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POSITIVE TECHNOLOGY JOURNAL

MIND, BRAIN, AND EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES - BY ANDREA GAGGIOLI, PH.D

Privacy & Cookie
About Me

Andrea Gaggioli

Tweets by @gag4all

NEWSLETTER

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POSITIVE TECHNOLOGY JOURNALS

* journals focusing on mind-brain-technology
* Behavior and information technology
* Cognition, Technology and Work
* Computers in Entertainment
* Computers in human behavior
* Convergence
* Convergence
* CyberPsychology and Behavior journal
* Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace
* Digital Creativity Journal
* E-minds
* Electronic Journal of E-learning
* Emerging Communication
* Games and culture
* Games for Health Journal
* Games Studies
* Gerontechnology
* Human Technology
* Human-Computer Interaction
* IEEE Pervasive Computing
* IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks
* IEEE Transactions on Neural Systems and Rehabilitation Engineering
* Interacting with Computers
* International Journal of Arts and Technology
* International Journal of Design Computing
* International Journal of Emerging Technologies in Learning
* International Journal Of Human-Computer Interaction
* International Journal of Human-Computer Studies
* International Journal of Web Based Communities
* International Journal on Cognitive Informatics and Natural...
* Journal of Systemics, Cybernetics and Informatics
* Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation
* Journal of Computer Assisted Learning
* Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication
* Journal of Cybertherapy and Rehabilitation
* Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied
* Journal of Intelligent Systems
* Journal of Medical Internet Research
* Journal of Mobile Technology in Medicine
* Journal of Neural Engineering
* Journal of NeuroEngineering and Rehabilitation
* Journal of online behavior
* Journal of Participatory Medicine
* Journal of Psychology of Science and Technology
* Journal of Sociocybernetics
* Journal of Technology in Human Services
* Journal on Multimodal User Interfaces
* Leonardo journal
* Metaverse Creativity
* Networks
* Neurocomputing Journal
* Personal and Ubiquitous Computing Journal
* Presence-Connect
* Presence: Teleoperators and virtual environments
* Psyche
* Psychnology journal
* Qwerty Journal
* Scientific American Mind
* Systemic Practice and Action Research
* User Modeling And User-Adapted Interaction
* Virtual Medical World Journal
* Virtual Reality Journal
* Zeitschrift für Medienpsychologie

CATEGORIES

* AI & robotics
* Augmented/mixed reality
* Big Data
* Biofeedback & neurofeedback
* Blue sky
* Brain stimulation
* Brain training & cognitive enhancement
* Brain-computer interface
* Call for papers
* Cognitive Informatics
* Computational psychology
* Creativity and computers
* Cyberart
* Cybertherapy
* Emotional computing
* Enactive interfaces
* Ethics of technology
* Future interfaces
* ICT and complexity
* Information visualization
* Locative media
* Meditation & brain
* Mental practice & mental simulation
* Neurotechnology & neuroinformatics
* Persuasive technology
* Pervasive computing
* Physiological Computing
* Positive App
* Positive Technology events
* Privacy & Cookie Law
* Research institutions & funding opportunities
* Research tools
* Self-Tracking
* Serious games
* Social Media
* Technology & spirituality
* Technostress
* Telepresence & virtual presence
* Transformative Experience Design
* Vintage computing
* Virtual worlds
* Wearable & mobile

DEC 14, 2018

TRANSFORMATIVE EXPERIENCE DESIGN

In the last couple of years, I and my team have been intensively working on a
new research program in Positive Technology: Transformative Experience Design.

In short, the goal of this project is to understand how virtual reality,
brain-based technologies and the language of arts can support transformative
experiences, that is, emotional experiences that promote deep personal change.

About Transformative Experience Design

As noted by Miller and C’de Baca, there are experiences in life that are able to
generate profound and long-lasting shifts in core beliefs and attitudes,
including subjective self-transformation. These experiences have the capacity
of changing not only what individuals know and value, but also how they see the
world.

According to Mezirow’s Transformative Learning Theory, these experiences can be
triggered by a “disorienting dilemma” usually related to a life crisis or major
life transition (e.g., death, illness, separation, or divorce), which forces
individuals to critically examine and eventually revise their core assumptions
and beliefs. The outcome of a transformative experience is a significant and
permanent change in the expectations – mindsets, perspectives and habits of mind
– through which we filter and make sense of the world. For these
characteristics, transformative experiences are gaining increasing attention not
only in psychology and neuroscience, but also in philosophy.

From a psychological perspective, transformative change is often associated to
specific experiential states, defined “self-transcendence experiences”. These
are transient mental states that allow individuals experiencing something
greater of themselves, reflecting on deeper dimensions of their existence and
shaping lasting spiritual beliefs. These experiences encompass several mental
states, including flow, positive emotions such as awe and elevation, “peak”
experiences, “mystical” experiences and mindfulness (for a review, see Yaden et
al.). Although the phenomenological profile of these experiential states can
vary significantly in terms of quality and intensity, they are characterized by
a diminished sense of self and increased feelings of connectedness to other
people and one’s surroundings. Previous research has shown
that self-transcendent experiences are important sources of positive
psychological outcomes, including increased meaning in life, positive mood and
life satisfaction, positive behavior change, spiritual development and
pro-social attitudes.

One potentially interesting question related to self-transcendent experiences
concerns whether, and to which extent, these mental states can be invited or
elicited by means of interactive technologies. This question lies at the center
of a new research program – Transformative Experience Design (TED) – which has a
two-fold aims:

* to systematically investigate the phenomenological and neuro-cognitive
aspects of self-transcendent experiences, as well as their implications for
individual growth and psychological wellbeing; and
* to translate such knowledge into a tentative set of design principles for
developing “e-experiences” that support meaning in life and personal growth.

The three pillars of TED: virtual reality, arts and neurotechnologies

I have identified three possible assets that can be combined to achieve this
goal:

1. The first strategy concerns the use of advanced simulation technologies,
such as virtual, augmented and mixed reality, as the elective medium to
generate controlled alteration of perceptual, motor and cognitive
processes.
2. The second asset regards the use of the language of arts to create
emotionally-compelling storytelling scenarios.
3. The third and final element of TED concerns the use of brain-based
technologies, such as brain stimulation and bio/neurofeedback, to modulate
neuro-physiological processes underlying self-transcendence mental states,
using a closed-loop approach.

The central assumption of TED is that the combination of these means provides a
broad spectrum of transformative possibilities, which include, for example,
“what it is like” to embody another self or another life form, simulating
peculiar neurological phenomena like synesthesia or out-of-body experiences, and
altering time and space perception.

