Behind the Scenes of Research: Roozbeh Sattari and The Quebec Speech Bank
What can the way we speak tell us about how we think? That’s the question driving the Quebec Speech Bank and the researcher behind it.
About Roozbeh Sattari
Roozbeh Sattari is one of our researchers at the Centre for Excellence in Youth Mental Health, where he is currently the project coordinator for the Quebec Speech Bank (QSB). Over the past seven years, he’s brought together a broad academic background: linguistics, electrical engineering, and psychology across a range of research projects, building expertise in study coordination, data collection, and cross-disciplinary teamwork along the way.
Sattari’s interest in speech research took root on an earlier project, when a new speech-sample section was added to a set of clinical assessments. Watching how much could be learned from a short, recorded sample like patterns in pacing, word choice, and structure that hinted at deeper cognitive processes, is what pulled him further into the field. That curiosity led him to meet Dr. Palaniyappan, our Centre’s Director, at a conference. He was drawn to the QSB immediately because it was a project built on the same intersection of linguistics, psychology, and neuroscience that had captured his interest from the start.
Ultimately, the project has the potential to significantly advance research on language, cognition and mental health
Roozbeh Sattari
What Is the Quebec Speech Bank?
The QSB collects and analyzes speech samples from adults across Quebec, from both English and French speakers. The project aims to create a large database of speech samples in order to further support research on speech and cognition.
The goal of the research is to gain insight on how speech patterns relate to cognition and mental health. It could eventually support clinical and computational research, including the development of improved assessment methods and tools for earlier detection.
How are speech samples collected?
To make participation as accessible as possible, language assessments are conducted remotely over Zoom. This means people from anywhere in Quebec can contribute without having to travel. It’s an approach that has made it easier to recruit from diverse communities and build a database that actually reflects the province’s population.
Why High-Quality Speech Data Matters
What surprised Roozbeh, once the project was underway, most was just how much preparation and coordination goes into data collection can even begin. That realization has shaped how he approaches the work: he is now dedicated to ensuring that all the data collection for the QSB remains high quality and consistent.
This has been challenging, considering how large scale and complex the database is. He’s paid particular attention to how the data is structured, so that it remains usable for analyses the team hasn’t even thought of yet.
Even small details in how the data is collected and organized can have a major impact on its quality and on the types of questions that can later be explored.
What Comes Next for the Quebec Speech Bank?
After less than a year of data collection, Sattari and his team are turning their attention to analysis. He’s especially curious to see whether the platform they’ve built could support future research beyond its current scope, and even potentially at a national scale.