
Chapter 7
Basic Concepts of
Multimodal Analysis
Mihai Gurban and Jean-Philippe Thiran
Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland
7.1. Defining Multimodality 145
7.2. Advantages of Multimodal Analysis 148
7.3. Conclusion 151
References 152
7.1 DEFINING MULTIMODALITY
The word multimodal is used by researchers in different fields and
often with different meanings. One of its most common uses is in
the field of human–computer (or man–machine) interaction (HCI).
Here, a modality is a natural way of interaction: speech, vision, face
expressions, handwriting, gestures or even head and body move-
ments. Using several such modalities can lead to