The safe and controlled use of these e-experiences hold the potential to
facilitate self-knowledge and self-understanding, foster creative expression,
develop new skills, and recognize and learn the value of others.

Example of TED research projects

Although TED is a recent research program, we are building a fast-growing
community of researchers, artists and developers to shape the next generation of
transformative experiences. Here is a list of recent projects and publications
related to TED in different application contexts.

The Emotional Labyrinth

In this project I teamed with Sergi Bermudez i Badia and Mónica S. Cameirão
from Madera Interactive Technologies Institute to realize the first example
of emotionally-adaptive virtual reality application for mental health. So far,
virtual reality applications in wellbeing and therapy have typically been based
on pre-designed objects and spaces. In this project, we suggest a different
approach, in which the content of a virtual world is procedurally generated at
runtime (that is, through algorithmic means) according to the user’s affective
responses. To demonstrate the concept, we developed a first prototype using
Unity: the “Emotional Labyrinth”. In this VR experience, the user walks through
a endless maze, whose structure and contents are automatically generated
according to four basic emotional states: joy, sadness, anger and fear.

During navigation, affective states are dynamically represented through
pictures, music, and animated visual metaphors chosen to represent and induce
emotional states.

The underlying hypothesis is that exposing users to multimodal representations
of their affective states can create a feedback loop that supports emotional
self-awareness and fosters more effective emotional regulation strategies. We
carried out a first study to (i) assess the effectiveness of the selected
metaphors in inducing target emotions, and (ii) identify relevant
psycho-physiological markers of the emotional experience generated by the
labyrinth. Results showed that the Emotional Labyrinth is overall a pleasant
experience in which the proposed procedural content generation can induce
distinctive psycho-physiological patterns, generally coherent with the meaning
of the metaphors used in the labyrinth design. Further, collected
psycho-physiological responses such as electrocardiography, respiration,
electrodermal activity, and electromyography are used to generate computational
models of users' reported experience. These models enable the future
implementation of the closed loop mechanism to adapt the Labyrinth procedurally
to the users' affective state.

Awe in Virtual Reality

Awe is a compelling emotional experience with philosophical roots in the domain
of aesthetics and religious or spiritual experiences. Both Edmund Burke’s
(1759/1970 and Immanuel Kant’s (1764/2007) analyses of the sublime as a
compelling experience that transcends one’s perception of beauty to something
more profound are couched in terms that seem synonymous with the modern
understanding of awe.

The contemporary psychological understanding of awe comes largely from a
foundational article written by Keltner and Haidt (2003). According to their
conceptualization, awe experiences encompass two key appraisals: the perception
of vastness and the need to mentally attempt to accommodate this vastness into
existing mental schemas.

Crucially, research has shown that experiencing awe is associated with positive
transformative changes at both psychological and physical levels (e.g., Shiota
et al., 2007; Schneider, 2009; Stellar et al., 2015). For example, awe can
change our perspective toward even unknown others thus increasing our generous
attitude toward them (Piff et al., 2015; Prade and Saroglou, 2016) and reducing
aggressive behaviors (Yang et al., 2016). Generally, awe broadens our
attentional focus (Sung and Yih, 2015), and extends time perception (Rudd et
al., 2012). Furthermore, this emotion protects our immunity system against
chronic and cardiovascular diseases and enhance our satisfaction toward life
(Krause and Hayward, 2015; Stellar et al., 2015).

Considering the transformative potential of awe, I and my doctoral student Alice
Chiricofocused on how to elicit intense feelings of this complex emotion using
virtual reality. To this end, we modeled three immersive virtual environments
(i.e., a forest including tall trees; a chain of mountains; and an earth view
from deep space) designed to induce a feeling of perceptual vastness. As
hypothesized, the three target environments induced a significantly greater awe
than a "neutral" virtual environment (a park consisting of a green clearing with
very few trees and some flowers). Full details of this study are reported here.

In another study, we examined the potential of VR-induced awe to foster
creativity. To this end, we exposed participants both to an awe-inducing
3D-video and to a neutral one in a within-subject design. After each stimulation
condition, participants reported the intensity and type of perceived emotion and
completed two verbal tasks of the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking (TTCT;
Torrance, 1974), a standardized test to measure creativity performance. Results
showed that awe positively affected key creativity components—fluidity,
flexibility, and elaboration measured by the TTCT subtest—compared to a neutral
stimulus, suggesting that (i) awe has a potential for boosting creativity, and
(ii) VR is a powerful awe-inducing medium that can be used in different
application contexts (i.e., educational, clinical etc.) where this emotion can
make a difference.

However, not only graphical 3D environments can be used to induce awe; in
another study, we showed that also 360° videos depicting vast natural
scenarios are powerful stimuli to induce intense feelings of this complex
emotion.

Immersive storytelling for psychotherapy and mental wellbeing

Growing research evidence indicates that VR can be effectively integrated in
psychotherapyto treat a number of clinical conditions, including anxiety
disorders, pain disorders and PTSD. In this context, VR is mostly used as
simulative tool for controlled exposure to critical/fearful situations. The
possibility of presenting realistic controlled stimuli and, simultaneously, of
monitoring the responses generated by the user offers a considerable advantage
over real experiences.

However, the most interesting potential of VR resides in its capacity of
creating compelling immersive storytelling experiences. As recently noted by
Brenda Wiederhold:

Virtual training simulations, documentaries, and experiences will, however, only be as effective as the emotions they spark in the viewer. To reach that point, the VR industry is faced with two obstacles: creating content that is enjoyable and engaging, and encouraging adoption of the medium among consumers. Perhaps the key to both problems is the recognition that users are not passive consumers of VR content. Rather, they bring their own thoughts, needs, and emotions to the worlds they inhabit. Successful stories challenge those conceptions, invite users to engage with the material, and recognize the power of untethering users from their physical world and throwing them into another. That isn’t just the power of VR—it’s the power of storytelling as a whole.

Thus, VR-based narratives can be used to generate an infinite number of
“possible selves”, by providing a person a “subjective window of presence” into
unactualized, but possible, worlds.

The emergence of immersive storytelling introduces the possibility of using VR
in mental health from a different rationale than virtual reality-based exposure
therapy. In this novel rationale, immersive stories, lived from a first-person
perspective, provide the patient the opportunity of engaging emotionally with
metaphoric narratives, eliciting new insights and meaning-making related to
viewers’ personal world views.

To explore this new perspective, I have been collaborating with the Italian
startup Become to test the potential of transformative immersive storytelling in
mental health and wellbeing. An intriguing aspect of this strategy is that, in
contrast with conventional virtual-reality exposure therapy, which is mostly
used in combination with Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy interventions, immersive
storytelling scenarios can be integrated in any therapeutic model, since all
kinds of psychotherapy involve some form of ‘storytelling’.

