. Proceedings of the Twenty-Fourth International Conference on User Modelling, Adaptation, and Personalization (UMAP 2016), Halifax, Canada, 2016.
    Outstanding Paper Award.
    [long paper] [doi] [pdf]
  • A. Vail, J. Wiggins, J. Grafsgaard, K. Boyer, E. Wiebe, J. Lester. The Affective Impact of Tutor Questions: Predicting Frustration and Engagement. Proceedings of the Ninth International Conference on Educational Data Mining (EDM 2016), Raleigh, North Carolina, 2016.
    Exemplary Paper Award.
    [long paper] [eric] [pdf]
  • W. Min, J. Wiggins, L. Pezzullo, A. Vail, K. Boyer, B. Mott, M. Frankosky, E. Wiebe, J. Lester. Predicting Dialogue Acts for Intelligent Virtual Agents with Multimodal Student Interaction Data. Proceedings of the Ninth International Conference on Educational Data Mining (EDM 2016), Raleigh, North Carolina, 2016.
    [short paper] [eric] [pdf]
  • A. Vail, J. Grafsgaard, K. Boyer, E. Wiebe, J. Lester. Predicting Learning from Student Affective Response to Tutor Questions. Proceedings of the Thirteenth International Conference on Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS 2016), Zagreb, Croatia, 2016.
    [long paper] [doi] [pdf]
  • A. Vail, K. Boyer, E. Wiebe, J. Lester. The Mars and Venus Effect: The Influence of User Gender on the Effectiveness of Adaptive Task Support. Proceedings of the Twenty-Third International Conference on User Modeling, Adaptation, and Personalization (UMAP 2015), Dublin, Ireland, 2015.
    Best Paper Award.
    [long paper] [doi] [pdf]
  • A. Vail, J. Grafsgaard, J. Wiggins, J. Lester, K. Boyer. Predicting Learning and Engagement in Tutorial Dialogue: A Personality-Based Model. Proceedings of the Sixteenth ACM International Conference on Multimodal Interaction (ICMI 2014), Istanbul, Turkey, 2014.
    [long paper] [doi] [pdf]
  • J. Grafsgaard, J. Wiggins, A. Vail, K. Boyer, E. Wiebe, J. Lester. The Additive Value of Multimodal Features for Predicting Engagement, Frustration, and Learning During Tutoring. Proceedings of the Sixteenth ACM International Conference on Multimodal Interaction (ICMI 2014), Istanbul, Turkey, 2014.
    Nominated for Outstanding Paper Award.
    [long paper] [doi] [pdf]
  • A. Vail, K. Boyer. Adapting to Personality Over Time: Examining the Effectiveness of Dialogue Policy Progressions in Task-Oriented Interaction. Proceedings of the Fifteenth Annual Meeting of the Special Interest Group on Discourse and Dialogue (SIGDIAL 2014), Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 2014.
    [long paper] [doi] [pdf]
  • A. Vail, K. Boyer. Identifying Effective Moves in Tutoring: On the Refinement of Dialogue Act Annotation Schemes. Proceedings of the Twelfth International Conference on Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS 2014), Honolulu, Hawaii, 2014.
    [long paper] [doi] [pdf]