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wind2000 · Oct 31, 2007

Computer system tunes in to our emotions
Last Updated: Wednesday, October 31, 2007 | 9:26 AM ET
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
A technology that can recognize anxiety in people is being developed by an Australian computer scientist.

Gordon McIntyre, a PhD student from the Research School of Information Services and Engineering, is working on a computer system that detects anxiety by analyzing a person's speech and facial expressions. The Australian National University researcher says the technology could be applied in a range of areas, from seniors care to driver safety.

The system looks for physical and verbal cues that indicate changes in a person's emotional state. Changes in speech rhythm and pitch, as well as any quavering in the voice, are picked up by speech recognition software. Changes in facial expressions are tracked using artificial neural networks, which mimic how the brain processes information.

In developing the project, McIntyre plotted 65 landscape points on the face that change during various emotional states, such as the eyebrows, lips and nose. The computer determines emotions by measuring changes in the location of these landscape points compared to an average or expression-free face.

McIntyre says work by body language scientists such as the University of California, San Francisco's Professor Emeritus Paul Ekman, suggests an anxious face will often show contracting eyebrows, a tightening of the upper lip and a deepening of the furrow between the nose and lips.

"We build up an average shape of a face from a database," McIntyre says. "And then measure the difference between an average face and one that is subject to the emotion."

Two types of anxiety
McIntyre, who is working with psychology colleagues to develop the program, says there are two types of anxiety. Long-term anxiety is more easily recognized via facial expressions, while short-term anxiety is revealed through speech.

One of his major hurdles is the lack of anxious face samples from which to develop a template image of the emotion. McIntyre plans to create his own database with the help of ANU's School of Psychology.

He hopes to run a series of experiments next year where anxiety will be induced in participants through computer games or dialogue. Their speech and faces will be recorded for inclusion in McIntyre's database.

According to McIntyre, a computer that can detect anxiety could be used to help train medical practitioners to recognize the condition and to monitor patients who are not able to communicate their needs clearly.

"The important thing is to get something working to show people what can be done and then let them look at the situations where it might fit," he says.
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http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2007/10/31/tech-emotions.html

I bet all the secret services will be buying this technology -tongue2

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