In this project, we are interested in understanding, for example, whether the
integration of immersive stories in the therapeutic setting can enhance the
efficacy of the intervention and facilitate patients in expressing their inner
thoughts, feelings, and life experiences.

Collaborate!

Are you a researcher, a developer, or an artist interested in collaborating in
TED projects? Here is how:

1. Drop me an email at: andrea.gaggioli@unicatt.it
2. Sign into ResearchGate and visit Transformative Experience Design project's
page
3. Have a look at the existing projects and publications to find out which TED
research line is more interesting to you.

Key references

[1] Miller, W. R., & C'de Baca, J. (2001). Quantum change: When epiphanies and
sudden insights transform ordinary lives. New York: Guilford Press.

[2] Yaden, D. B., Haidt, J., Hood, R. W., Jr., Vago, D. R., & Newberg, A. B.
(2017). The varieties of self-transcendent experience. Review of General
Psychology, 21(2), 143-160.

[3] Gaggioli, A. (2016). Transformative Experience Design. In Human Computer
Confluence. Transforming Human Experience Through Symbiotic Technologies, eds A.
Gaggioli, A. Ferscha, G. Riva, S. Dunne, and I. Viaud-Delmon (Berlin: De Gruyter
Open), 96–121.

00:49 Posted in Biofeedback & neurofeedback, Blue sky, Technology &
spirituality, Transformative Experience Design, Virtual worlds, Wearable &
mobile | Permalink | Comments (0)

OCT 18, 2018

€4 MILLION EU GRANT FOR RESEARCH INTO PROVIDING SUSTAINABLE INFORMAL CARE

Over €4 million worth of EU funding has been awarded to the international
network ‘ENTWINE informal care’, led by Prof. Mariët Hagedoorn and Prof. Robbert
Sanderman from the department of Health Psychology at the University Medical
Centre Groningen (UMCG). The grant will be used to train 15 novice researchers
to study and solve questions relating to sustainable ways of providing informal
care.

Informal carers provide unpaid care to relatives or friends with a chronic
illness, disability or another long-term care need. An ageing population and
medical advances are causing a sharp rise in the care needs of the elderly and
the sick, while the availability of informal carers in Europe is dropping.
European healthcare systems rely heavily on the services of informal carers, but
there are fears for the long-term sustainability of these systems. Who will look
after our elderly relatives in the future, and how?

For the purposes of this research, the ENTWINE network will focus on both the
increasing need for care and people's willingness and capacity to provide care.
Cultural and individual differences will be among the factors examined.
Combining knowledge from the fields of both psychology and technology will
enable the network to develop support to help informal carers keep up their
commitment and to promote positive caregiving experiences. This could involve
using social robots to reduce stress among informal carers, or fitting homes
with sensors to monitor confused or vulnerable care recipients. The network also
wants to find the best way of implementing support such as this for informal
carers. By providing this research opportunity and training programme for novice
researchers, the network hopes to take up a key position in the development of
sustainable informal care in Europe.

The strength of the ENTWINE network stems from the close collaboration between
researchers from various academic fields and between universities, businesses
and non-profit organizations in a range of European countries. The researchers
(PhD students) will be appointed in the Netherlands, United Kingdom, Israel,
Italy and Sweden. As 15 PhD positions are available, the network is interested
in candidates from diverse backgrounds including psychology, sociology,
economics and technology, as well as computer, communication and health
sciences. Applications are welcome until 30 November 2018.

The EU grant has been allocated as part of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie programme:
a programme that aims to give novice researchers a chance to improve their
research skills, work with established research teams and elevate their own
career prospects. Grants are awarded on the understanding that the projects
involve several organizations from different European countries and that close
collaboration will develop between research institutes and businesses.

More information is available at: www.entwine-itn.eu

14:44 Posted in Positive App, Positive Technology events, Research institutions
& funding opportunities | Permalink | Comments (0)

SEP 23, 2018

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE AWE EXPERIENCE SCALE

Awe is a complex emotion composed of an appraisal of vastness and a need for
accommodation. The purpose of this study was to develop a robust state measure
of awe, the Awe Experience Scale (AWE-S), based on the extant experimental
literature. In study 1, participants (N = 501) wrote about an intense moment of
awe that they had experienced and then completed a survey about their
experience. Exploratory factor analysis revealed a 6-factor structure,
including: altered time perception (F1); self-diminishment (F2); connectedness
(F3); perceived vastness (F4); physical sensations (F5); need for accommodation
(F6). Internal consistency was strong for each factor (α ≥ .80). Study 2
confirmed the 6-factor structure (N = 636) using fit indices (CFI = .905; RMSEA
= .054). Each factor of the AWES is significantly correlated with the awe items
of the modified Differential Emotions Scale (mDES) and Dispositional Positive
Emotion Scale (D-PES). Triggers, valence, and themes associated with awe
experiences are reported.

To cite this research:

Yaden, D.B. Kaufman, S.B., Hyde, E., Chirico, A., Gaggioli, A., Zhang, J.W.,
Keltner, D. (2018) The development of the Awe Experience Scale (AWE-S): A
multifactorial measure for a complex emotion, The Journal of Positive
Psychology, DOI: 10.1080/17439760.2018.1484940

18:57 Posted in Emotional computing | Permalink | Comments (0)

BLOCKCHAIN TECHNOLOGY: LIVING IN A DECENTRALIZED EVERYTHING

In the last months, there has been a growing interest about blockchain
technology, the open and distributed ledger that is at the heart of Bitcoin and
other cryptocurrencies. This technology is based on a peer-to-peer network that
allows storing any type of transaction in a verifiable and trustworthy way.

However, the most important feature of blockchain is that its distributed nature
makes any type of centralized control authority superfluous: each transaction is
monitored and approved by all the users within the ledger, which ensures the
fairness of the process and also guarantees that the data cannot be traced back
to an individual (anonymization).

The self-sustainability of this process is based on “mining”, a review process
performed on each block of data in a blockchain that is rewarded by means of
“tokens” or cryptocurrencies. In other words, the “miners” are incentivized to
solve the complex computational problems required for validating the next block
of transactions (hence the term “blockchain”) and keeping the system protected.

About a decade ago, blockchain technology was first outlined in a brilliant
white paper written by Satoshi Nakamoto (which is a pseudonym for the author
whose identity is currently unknown) as a way to exchange and store Bitcoins -
the first cryptocurrency.

However, it was then soon realized that the potential of this distributed
architecture could go far beyond the use of virtual money.

