The Virtual Human Breathing Relaxation System

Dar, Sanobar; Lush, Victoria; Bernardet, Ulysses

doi:10.1109/expat.2019.8876478

Cited by 10 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…Broadly speaking there are two complementary ways in with virtual humans are used; Firstly, as stand-ins for biological humans, in what can be described as "social interaction as a service, " and secondly, as a tool to develop and test models of human cognition, affect, personality, and behaviour regulation. In the prior application case, virtual humans are developed e.g., as virtual therapists (Ranjbartabar et al, 2019), for guided relaxation (Tunney et al, 2016;Dar et al, 2019), in language teaching (Scassellati et al, 2018), various forms of training such as communication and social skills (Razavi et al, 2016;Tanaka et al, 2017), negotiation skills (Broekens et al, 2012), and public speaking (Batrinca et al, 2013). For such virtual humans to create an efficient and satisfactory user experience, they have to behave coherently and consistently throughout the interaction (Faur et al, 2013;Saberi, 2016b).…”

Section: Virtual Humansmentioning

confidence: 99%

Expressing Personality Through Non-verbal Behaviour in Real-Time Interaction

2021

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The attribution of traits plays an important role as a heuristic for how we interact with others. Many psychological models of personality are analytical in that they derive a classification from reported or hypothesised behaviour. In the work presented here, we follow the opposite approach: Our personality model generates behaviour that leads an observer to attribute personality characteristics to the actor. Concretely, the model controls all relevant aspects of non-verbal behaviour such as gaze, facial expression, gesture, and posture. The model, embodied in a virtual human, affords to realistically interact with participants in real-time. Conceptually, our model focuses on the two dimensions of extra/introversion and stability/neuroticism. In the model, personality parameters influence both, the internal affective state as well as the characteristic of the behaviour execution. Importantly, the parameters of the model are based on empirical findings in the behavioural sciences. To evaluate our model, we conducted two types of studies. Firstly, passive experiments where participants rated videos showing variants of behaviour driven by different personality parameter configurations. Secondly, presential experiments where participants interacted with the virtual human, playing rounds of the Rock-Paper-Scissors game. Our results show that the model is effective in conveying the impression of the personality of a virtual character to users. Embodying the model in an artificial social agent capable of real-time interactive behaviour is the only way to move from an analytical to a generative approach to understanding personality, and we believe that this methodology raises a host of novel research questions in the field of personality theory.

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Section: Virtual Humansmentioning

confidence: 99%

Expressing Personality Through Non-verbal Behaviour in Real-Time Interaction

2021

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“…The full-fledged VHBRS is currently under development. In the first pilot study, we aimed to determine the feasibility of using breathing signals from a VH, namely body movement and breathing sounds, to influence the breathing behaviour of participants [117]. As a step toward the closed-loop control system, we implemented an open-loop system that uses passive entrainment, meaning that the external pacemaker is set to a fixed frequency independent of the frequency of the target system (Figure 8).…”

Section: Pilot Studymentioning

confidence: 99%

When Agents Become Partners: A Review of the Role the Implicit Plays in the Interaction with Artificial Social Agents

Dar

Bernardet

2020

MTI

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The way we interact with computers has significantly changed over recent decades. However, interaction with computers still falls behind human to human interaction in terms of seamlessness, effortlessness, and satisfaction. We argue that simultaneously using verbal, nonverbal, explicit, implicit, intentional, and unintentional communication channels addresses these three aspects of the interaction process. To better understand what has been done in the field of Human Computer Interaction (HCI) in terms of incorporating the type channels mentioned above, we reviewed the literature on implicit nonverbal interaction with a specific emphasis on the interaction between humans on the one side, and robot and virtual humans on the other side. These Artificial Social Agents (ASA) are increasingly used as advanced tools for solving not only physical but also social tasks. In the literature review, we identify domains of interaction between humans and artificial social agents that have shown exponential growth over the years. The review highlights the value of incorporating implicit interaction capabilities in Human Agent Interaction (HAI) which we believe will lead to satisfying human and artificial social agent team performance. We conclude the article by presenting a case study of a system that harnesses subtle nonverbal, implicit interaction to increase the state of relaxation in users. This “Virtual Human Breathing Relaxation System” works on the principle of physiological synchronisation between a human and a virtual, computer-generated human. The active entrainment concept behind the relaxation system is generic and can be applied to other human agent interaction domains of implicit physiology-based interaction.

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“…Unlike Virtual Reality (VR), which places the user in a simulated artificial environment, AR allows "augmentation" of real user experience by enhancing it with visual, sound, tactile, olfactory, and gustatory information [13]. AR and VR technologies are not just for entertainment or gaming, they have a real potential to make a difference in the healthcare industry and, in mental healthcare, they can become an effective solution for timely interventions and stimulation of personal change in people with mental health illnesses [14].…”

Section: Augmented Reality For Mental Healthmentioning

confidence: 99%

Towards Accessible Mental Healthcare through Augmented Reality and Self-Assessment Tools

et al. 2020

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<p class="0abstractCxSpFirst">Mental health presents a growing public health concern worldwide with mental illnesses affecting people’s quality of life and causing an economic impact on societies. The rapidly increasing demand for mental healthcare is calling for new ways of disseminating mental health knowledge and for supporting people with mental health illnesses. As an alternative to traditional mental health therapies and treatments, mental health self-assessment and self-management tools become widely available to the public. While such tools can potentially offer more timely personalised support, individuals seeking help are faced with the challenge of making an appropriate choice from an exhaustive number of online tools, mobile apps, and support programs.</p><p class="0abstractCxSpLast">In this article, we present myGRaCE – a self-assessment and self-management mental health tool made accessible to users via Augmented Reality technologies. The advantage of the system is that it provides a direct pathway to relevant and reliable mental health resources and offers a positive incentive and interventions for at-risk users. The system offers service users the resources to gain a better understanding of their mental state and increase control of their mental health conditions via self-monitoring and self-help.</p>

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The Virtual Human Breathing Relaxation System

Cited by 10 publications

References 11 publications

Expressing Personality Through Non-verbal Behaviour in Real-Time Interaction

Expressing Personality Through Non-verbal Behaviour in Real-Time Interaction

When Agents Become Partners: A Review of the Role the Implicit Plays in the Interaction with Artificial Social Agents

Towards Accessible Mental Healthcare through Augmented Reality and Self-Assessment Tools

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