Neurophysiological Assessment of Affective Experience

In the field of Affective Computing the affective experience (AX) of the user during the interaction with computers is of great interest. The automatic recognition of the affective state, or emotion, of the user is one of the big challenges. In this proposal I focus on the affect recognition via physiological and neurophysiological signals. Long‐standing evidence from psychophysiological research and more recently from research in affective neuroscience suggests that both, body and brain physiology, are able to indicate the current affective state of a subject. However, regarding the classification of AX several questions are still unanswered. The principal possibility of AX classification was repeatedly shown, but its generalisation over different task contexts, elicitating stimuli modalities, subjects or time is seldom addressed. In this proposal I will discuss a possible agenda for the further exploration of physiological and neurophysiological correlates of AX over different elicitation modalities and task contexts

Plug-in to fear: game biosensors and negative physiological responses to music

The games industry is beginning to embark on an ambitious journey into the world of biometric gaming in search of more exciting and immersive gaming experiences. Whether or not biometric game technologies hold the key to unlock the “ultimate gaming experience” hinges not only on technological advancements alone but also on the game industry’s understanding of physiological responses to stimuli of different kinds, and its ability to interpret physiological data in terms of indicative meaning. With reference to horror genre games and music in particular, this article reviews some of the scientific literature relating to specific physiological responses induced by “fearful” or “unpleasant” musical stimuli, and considers some of the challenges facing the games industry in its quest for the ultimate “plugged-in” experience

Enactivism, other minds, and mental disorders

Although enactive approaches to cognition vary in terms of their character and scope, all endorse several core claims. The first is that cognition is tied to action. The second is that cognition is composed of more than just in-the-head processes; cognitive activities are externalized via features of our embodiment and in our ecological dealings with the people and things around us. I appeal to these two enactive claims to consider a view called “direct social perception” : the idea that we can sometimes perceive features of other minds directly in the character of their embodiment and environmental interactions. I argue that if DSP is true, we can probably also perceive certain features of mental disorders as well. I draw upon the developmental psychologist Daniel Stern’s notion of “forms of vitality”—largely overlooked in these debates—to develop this idea, and I use autism as a case study. I argue further that an enactive approach to DSP can clarify some ways we play a regulative role in shaping the temporal and phenomenal character of the disorder in question, and it may therefore have practical significance for both the clinical and therapeutic encounter

Physiological arousal response to differing musical genres

Music is a complex medium that has social, psychological, and physiological implications. Music elicits early emotional responses (arousal) in the sympathetic nervous system, that later become consciously recognized emotions. We investigated how music genre effects physiological arousal by measuring participant skin conductance level (SCL). Physiological responses of 19 participants (3 male, mean age 23 years) were recorded by way of the iWorx 214 Psychophysiology Teaching Kit. The stimuli were four different genres of music: classical, Dubstep, Celtic, and big band (swing). Stimuli were presented to participants in one of four counterbalanced blocks. Participants\u27 highest SCL matched their reported genre preference 31.57% of the time. Contrary to our hypothesis, participants did not have a higher SCL for their preferred music, leading us to hypothesize that people habituate to their musical preference. The most significant result was that participants were able to accurately describe their emotional arousal to a musical stimulus. Thus, participants were able to recognize their physiological reaction to musical genres

Effects of musically-induced emotions on choice reaction time performance

The main objective of the current study was to examine the impact of musically-induced emotions on athletes’ subsequent choice reaction time (CRT) performance. A random sample of 54 tennis players listened to researcher-selected music whose tempo and intensity were modified to yield six different music excerpts (three tempi x two intensities) before completing a CRT task. Affective responses, heart rate (HR), and RTs for each condition were contrasted with white noise and silence conditions. As predicted, faster music tempi elicited more pleasant and aroused emotional states; and higher music intensity yielded both higher arousal (p < .001) and faster subsequent CRT performance (p < .001). White noise was judged significantly less pleasant than all experimental conditions (p < .001); and silence was significantly less arousing than all but one experimental condition (p < .001). The implications for athletes’ use of music as part of a preevent routine when preparing for reactive tasks are discussed

Emotion elicitation during music listening: subjective self-reports, facial expression, and autonomic reactivity

The use of music as emotional stimuli in experimental studies has grown in recent years. However, prior studies have mainly focused on self-reports and central measures, with a few works exploring the time course of psychophysiological correlates. Moreover, most of the previous research has been carried out either from the dimensional or categorical model but not combining both approaches to emotions. This study aimed to investigate subjective and physiological correlates of emotion elicitation through music, following the three-dimensional and the discrete emotion model. A sample of 50 healthy volunteers (25 women) took part in this experiment by listening to 42 film music excerpts (14 pleasant, 14 unpleasant, 14 neutral) presented during 8 s, while peripheral measures were continuously recorded. After music offset, affective dimensions (valence, energy arousal, and tension arousal) as well as discrete emotions (happiness, sadness, tenderness, fear, and anger) were collected using a 9-point scale. Results showed an effect of the music category on subjective and psychophysiological measures. In peripheral physiology, greater electrodermal activity, heart rate acceleration, and zygomatic responses, besides lower corrugator amplitude, were observed for pleasant excerpts in comparison to neutral and unpleasant music, from 2 s after stimulus onset until the end of its duration. Overall, our results add evidence for the efficacy of standardized film music excerpts to evoke powerful emotions in laboratory settings; thus, opening a path to explore interventions based on music in pathologies with underlying emotion deregulatory processes.Funding for open access charge: CRUE-Universitat Jaume

Tune in to your emotions: a robust personalized affective music player

The emotional power of music is exploited in a personalized affective music player (AMP) that selects music for mood enhancement. A biosignal approach is used to measure listeners’ personal emotional reactions to their own music as input for affective user models. Regression and kernel density estimation are applied to model the physiological changes the music elicits. Using these models, personalized music selections based on an affective goal state can be made. The AMP was validated in real-world trials over the course of several weeks. Results show that our models can cope with noisy situations and handle large inter-individual differences in the music domain. The AMP augments music listening where its techniques enable automated affect guidance. Our approach provides valuable insights for affective computing and user modeling, for which the AMP is a suitable carrier application