Actually, the decentralized mechanism allowed by blockchain can be applied in a
number of different domains, to monitor all the online transactions – such as
contracts, tasks, payments etc. - that have become ubiquitous in our everyday
life.

As Iansiti and Lakhani explain in the Harvard Business Review:

> Intermediaries like lawyers, brokers, and bankers might no longer be
> necessary. Individuals, organizations, machines, and algorithms would freely
> transact and interact with one another with little friction. This is the
> immense potential of blockchain

In the last few years, the number of applications and uses of blockchain has
been growing rapidly, including the Internet of Things (IoT). The rapid adoption
of IoT solutions by enterprises is generating increasing demands for protecting
the complex ecosystem of connected devices from information attacks and physical
tampering.

According to analyst firm Gartner, in two years from now more than 25% of
identified enterprise attacks will involve IoT, though IoT will account for only
10% of IT security budgets.

Blockchain-based decentralized cryptographic processes can provide effective new
and more scalable ways to ensure that the data is legitimate and that the
process introducing it is well-defined. In this sense, it can be predicted that
blockchain (and its derived technologies) could become soon the very blackbone
of IoT.

For example, the IOTA project is a new-generation cryptographic token that has
been specifically conceived to meet the needs of IoT. In contrast to existing
virtual currencies, the IOTA introduces a new mathematical feature – the Tangle
– that reduces the computational complexity of the process and so thus makes it
more suitable for addressing the exponential scalability demands associated to
the IoT; in addition, unlike existing cryptocurrencies, the IOTA uses
quantum-resistant cryptographic algorithms, which are almost immune to
brute-force attacks.

In November 2017, IOTA has partnered with some of the biggest global corporate
names led by Microsoft, Volkswagen and Samsung Group to develop a secure
marketplace for data, as Reuters reports. The raising interest of economic
giants in blockchain technologies is no big surprise, since many analysts regard
this technology as one of the few innovations with highest disruptive potential.
For example, the World Economic Forum forecasts estimates that by 2025
activities based on distributed ledger technology will account for 10% of global
GDP.

The transformative potential of blockchain has not been overlooked by
governments and public institutions, too, which see in this technology also a
possible mean to develop new solutions for public issues. For example, the
European Union has recently launched a blockchain contest dubbed "Blockchains
for Social Good", which seeks entries from those who can propose solutions for
public issues, leveraging the technology to provide a mix of greater
transparency and decentralization.

18:52 | Permalink | Comments (0)

MAY 16, 2017

NEW FRONTIERS RESEARCH TOPIC ON POSITIVE TECHNOLOGY (MANUSCRIPT SUBMISSION: 28
FEB 2018)

We are very excited to present this new Frontiers research topic on Positive
Technology

Frontiers in Psychology is the #1 largest and the #2 most cited psychology
journal in the world. Impact Factor: 2.463 (as accessed May 2017)

Submission Deadlines

30 September 2017 -> Abstract

28 February 2018 -> Manuscript

We look forward to receive your contribution!

ABOUT THIS RESEARCH TOPIC

In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the potential role that
digital technologies can play in promoting well-being. Smartphones, wearable
devices, virtual/augmented reality, social media, and the internet provide a
wealth of useful tools and resources to support psychological interventions that
facilitate positive emotions, resilience, personal growth, creativity, and
social connectedness.

Understanding the full extent of this potential, however, requires an
interdisciplinary approach that integrates the scientific principles of
well-being into the design of e-experiences that foster positive change.
Positive Technology is an emergent field within human-computer interaction that
seeks to understand how interactive technologies can be used in evidence-based
well-being interventions. It’s focus of analysis is two-fold: at the theoretical
level, Positive Technology aims to develop conceptual frameworks and models for
understanding how computers can be effectively used to help individuals achieve
greater well-being.

At the methodological and applied level, Positive Technology is concerned with
the design, development, and validation of digital experiences that promote
positive change through pleasure, flow, meaning, competence, and positive
relationships.

This Research Topic aims to explore the potential of interactive technology for
well-being applications by focusing on the following issues:
- methodological issues in designing and evaluating positive technologies;
- technology-based strategies for promoting positive emotions and fostering
eudaimonic and self-actualizing experiences;
- computer-based applications in stress prevention, monitoring, and management;
- online positive interventions;
- interactive technologies and positive change;
- digital tools & strategies for enhancing individual and team creativity;
- videogames and serious games for mental health prevention and promotion;
- technology and spirituality;
- positive technologies for healthy ageing;
- technology-based interventions to promote life skills and social
connectedness;
- self-help applications to learn affective regulation strategies (at their
multiple levels: e.g., interpersonal, intrapersonal; automatic, explicit;
covert, overt).

Keywords: human-media interaction, positive psychology interventions,
cyberpsychology, mental health

13:09 Posted in Call for papers, Positive Technology events, Research tools |
Permalink | Comments (0)

APR 11, 2017

NEW RESEARCHGATE PROJECT ON POSITIVE TECHNOLOGY

I have created a new project in ResearchGate for those of you who are interested
to get the latest updates in PT research (including full-text access to most of
our papers):

https://www.researchgate.net/project/Positive-Technology-...

It is also a useful tool to explore scientific collaboration opportunities, so
if you find anything that matches your interests please let us know!

16:09 Posted in Positive Technology events, Research tools | Permalink |
Comments (0)

APR 06, 2017

CROWDSOURCING VR RESEARCH

If 2016 has been a golden year for virtual reality, there is reason to believe
that the coming year may be even better. According to a recent market forecast
by International Data Corporation (IDC), worldwide revenues for the augmented
reality and virtual reality market are projected to grow from $5.2 billion in
2016 to more than $162 billion in 2020.

With virtual reality becoming a mass product, it becomes crucial to understand
its psychological effects on users.

Over the last decade, a growing body of research has been addressing the
positive and negative implications of virtual experience for the human mind. Yet
many questions still remain unanswered.

Some of these issues are concerned with the defining features of virtual
experience, i.e., what it means to be “present” in a computer-simulated reality.
Other questions regard the drawbacks of virtual environments, such as
cybersickness, addiction and other psychological disorders caused by prolonged
exposure to immersive virtual worlds.

For example, in a recent article appeared in The Atlantic, Rebecca Searles wrote
that after exploring a virtual environment, some users have reported a feeling
of detachment that can last days or even weeks. This effect had been already
documented by Frederick Aardema and colleagues in the journal Cyberpsychology,
Behavior, and Social Networking some years ago. The team administered a
nonclinical sample questionnaires to measures dissociation, sense of presence,
and immersion before and after an immersion in a virtual environment. Findings
showed that after explosure to virtual reality, participants reported an
increase in dissociative experience (depersonalization and derealization),
including a lessened sense of presence in objective reality.

