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TiCo: Time-Controllable Training for Spoken Dialogue Models

Kai-Wei Chang, Wei-Chih Chen, En-Pei Hu, Hung-yi Lee, James Glass · Mar 23, 2026 · Citations: 0

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How to use this page

Low trust

Use this as background context only. Do not make protocol decisions from this page alone.

Best use

Background context only

What to verify

Read the full paper before copying any benchmark, metric, or protocol choices.

Evidence quality

Low

Derived from extracted protocol signals and abstract evidence.

Abstract

We propose TiCo, a simple post-training method for enabling spoken dialogue models (SDMs) to follow time-constrained instructions and generate responses with controllable duration. This capability is valuable for real-world spoken language systems such as voice assistants and interactive agents, where controlling response duration can improve interaction quality. However, despite their strong ability to generate natural spoken responses, existing models lack time awareness and struggle to follow duration-related instructions (e.g., "Please generate a response lasting about 15 seconds"). Through an empirical evaluation of both open-source and commercial SDMs, we show that they frequently fail to satisfy such time-control requirements. TiCo addresses this limitation by enabling models to estimate elapsed speaking time during generation through Spoken Time Markers (STM) (e.g., <10.6 seconds>). These markers help the model maintain awareness of time and adjust the remaining content to meet the target duration. TiCo is simple and efficient: it requires only a small amount of data and no additional question-answer pairs, relying instead on self-generation and reinforcement learning. Experimental results show that TiCo significantly improves adherence to duration constraints while preserving response quality.

Abstract-only analysis — low confidence

All signals on this page are inferred from the abstract only and may be inaccurate. Do not use this page as a primary protocol reference.

  • This paper looks adjacent to evaluation work, but not like a strong protocol reference.
  • The available metadata is too thin to trust this as a primary source.
  • The abstract does not clearly describe the evaluation setup.
  • The abstract does not clearly name benchmarks or metrics.
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Should You Rely On This Paper?

This paper is adjacent to HFEPX scope and is best used for background context, not as a primary protocol reference.

Best use

Background context only

Use if you need

Background context only.

Main weakness

This paper looks adjacent to evaluation work, but not like a strong protocol reference.

Trust level

Low

Usefulness score

0/100 • Low

Treat as adjacent context, not a core eval-method reference.

Human Feedback Signal

Not explicit in abstract metadata

Evaluation Signal

Weak / implicit signal

Usefulness for eval research

Adjacent candidate

Extraction confidence 15%

If you are doing eval pipeline work, start here:

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What We Could Verify

These are the protocol signals we could actually recover from the available paper metadata. Use them to decide whether this paper is worth deeper reading.

Human Feedback Types

missing

None explicit

No explicit feedback protocol extracted.

"We propose TiCo, a simple post-training method for enabling spoken dialogue models (SDMs) to follow time-constrained instructions and generate responses with controllable duration."

Evaluation Modes

missing

None explicit

Validate eval design from full paper text.

"We propose TiCo, a simple post-training method for enabling spoken dialogue models (SDMs) to follow time-constrained instructions and generate responses with controllable duration."

Quality Controls

missing

Not reported

No explicit QC controls found.

"We propose TiCo, a simple post-training method for enabling spoken dialogue models (SDMs) to follow time-constrained instructions and generate responses with controllable duration."

Benchmarks / Datasets

missing

Not extracted

No benchmark anchors detected.

"We propose TiCo, a simple post-training method for enabling spoken dialogue models (SDMs) to follow time-constrained instructions and generate responses with controllable duration."

Reported Metrics

missing

Not extracted

No metric anchors detected.

"We propose TiCo, a simple post-training method for enabling spoken dialogue models (SDMs) to follow time-constrained instructions and generate responses with controllable duration."

Human Feedback Details

  • Uses human feedback: No
  • Feedback types: None
  • Rater population: Not reported
  • Expertise required: General

Evaluation Details

  • Evaluation modes:
  • Agentic eval: None
  • Quality controls: Not reported
  • Evidence quality: Low
  • Use this page as: Background context only

Protocol And Measurement Signals

Benchmarks / Datasets

No benchmark or dataset names were extracted from the available abstract.

Reported Metrics

No metric terms were extracted from the available abstract.

Research Brief

Metadata summary

We propose TiCo, a simple post-training method for enabling spoken dialogue models (SDMs) to follow time-constrained instructions and generate responses with controllable duration.

Based on abstract + metadata only. Check the source paper before making high-confidence protocol decisions.

Key Takeaways

  • We propose TiCo, a simple post-training method for enabling spoken dialogue models (SDMs) to follow time-constrained instructions and generate responses with controllable duration.
  • This capability is valuable for real-world spoken language systems such as voice assistants and interactive agents, where controlling response duration can improve interaction quality.
  • However, despite their strong ability to generate natural spoken responses, existing models lack time awareness and struggle to follow duration-related instructions (e.g., "Please generate a response lasting about 15 seconds").

Researcher Actions

  • Compare this paper against nearby papers in the same arXiv category before using it for protocol decisions.
  • Check the full text for explicit evaluation design choices (raters, protocol, and metrics).
  • Use related-paper links to find stronger protocol-specific references.

Caveats

  • Generated from abstract + metadata only; no PDF parsing.
  • Signals below are heuristic and may miss details reported outside the abstract.

Recommended Queries

Research Summary

Contribution Summary

  • We propose TiCo, a simple post-training method for enabling spoken dialogue models (SDMs) to follow time-constrained instructions and generate responses with controllable duration.
  • This capability is valuable for real-world spoken language systems such as voice assistants and interactive agents, where controlling response duration can improve interaction quality.
  • Through an empirical evaluation of both open-source and commercial SDMs, we show that they frequently fail to satisfy such time-control requirements.

Why It Matters For Eval

  • This capability is valuable for real-world spoken language systems such as voice assistants and interactive agents, where controlling response duration can improve interaction quality.
  • Through an empirical evaluation of both open-source and commercial SDMs, we show that they frequently fail to satisfy such time-control requirements.

Researcher Checklist

  • Gap: Human feedback protocol is explicit

    No explicit human feedback protocol detected.

  • Gap: Evaluation mode is explicit

    No clear evaluation mode extracted.

  • Gap: Quality control reporting appears

    No calibration/adjudication/IAA control explicitly detected.

  • Gap: Benchmark or dataset anchors are present

    No benchmark/dataset anchor extracted from abstract.

  • Gap: Metric reporting is present

    No metric terms extracted.

Related Papers

Papers are ranked by protocol overlap, extraction signal alignment, and semantic proximity.

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