Hirotoshi Asano

The evaluation of the emotion by near-infrared spectroscopy

Our purpose is to develop the technology for evaluating emotion objectively from the oxygenated hemoglobin within a brain. Nowadays, Japan is an aging society. The elderly people who need care will increase from now on increasingly. In the case of the person requiring the care who lost the function to convey an intention especially, the objective judgment to a physical and mental pain is required. Persons requiring care will also increase in number with the increase in this population. We gave subject stimulus of a comfortable or an uncomfortable sound and measured concentration of the oxygenated hemoglobin of a frontal lobe part by near-infrared spectroscopy. Based on the experimental result, a comfortable state or an uncomfortable state was distinguished by concentration of the oxygenated hemoglobin using the bayesian network. As a result, we were able to estimate the subject’s psychological condition.

The Estimation of Taste Preference Based on Prefrontal Cortex Activity

The purpose of this study is to develop a method for objective evaluation about preference of taste based on brain activities. To achieve this goal, we propose a system estimated the preference from subject’s brain activities by using sensitivity matrix. The system is able to estimate subject’s preference by taking advantage of change of cerebral blood flow based on brain activities in the frontal lobe. The effectiveness of the system was tested through experiment. We measured the subject’s brain activities during drinking a beverage by using near-infrared spectroscopy and verified the effectiveness of the system from the data. From the results, an interesting data on relationship the psychological preference and brain activities in the frontal lobe was obtained. The estimated values corresponded to subject’s psychological values. The obtained data suggest that the effectiveness of the proposed approach. The finding results are a step toward identifying psychological preference of taste.

Group behavior of agents with an emotional model

Recently, there has been much interest in the study of the formation of groups of agents that cause interactions between agents and invent new functions. We gave some agents an action rule based on the interactions of human feelings by using a circumplex model. It had been decided that the parameters of feelings in this model should have only two axes. In this report, eight basic action dimensions and pure feelings on four corresponding axes were given to agents as a model of feelings and actions based on the multiple factor analysis theory of R. Plutchik, and the behavioral characteristics of the group of agents were examined.

Autonomous reconfiguration of robot shape by using Q-learning

A modular robot can be built with a shape and function that matches the working environment. We developed a four-arm modular robot system which can be configured in a planar structure. A learning mechanism is incorporated in each module constituting the robot. We aim to control the overall shape of the robot by an accumulation of the autonomous actions resulting from the individual learning functions. Considering that the overall shape of a modular robot depends on the learning conditions in each module, this control method can be treated as a dispersion control learning method. The learning object is cooperative motion between adjacent modules. The learning process proceeds based on Q-learning by trial and error. We confirmed the effectiveness of the proposed technique by computer simulation.

Estimating autonomic nerve activity using variance of thermal face images

In this paper, we propose a novel method for evaluating mental workload (MWL) using variances in facial temperature. Moreover, our method aims to evaluate autonomic nerve activity using single facial thermal imaging. The autonomic nervous system is active under MWL. In previous studies, temperature differences between the nasal and forehead portions of the face were used in MWL evaluation and estimation. Hence, nasal skin temperature (NST) is said to be a reliable indicator of autonomic nerve activity. In addition, autonomic nerve activity has little effect on forehead temperature; thus, temperature differences between the nasal and forehead portions of the face have also been demonstrated to be a good indicator of autonomic nerve activity (along with other physiological indicators such as EEG and heart rate). However, these approaches have not considered temperature changes in other parts of the face. Thus, we propose novel method using variances in temperature for the entire face. Our proposed method enables capture of other parts of the face for temperature monitoring, thereby increasing evaluation and estimation accuracy at higher sensitivity levels than conventional methods. Finally, we also examined whether further high-precision evaluation and estimation was feasible. Our results proved that our proposed method is a highly accurate evaluation method compared with results obtained in previous studies using NST.