However, more research is needed to understand this phenomenon, and other
aspects of virtual experience that are still to be uncovered.

Until today, most studies on virtual reality have been mainly conducted in
scientific laboratories, because of the relatively high costs of virtual reality
hardware and the need of specialist expertise for system setup and maintenance.

However, the increasing diffusion of commercial virtual reality headsets and
software could make it possible to move research from the laboratory to private
homes. For example, researchers could create online experiments and ask people
to participate using their own virtual reality equipment, eventually providing
some kind of rewards for their involvement.

An online collaboration platform could be developed to plan studies, create
research protocols, collect and share data from participants. This open research
strategy may offer several advantages. For example, the platform would offer
researchers the opportunity to rapidly get input from large numbers of virtual
reality participants. Furthermore, the users themselves could be involved in
formulating research questions and co-create experiments with researchers.

In the medical field, this approach has been successfully pioneered by online
patient communities such as PatientsLikeMe and CureTogether. These social health
sites provide a real-time research platform that allow clinical researchers and
patients to partner for improving health outcomes. Other examples of
internet-based citizen science projects include applications in astronomy,
environmental protection, neuroscience to name a few (more examples can be found
in Zooniverse, the world’s largest citizen science web portal).

But virtual reality could extend the potential of citizen science even further.
For example, virtual reality applications could be developed that are
specifically designed for research purposes, i.e., virtual reality games that
“manipulate” some variables of interest for researchers, or virtual reality
versions of classic experimental paradigms, such as the “Stroop test”. It could
be even possible to create virtual reality simulations of whole research
laboratories, to allow participants to participate in online experiments using
their avatars.

09:41 Posted in Research tools, Telepresence & virtual presence, Virtual worlds
| Permalink | Comments (0)

FEB 28, 2017

BRINGING MORE TRANSPARENCY TO AI

The development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) has taken giant steps during the
last decade, to the point that for many experts, including the world-renowned
astrophysics Stephen Hawking and hi-tech entrepreneur Elon Musk, AI could even
destroy our civilization by overtaking humans. However, on the other side, AI
may bring about huge benefits for the humankind, some of which may be still
beyond our imagination of today. Thus, the scientific community is faced with
the challenge of how we can develop powerful AI systems that support our
civilization, preventing, at the same time, the potential side effects of an
uncontrolled AI evolution.

To address these challenges, in late September 2016, tech giants Google,
Facebook, Microsoft, Amazon and IBM launched a “Partnership on Artificial
Intelligence to benefit People and Society”. The new alliance has been
established “to study and formulate best practices on AI technologies, to
advance the public’s understanding of AI, and to serve as an open platform for
discussion and engagement about AI and its influences on people and society.”

As claimed in the mission statement, a specific goal of the initiative is to
help improving public awareness of what is happening in the AI field, where a
number of players are shaping the future of intelligent services. Also, the
Partnership aims at creating a more inclusive discussion, by extending the
participation from AI specialists to activists and experts in other disciplines,
such as psychology, philosophy, economics, finance, sociology, public policy,
and law, to discuss and provide guidance on emerging issues related to the
impact of AI on society.

The Partnership on AI to benefit People and Society has the potential to create
a greater multidisciplinary understanding of the opportunities and challenges
associated with potential breakthroughs in this field; yet, some key players,
such as Apple and Elon Musk's OpenAI, - a non-profit AI research project - have
not yet joined the club.

While the goals of the Partnership have been set, the strategy that the alliance
intends to put in place to attain these objectives is still unclear. Thus, it is
too early to understand how the association will concretely address the
challenges that needs to be addressed with the public, i.e., how can AI be
safely used to support military activities, or how to deal with the legal
responsibilities for any damages caused by AI to humans.

23:13 Posted in Research tools, Social Media | Permalink | Comments (0)

PING-PONG ROBOT

Developed by Omron Corporation, FORPHEUS (Future Omron Robotics Technology for
Exploring Possibility of Harmonized aUtomation with Sinic Theoretics) has
officially been given the Guinness World Records title for being the First robot
table tennis tutor for its unique technological intelligence and educational
capabilities.

According to the project's lead developer Taku Oya, the goal of FORPHEUS was to
harmonise humans and robots, by way of teaching the game of table tennis to
human players.

The machine is easily able to act as a coach thanks to cutting edge vision and
motion sensors it can use to gage movement during a match. FORPHEUS also
features an array of cameras that are situated above the ping pong table which
monitors the position of the ball at an impressive rate of 80 times per second.
This functionality also allows the robot to show its human student to see a
projected image as to where the return ball will land so that they may improve
their skills.

23:02 Posted in AI & robotics | Permalink | Comments (0)

FEB 22, 2017

THE POTENTIAL OF VIRTUAL REALITY FOR THE INVESTIGATION OF AWE

Alice Chirico, David B. Yaden, Giuseppe Riva and Andrea Gaggioli

Front. Psychol., 09 November 2016 https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2016.01766

Dipartimento di Psicologia, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milan, Italy

The emotion of awe is characterized by the perception of vastness and a need for
accommodation, which can include a positive and/or negative valence. While a
number of studies have successfully manipulated this emotion, the issue of how
to elicit particularly intense awe experiences in laboratory settings remains.
We suggest that virtual reality (VR) is a particularly effective mood induction
tool for eliciting awe. VR provides three key assets for improving awe. First,
VR provides users with immersive and ecological yet controlled environments that
can elicit a sense of “presence,” the subjective experience of “being there” in
a simulated reality. Further, VR can be used to generate complex, vast stimuli,
which can target specific theoretical facets of awe. Finally, VR allows for
convenient tracking of participants’ behavior and physiological responses,
allowing for more integrated assessment of emotional experience. We discussed
the potential and challenges of the proposed approach with an emphasis on VR’s
capacity to raise the signal of reactions to emotions such as awe in laboratory
settings.

20:23 Posted in Technology & spirituality, Virtual worlds | Permalink | Comments
(0)

JAN 19, 2017

FACEBOOK STUDY FINDS INTROVERTS FEEL MORE COMFORTABLE WITH VR SOCIAL INTERACTION

Via RoadToVr

A recent study by Facebook IQ, in which people completed one-on-one
conversations in VR, concluded that most people respond positively, and
introverts in particular feel more comfortable. Facebook IQ is a team
established to assist marketers in understanding the way people communicate
online and offline.

Facebook has been exploring the potential of social VR since their famous
acquisition of Oculus VR in 2014. More recently, they detailed the results of
their social VR avatar experiments and are planning to launch a ‘social VR app’
very soon. A different social experiment was recently completed by Facebook IQ,
an internal team who help businesses understand communication trends and
advertising effectiveness – asking 60 people to have a one-on-one conversation,
half of them being in person, and half being in a VR environment wearing the
Oculus Rift.

