Tips,for,Choosing,Forensic,Tra business, insurance Tips for Choosing a Forensic Transcription Provider

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There are a variety of companies out thereclaiming to offer forensic transcription and if you don’t know much about it,it makes it difficult to determine the likely quality of each service provider.First off, there are two questions that I must address. What is forensictranscription and who is qualified to perform it.What is ForensicTranscription?Forensic transcription can be considered the transcription ofanything of an evidentiary nature. However, it is often used to referspecifically to the transcription of marginally intelligible speech. Actually -not just the transcription of it but the scientific methods used in doing so. Thissecond definition of forensic transcription is the one this article addresses.The best forensic transcriptionists are going to be linguists with amastery of phonetics. They don’t just listen closely to the dialog and typewhat they here. They use various audio enhancement and noise reduction methods aswell as more traditional means that transcriptionists use such as looping,slowing down the speed of the speech and using high quality headphones. Inaddition, these forensic transcriptionists will pay close attention topragmatics, syntax, and other characteristics of a person’s speech and finally,they may use a spectrogram to help in the decoding process. A spectrogram is avisual representation of a speech waveform.Speech and SpectrogramsWhen we speak we produce different types of sounds and these soundsare created in different ways. Sounds are created by different parts of thetongue, lips, soft palate, teeth, and so-forth. How and when air movementoccurs in different parts of the vocal tract such as the oral and nasalcavities is also important. The point is that there is a variety of verydifferent types of sounds and these different types of sound show updifferently on the spectrogram. Spectrograms show harmonics, plosives,fricatives, nasal stops and so-forth in distinct ways. A linguist can’t read aspectrogram like a book, but it can give clues by showing the types of soundsthat are made; even when the speech itself isn’t all that intelligible. This inturn helps the linguist decode difficult-to-understand speech.Finding the Right CompanyIf you have a speech recording that is for some reason difficult tounderstand, you will want to find a company that provides forensictranscription services. Many transcription companies will accept marginallyintelligible recordings (and charge you more for it) but the only difference inservice is that they will spend more time listening to it. They will use thetried and true methods that transcriptionists have used for years withrecordings of either good or fair quality (looping, slowing the speech, andturning up the volume). This will be a waste of your money. It may be okay forslightly difficult or noisy recordings but not the really difficult stuff.So in order to keep the “unintelligible” and “inaudible” entries toa minimum you will have to look beyond the typical transcription company (i.e.,medical, legal, business, and general) to take a crack at your recording. Youcan take a look at forensic audio and “more advanced” transcription anddetective related companies. These will often produce better results but youstill have to be careful. Many of these companies will have an audio engineer useaudio enhancement techniques at an attempt to improve the intelligibility - butthen they assign the actual transcription to a regular transcriptionist. Peopleneed to understand that audio enhancement only goes so far. Oftentimes itdoesn’t make anything easier to understand. It’ll make the recording less noisyor “more listenable” by eliminating buzzing, tones, hum, and the like, but thespeech itself will often remain mostly unintelligible. Since the cost is muchmore at this level your recording will be given more attention and theadditional time may yield greater results with the deciphering process but itisn’t the same as having someone with a background in phonetics do thedecoding.In addition, a forensic linguist probably won’t want an enhancedrecording. He will know which parts of the recording should receive filteringand can do it himself. This way none of the recording will be over enhanced orenhanced unnecessarily. Why pay an audio engineer to work on it when theforensic transcriptionist can do it himself and only to the appropriatesections?Not Just a TranscriptWhen your forensic transcription is done by a forensic linguist orphonetician (or sometimes a speech scientist), you not only get someone withthe ability to provide the best possible transcript, but you also get aforensic analysis and report explaining the methods used along with how and whythe linguist came to his conclusions. A curriculum vitae may also accompany thetranscript and report which can be helpful convincing a judge to allow its usefor trial. Having a qualified forensic linguist do the work and submit his analysisand CV may even be useful in preventing the case from going to trial at all.Below are two real examples of forensic transcription by a linguistbeing used in an investigation.Examples:Aprisoner who had previously been on probation was also suspected of murder. Thepolice decided to place a tape recorder in the visiting room of the prisonwhere the he would meet with his girlfriend. Unfortunately the visiting roomwas crowded with noisy people. Thus, the recorded dialog of the prisoner andhis girlfriend was mostly unintelligible. After the forensic examiner appliedspeech enhancement techniques to the recording and preformed a difficultforensic transcription, it was established that the suspect was telling hisgirlfriend about how he had committed the murder.Agroup of men were traveling in a car and were discussing a crime they hadrecently committed. Unbeknownst to them their discussion was being recorded.However, the radio was on at the time as well as a noisy car engine making itdifficult to understand. After using speech decoding and enhancement techniquesthe dialog was successfully transcribed. It was discovered that the men whowere suspected of auto theft, had been actually talking about a murder.