Neural networks are typically black-boxes that remain opaque with regards to their decision mechanisms. Several works in the literature have proposed post-hoc explanation methods to alleviate this issue. This paper proposes LMAC-TD, a post-hoc explanation method that trains a decoder to produce explanations directly in the time domain. This methodology builds upon the foundation of L-MAC, Listenable Maps for Audio Classifiers, a method that produces faithful and listenable explanations. We incorporate SepFormer, a popular transformer-based time-domain source separation architecture. We show through a user study that LMAC-TD significantly improves the audio quality of the produced explanations while not sacrificing from faithfulness.

Current research in machine learning and artificial intelligence is largely centered on modeling and performance evaluation, less so on data collection. However, recent research demonstrated that limitations and biases in data may negatively impact trustworthiness and reliability. These aspects are particularly impactful on sensitive domains such as mental health and neurological disorders, where speech data are used to develop AI applications for patients and healthcare providers. In this paper, we chart the landscape of available speech datasets for this domain, to highlight possible pitfalls and opportunities for improvement and promote fairness and diversity. We present a comprehensive list of desiderata for building speech datasets for mental health and neurological disorders and distill it into an actionable checklist focused on ethical concerns to foster more responsible research.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has gradually attracted attention in the field of artistic creation, resulting in a debate on the evaluation of AI artistic outputs. However, there is a lack of common criteria for objective artistic evaluation both of human and AI creations. This is a frequent issue in the field of dance, where different performance metrics focus either on evaluating human or computational skills separately. This work proposes a methodological approach for the artistic evaluation of both AI and human artistic creations in the field of robotic dance. First, we define a series of common initial constraints to create robotic dance choreographies in a balanced initial setting, in collaboration with a group of human dancers and choreographer. Then, we compare both creation processes through a human audience evaluation. Finally, we investigate which choreography aspects (e.g., the music genre) have the largest impact on the evaluation, and we provide useful guidelines and future research directions for the analysis of interconnections between AI and human dance creation.