Interestingly, they didn’t use the VR avatars seen in Facebook’s own
demonstrations, nor did they use the Oculus avatars found in the Rift’s menus –
instead they used vTime, a popular ‘sociable network’ app available for Rift,
Gear VR, Cardboard and Daydream. vTime uses its own full-body avatar system,
complete with automatically-animating hands – surprising that these would be
used in such an experiment. However, it seems like the main reason for choosing
the software was to use its comfortable ‘train cabin’ environment – a familiar
and natural place to converse with a stranger – and the focus of the experiment
was about vocal communication.

Applied neuroscience company Neurons Inc was commissioned to assist with the
study of cognitive and emotional responses; all participants wore high
resolution electroencephalography (EEG) scanners, used to record electrical
activity in the brain, and eye trackers. With half the group conducting a normal
one-to-one conversation in person, and the other half engaged in vTime, Neurons
Inc was able to compare the level of comfort and engagement of a VR conversation
compared to a conventional one. The eye trackers helped to determine the user’s
level of attention, and the EEG scanners were used to assess motivation and
cognitive load, based on the level of brain activity. If the load is too low, it
means the person is bored; too high and they’re stressed.

According to the report published on Facebook Insights, the participants, who
had mostly never tried VR before, were within the ‘optimal range of cognitive
effort’, being neither bored nor overstimulated. The cognitive load decreased
over time, meaning that people naturally became more comfortable as the
conversation progressed. In the interviews that followed, 93% said that they
liked their virtual conversation partner, and those who were identified as more
introverted responded ‘particularly positively’, being more engaged by meeting
in VR than by meeting in person.

09:07 Posted in Research tools, Social Media, Virtual worlds | Permalink |
Comments (0)

JAN 02, 2017

BABIES EXPOSED TO STIMULATION GET BRAIN BOOST

Source: The Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU)

Many new parents still think that babies should develop at their own pace, and
that they shouldn't be challenged to do things that they're not yet ready for.
Infants should learn to roll around under their own power, without any "helpful"
nudges, and they shouldn't support their weight before they can stand or walk on
their own. They mustn't be potty trained before they are ready for it.

According to neuroscientist Audrey van der Meer, a professor at the Norwegian
University of Science and Technology (NTNU) this mindset can be traced back to
the early 1900s, when professionals were convinced that our genes determine who
we are, and that child development occurred independently of the stimulation
that a baby is exposed to. They believed it was harmful to hasten development,
because development would and should happen naturally.

Early stimulation in the form of baby gym activities and early potty training
play a central role in Asia and Africa. The old development theory also
contrasts with modern brain research that shows that early stimulation
contributes to brain development gains even in the wee ones among us.

Using the body and senses

Van der Meer is a professor of neuropsychology and has used advanced EEG
technology for many years to study the brain activity of hundreds of babies.

The results show that the neurons in the brains of young children quickly
increase in both number and specialization as the baby learns new skills and
becomes more mobile. Neurons in very young children form up to a thousand new
connections per second.

Van der Meer's research also shows that the development of our brain, sensory
perception and motor skills happen in sync. She believes that even the smallest
babies must be challenged and stimulated at their level from birth onward. They
need to engage their entire body and senses by exploring their world and
different materials, both indoors and out and in all types of weather. She
emphasizes that the experiences must be self-produced; it is not enough for
children merely to be carried or pushed in a stroller.

Unused brain synapses disappear

"Many people believe that children up to three years old only need cuddles and
nappy changes, but studies show that rats raised in cages have less dendritic
branching in the brain than rats raised in an environment with climbing and
hiding places and tunnels. Research also shows that children born into cultures
where early stimulation is considered important, develop earlier than Western
children do," van der Meer says.

She adds that the brains of young children are very malleable, and can therefore
adapt to what is happening around them. If the new synapses that are formed in
the brain are not being used, they disappear as the child grows up and the brain
loses some of its plasticity.

Van der Meer mentions the fact that Chinese babies hear a difference between the
R and L sounds when they are four months old, but not when they get older. Since
Chinese children do not need to distinguish between these sounds to learn their
mother tongue, the brain synapses that carry this knowledge disappear when they
are not used.

Loses the ability to distinguish between sounds

Babies actually manage to distinguish between the sounds of any language in the
world when they are four months old, but by the time they are eight months old
they have lost this ability, according to van der Meer.

In the 1970s, it was believed that children could only learn one language
properly. Foreign parents were advised not to speak their native language to
their children, because it could impede the child's language development. Today
we think completely differently, and there are examples of children who speak
three, four or five languages fluently without suffering language confusion or
delays.

Brain research suggests that in these cases the native language area in the
brain is activated when children speak the languages. If we study a foreign
language after the age of seven, other areas of the brain are used when we speak
the language, explains Van der Meer.

She adds that it is important that children learn languages by interacting with
real people.

"Research shows that children don't learn language by watching someone talk on a
screen, it has to be real people who expose them to the language," says van der
Meer.

Early intervention with the very young

Since a lot is happening in the brain during the first years of life, van der
Meer says that it is easier to promote learning and prevent problems when
children are very young.

The term "early intervention" keeps popping up in discussions of kindergartens
and schools, teaching and learning. Early intervention is about helping children
as early as possible to ensure that as many children as possible succeed in
their education and on into adulthood - precisely because the brain has the
greatest ability to change under the influence of the ambient conditions early
in life.

"When I talk about early intervention, I'm not thinking of six-year-olds, but
even younger children from newborns to age three. Today, 98 per cent of
Norwegian children attend kindergarten, so the quality of the time that children
spend there is especially important. I believe that kindergarten should be more
than just a holding place -- it should be a learning arena - and by that I mean
that play is learning," says van der Meer.

Too many untrained staff

She adds that a two-year old can easily learn to read or swim, as long as the
child has access to letters or water. However, she does not want kindergarten to
be a preschool, but rather a place where children can have varied experiences
through play.

"This applies to both healthy children and those with different challenges. When
it comes to children with motor challenges or children with impaired vision and
hearing, we have to really work to bring the world to them," says van der Meer.

"One-year-olds can't be responsible for their own learning, so it's up to the
adults to see to it. Today untrained temporary staff tend to be assigned to the
infant and toddler rooms, because it's 'less dangerous' with the youngest ones
since they only need cuddles and nappy changes. I believe that all children
deserve teachers who understand how the brains of young children work. Today,
Norway is the only one of 25 surveyed OECD countries where kindergarten teachers
do not constitute 50 per cent of kindergarten staffing," she said.

