Welcome to the “Conversational Grounding in the Age of Large Language Models” workshop which will be conducted with ESSLLI.
Motivation
Conversational Grounding is the vital process through which conversation participants develop and share new mutual knowledge, paving the way for this shared information to be referenced in future dialogues. This process encompasses more than the mere exchange of information through statements; it involves a complex interaction of visual cues, inferential reasoning, and dynamic feedback mechanisms. Despite extensive research in this field, numerous challenges persist, especially when adapting to diverse scenarios and contexts. These can include varying numbers and types of conversational partners, different sensory and action capabilities, and distinct objectives.
The advent of large language models may introduce significant shifts in how grounding processes are understood and new challenges to overcome, even as they offer novel solutions to existing problems. Now is an opportune time to unite researchers and professionals who are exploring various facets of Conversational Grounding. Our workshop aims to foster a deeper collective understanding of this subject and to share the latest best practices in the design, modeling, and application of conversational grounding within dialogue systems. Join us as we navigate the evolving landscape of conversational technologies together.
Outline
The workshop will consist of five ESSLLI 90-minute sessions over five days, during the first week of the ESSLLI summer school (July 29 – August 2nd) in Leuven, Belgium.
The sessions will include a mixture of the following:
- presentations of previous work by the organizers
- presentations of new work by participants
- group discussions
Each session will probably have the following structure –
- Initial presentation (background by organizers or new talk from participants)
- Discussions
- Second presentation from participants
- Discussions
- Group discussion on a topic
*Specific topics and schedules will depend on accepted submissions by the participants.
Topic Themes
Topics will revolve around the following(however other related topics are welcome) –
- Fundamental Issues in Conversational Grounding
- Use of LLMs for Conversational Grounding
- Situated and Multimodal Grounding
- Multiparty Grounding
- Grounding for Specific Application areas
Registration
Please note that all participants must be registered for ESSLLI. More information on registration is available here: https://2024.esslli.eu/
Submission Instructions
In order to participate, please submit a 2-page extended abstract describing your work related to conversational grounding, and what you’d like to present at the workshop via the following submission link – https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=cg24 (previously published or new work are both welcome).
Submissions must use the ACL template which can be found here – – https://github.com/acl-org/acl-style-files
Timeline
10th May, 2024 Deadline for paper submission
24th May, 2024 Acceptance notification
29th July, 2024 Start of the workshop
2nd August, 2024 End of the workshop
Venue
The workshop will be conducted as part of ESSLLI 2024 which will be held at the Faculty of Social Sciences, conveniently located in the city center of Leuven, Belgium.
Organisers
David Traum – University of Southern California
Justine Cassell – Carnegie Mellon University, INRIA
Biswesh Mohapatra – INRIA
Contact
For any query, please contact us at CG24_esslli@outlook.com