Driver’s Modeling with System Identification Algorithm to Aim Reducing Drowsiness

The purpose of this study is to develop a biological model between skin temperature change and cooling stimulation to prevent drivers from becoming drowsiness. The traffic accident by an operation mistake or aimless operation has occurred. A factor of these accidents has a driver’s nap. In recent years, many researchers have studied eagerly this theme. The purpose of their studies is to detect a driver’s drowsiness. On the other hand, the aim of our study is to contribute to development of technology for safe drive assistance to maintain a driver’s arousal levels. This technology may give a technical innovation in the relevant area. In general, a change in blood volume in nasal part depends on the vasoconstrictive effect of the sympathetic nervous system along with changes in physiological and psychological conditions. The nasal skin temperature changes depending on the blood flow, thus, the temperature reflects the physiological state. The temperature also decreases as the blood flow in the nasal area decreases during sympathetic hyperactivity. The temperature increases as the blood flow in the nasal area increases due to sympathetic suppression. Previous studies have showed a relationship between nasal skin temperature reflecting autonomic nervous system activity and arousal level. The experiment was conducted to gather data for constructing a biological model of a driver and the relationship between cooling stimulation and nasal skin temperature was modeled with system identification. And the usefulness of models was examined with time response simulation and nyquist diagram. In summary, it is possible to construct biological model based on relationship between thermal stimulation and nasal skin temperature by using ARX, ARMAX and BJ of low order.

Development of Device for Measurement of Skin Potential by Grasping of the Device

In this study, we developed a device for measuring skin potential activity requiring the subject to only grasp the interface. There is an extant method for measuring skin potential activity, which is an indicator for evaluating Mental Work-Load (MWL). It exploits the fact that when a human being experiences mental stress, such as tension or excitement, emotional sweating appears at skin sites such as the palm and sole; concomitantly, the skin potential at these sites varies. At present, skin potential activity of the hand is measured by electrodes attached to the whole arm. Alternatively, if a method can be developed to measure skin potential activity (and in turn emotional sweating) by an electrode placed on the palm only, it would be feasible to develop a novel portable burden-evaluation interface that can measure the MWL with the subject holding the interface. In this study, a prototype portable load-evaluation interface was investigated for its capacity to measure skin potential activity while the interface is held in the subject’s hand. This interface, wherein an electrode is attached to the device, rather than directly to the hand, can measure the parameters with the subject gripping the device. Moreover, by attaching the electrode laterally rather than longitudinally to the device, a touch by the subject, at any point on the sides of the device, enables measurement. The electrodes used in this study were tin foil tapes. In the experiment, subjects held the interface while it measured their MWL. However, the amplitude of skin potential activity (which reflects the strength of the stimulus administered on the subjects) obtained by the proposed method was lower than that obtained by the conventional method. Nonetheless, because sweat response due to stimulation could be quantified with the proposed method, the study demonstrated the possibility of load measurements considering only the palm.

Physiological and psychological evaluations in low- and high-frequency noise using near-infrared spectroscopy

This study aims to evaluate physiological and psychological states using near infrared spectroscopy in noise environments with low or high frequencies. Our system assumes that noise affects brain activity in the frontal lobe. In order to evaluate the subject’s states in a noise environment, we constructed an experimental system that measures the subject’s states. The experimental method adopted here was borrowed from our previous studies. In the present study, we collected experimental data about the subject’s unpleasant or pleasant experiences by producing a noise environment with low and high frequencies. We conclude that noises with low or high frequencies affect our psychological states as well as brain activity in the frontal lobe.

Taste of Preference Evalution by Oxygenated Hemoglobin of a Frontal Lobe

We examined the possibility of the preference evaluation of the taste that used the near-infrared spectroscopy. As a result, the possibility of the objective evaluation by fNIRS was shown.

Investigation of Evaluation for Sound Reproduction by Oxygenated Hemoglobin Concentration Change in Frontal Lobe

This paper estimated possibility of the objective assessment scale for “DEEP KANSEI” from the amount of oxygenated hemoglobin concentration change in the prefrontal area using fNIRS. Specifically, physiological and psychological measurement was performed for comparison with “Extra HI System M” developed aiming at reproduction of “DEEP KANSEI” and the conventional system. Specifically, reproduction of the deep sensitivity by Extra Hi System M was first checked using the evaluation word relevant to DEEP KANSEI. Next, it measured using change of oxygenated hemoglobin under the same condition. Consequently, the difference was found by the part on either side from the center of the prefrontal area. Moreover, we showed a possibility that “DEEP KANSEI” could be evaluated objective from change of brain activity.