More children with special needs

Lars Adde is a specialist in paediatric physical therapy at St. Olavs Hospital
and a researcher at NTNU's Department of Laboratory Medicine, Children's and
Women's Health. He works with young children who have special needs, in both his
clinical practice and research.

He believes it is important that all children are stimulated and get to explore
the world, but this is especially important for children who have special
challenges. He points out that a greater proportion of children that are now
coming into the world in Norway have special needs.

"This is due to the rapid development in medical technology, which enables us to
save many more children -- like extremely premature babies and infants who get
cancer. These children would have died 50 years ago, and today they survive --
but often with a number of subsequent difficulties," says Adde.

New knowledge offers better treatment

Adde says that the new understanding of brain development that has been
established since the 1970s has given these children far better treatment and
care options.

For example, the knowledge that some synapses in the brain are strengthened
while others disappear has led to the understanding that we have to work at what
we want to be good at - like walking. According to the old mindset, any general
movement would provide good general motor function.

Babies who are born very prematurely at St. Olavs Hospital receive follow-up by
an interdisciplinary team at the hospital and a municipal physiotherapist in
their early years. Kindergarten staff where the child attends receive training
in exactly how this child should be stimulated and challenged at the appropriate
level. The follow-up enables a child with developmental delays to catch up
quickly, so that measures can be implemented early -- while the child's brain is
still very plastic.

A child may, for example, have a small brain injury that causes him to use his
arms differently. Now we know that the brain connections that govern this arm
become weaker when it is used less, which reinforces the reduced function.

"Parents may then be asked to put a sock on the "good" hand when their child
uses his hands to play. Then the child is stimulated and the brain is challenged
to start using the other arm," says Adde.

Shouldn't always rush development

Adde stresses that it is not always advisable to speed up the development of
children with special needs who initially struggle with their motor skills.

A one-year old learning to walk first has to learn to find her balance. If the
child is helped to standing position, she will eventually learn to stand - but
before she has learned how to sit down again. If the child loses her balance,
she'll fall like a stiff cane, which can be both scary and counterproductive.

In that situation, "we might then ask the parents to instead help their child up
to kneeling position while it holds onto something. Then the child will learn to
stand up on its own. If the child falls, it will bend in the legs and tumble on
its bum. Healthy children figure this out on their own, but children with
special challenges don't necessarily do this," says Adde.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Story Source:

Materials provided by The Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU).

22:37 Posted in Brain stimulation, Brain training & cognitive enhancement |
Permalink | Comments (0)

MIND-CONTROLLED TOYS: THE NEXT GENERATION OF CHRISTMAS PRESENTS?

Source: University of Warwick

The next generation of toys could be controlled by the power of the mind, thanks
to research by the University of Warwick.

Led by Professor Christopher James, Director of Warwick Engineering in
Biomedicine at the School of Engineering, technology has been developed which
allows electronic devices to be activated using electrical impulses from brain
waves, by connecting our thoughts to computerised systems. Some of the most
popular toys on children's lists to Santa - such as remote-controlled cars and
helicopters, toy robots and Scalextric racing sets - could all be controlled via
a headset, using 'the power of thought'.

This could be based on levels of concentration - thinking of your favourite
colour or stroking your dog, for example. Instead of a hand-held controller, a
headset is used to create a brain-computer interface - a communication link
between the human brain and the computerised device.

Sensors in the headset measure the electrical impulses from brain at various
different frequencies - each frequency can be somewhat controlled, under special
circumstances. This activity is then processed by a computer, amplified and fed
into the electrical circuit of the electronic toy. Professor James comments on
the future potential for this technology: "Whilst brain-computer interfaces
already exist - there are already a few gaming headsets on the market - their
functionality has been quite limited.

New research is making the headsets now read cleaner and stronger signals than
ever before - this means stronger links to the toy, game or action thus making
it a very immersive experience. "The exciting bit is what comes next - how long
before we start unlocking the front door or answering the phone through
brain-computer interfaces?"

22:33 Posted in Biofeedback & neurofeedback, Brain stimulation, Brain training &
cognitive enhancement, Brain-computer interface | Permalink | Comments (0)

THE POTENTIAL OF VIRTUAL REALITY FOR THE INVESTIGATION OF AWE

The Potential of Virtual Reality for the Investigation of Awe

Alice Chirico, David B. Yaden, Giuseppe Riva and Andrea Gaggioli

Front. Psychol., 09 November 2016 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2016.01766

22:21 Posted in Emotional computing, Research tools, Virtual worlds | Permalink
| Comments (0)

WHY WE SHOULD FIX INEQUALITIES IN SCIENCE

Science is a source of progress and the best hope for the future of mankind.
With a world population reaching seven billion individuals and a growing
consumption of (increasingly scarce) natural resources, the only chance that we
have to avoid the collapse of civilization caused by our own expansion is to
find new strategies for sustainable development. But addressing this challenge
will be impossible without the support of scientific and technological
innovation.

Thanks to scientific research, we have conquered space, developed therapies for
devastating pathologies, and explored the mysteries of matter. Science is
illuminating our understanding of the most complex object in nature—the
brain—and expanding our knowledge of the universe. But today, science is
suffering from several diseases.

In most countries, researchers strive to find the economic resources to carry
out their research and keep their jobs. Since research funding is scarce,
scientists are forced to compete with peers in order to obtain them. The odds of
winning this hard competition, however, are increasingly more dependent upon the
scientific impact and productivity of grant seekers than they are on the
excellence of the research proposals. As a consequence, researchers who are not
able to produce a decent number of publications on sufficiently prestigious
outlets have almost no chance of receiving funding and realizing their ideas.
This is why the notorious motto, publish or perish, has become the #1 concern of
most researchers in the world.

The pressure to publish has several negative implications. First, it pushes
conflicts of interest and risks of scientific misconduct, for example
falsification or fabrication of data. Furthermore, the spasmodic need to
increase one’s h-index (a way to measure academic impact) leads researchers (and
especially younger scholars) to focus on topics that are currently more
mainstream or fashionable, and thus more likely to attract a greater number of
citations from other authors. And last - but not least - while the rush to
publish can generate more papers, it also increases the volume of poor
scientific work. It could be argued that only a competitive system, such as the
current one, can make it possible to select the best talents and ideas, thus
ensuring the highest return on investment for society. But in reality, there is
no evidence that the increase in scientific productivity is associated with
better research outcomes.

Furthermore, as recently shown by University of Michigan sociologist Yu Xie,
science is becoming more and more a ‘‘winner takes all’’ field, in which a few
talented scientists receive much greater recognition and rewards than
lesser-known scientists for comparable contributions. As a consequence, many
young researchers, although brilliant, have little chance of being recognized at
all because most of the available resources are taken by the ‘‘giants’’ of their
scientific disciplines. But in addition to diminishing integrity, lowering
scientific quality, and spreading frustration among younger scholars, the
current system may also threaten the very driving forces behind science: the
passion to invent and discover. As noted by Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer,
two prominent experts of innovation, ‘‘what doesn’t motivate creativity can kill
it.’’

22:16 Posted in Blue sky | Permalink | Comments (0)

THE IMPACT OF VIRTUAL REALITY ON CHRONIC PAIN

The Impact of Virtual Reality on Chronic Pain.

PLoS One. 2016;11(12):e0167523

Authors: Jones T, Moore T, Choo J

Abstract. The treatment of chronic pain could benefit from additional non-opioid
interventions. Virtual reality (VR) has been shown to be effective in decreasing
pain for procedural or acute pain but to date there have been few studies on its
use in chronic pain. The present study was an investigation of the impact of a
virtual reality application for chronic pain. Thirty (30) participants with
various chronic pain conditions were offered a five-minute session using a
virtual reality application called Cool! Participants were asked about their
pain using a 0-10 visual analog scale rating before the VR session, during the
session and immediately after the session. They were also asked about immersion
into the VR world and about possible side effects. Pain was reduced from
pre-session to post-session by 33%. Pain was reduced from pre-session during the
VR session by 60%. These changes were both statistically significant at the p <
.001 level. Three participants (10%) reported no change between pre and post
pain ratings. Ten participants (33%) reported complete pain relief while doing
the virtual reality session. All participants (100%) reported a decrease in pain
to some degree between pre-session pain and during-session pain. The virtual
reality experience was found here to provide a significant amount of pain
relief. A head mounted display (HMD) was used with all subjects and no
discomfort was experienced. Only one participant noted any side effects. VR
seems to have promise as a non-opioid treatment for chronic pain and further
investigation is warranted.

22:12 Posted in Virtual worlds | Permalink | Comments (0)

EFFECTS OF SMART-TABLET-BASED NEUROFEEDBACK TRAINING ON COGNITIVE FUNCTION IN
CHILDREN WITH ATTENTION PROBLEMS

Effects of Smart-Tablet-Based Neurofeedback Training on Cognitive Function in
Children with Attention Problems

J Child Neurol. 2016 May;31(6):750-60 Authors: Shin MS, Jeon H, Kim M, Hwang T,
Oh SJ, Hwangbo M, Kim KJ

Abstract We sought to determine whether smart-tablet-based neurofeedback could
improve executive function-including attention, working memory, and
self-regulation-in children with attention problems. Forty children (10-12 years
old) with attention problems, as determined by ratings on the Conners Parent
Rating Scale, were assigned to either a neurofeedback group that received 16
sessions or a control group. A comprehensive test battery that assessed general
intelligence, visual and auditory attention, attentional shifting, response
inhibition and behavior rating scales were administered to both groups before
neurofeedback training. Several neuropsychological tests were conducted at
posttraining and follow-up assessment. Scores on several neuropsychological
tests and parent behavior rating scales showed significant improvement in the
training group but not in the controls. The improvements remained through the
follow-up assessment. This study suggests that the smart-tablet-based
neurofeedback training program might improve cognitive function in children with
attention problems.

22:07 Posted in Biofeedback & neurofeedback | Permalink | Comments (0)

OCT 15, 2016

TRANSFORMING EXPERIENCE: THE POTENTIAL OF AUGMENTED REALITY AND VIRTUAL REALITY
FOR ENHANCING PERSONAL AND CLINICAL CHANGE

Front. Psychiatry, 30 September 2016 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2016.00164

Giuseppe Riva, Rosa M. Baños, Cristina Botella, Fabrizia Mantovani and Andrea
Gaggioli

During life, many personal changes occur. These include changing house, school,
work, and even friends and partners. However, the daily experience shows clearly
that, in some situations, subjects are unable to change even if they want to.
The recent advances in psychology and neuroscience are now providing a better
view of personal change, the change affecting our assumptive world: (a) the
focus of personal change is reducing the distance between self and reality
(conflict); (b) this reduction is achieved through (1) an intense focus on the
particular experience creating the conflict or (2) an internal or external
reorganization of this experience; (c) personal change requires a progression
through a series of different stages that however happen in discontinuous and
non-linear ways; and (d) clinical psychology is often used to facilitate
personal change when subjects are unable to move forward. Starting from these
premises, the aim of this paper is to review the potential of virtuality for
enhancing the processes of personal and clinical change. First, the paper
focuses on the two leading virtual technologies – augmented reality (AR) and
virtual reality (VR) – exploring their current uses in behavioral health and the
outcomes of the 28 available systematic reviews and meta-analyses. Then the
paper discusses the added value provided by VR and AR in transforming our
external experience by focusing on the high level of personal efficacy and
self-reflectiveness generated by their sense of presence and emotional
engagement. Finally, it outlines the potential future use of virtuality for
transforming our inner experience by structuring, altering, and/ or replacing
our bodily self-consciousness. The final outcome may be a new generation of
transformative experiences that provide knowledge that is epistemically
inaccessible to the individual until he or she has that experience, while at the
same time transforming the individual's worldview.

15:49 Posted in Research tools, Technology & spirituality, Telepresence &
virtual presence, Transformative Experience Design, Virtual worlds | Permalink

SEP 19, 2016

PFIZER LAUNCHES NEW "MOODIVATOR" APP TO HELP SUPPORT, ENCOURAGE AND MOTIVATE
PEOPLE WITH DEPRESSION

has launched a new app, Moodivator, to help motivate and encourage the millions
of adults who experience depression. Depression is one of the most common mental
health disorders in the United States, as an estimated one in 15 adults (6.7%)
experience at least one major depressive episode in any given year.
Living with depression can feel isolating, overwhelming and impact all aspects
of a person's life. An increasing number of patients, especially those who
suffer from chronic conditions like depression, are turning to their smartphones
to supplement treatment they receive. The new app aims to provide ongoing
motivation in a simple and portable way. Moodivator is designed to help
complement the treatment patients receive by allowing them to track their mood,
set goals and establish routines that can help support them in their daily life.
The Moodivator app is free and available to download for iPhones from the Apple
App Store

Treatment for depression often includes a number of approaches such as talk
therapy, medication, peer support and a personal wellness plan - however, it may
be challenging for some patients to adhere to their treatment. Fortunately,
advances in technology like Moodivator are offering new ways to approach health
management, encouraging them to take a more active role in managing their
condition. In fact, a 2014 survey found that 70% of patients being treated for a
mental health disorder say they want to use a mobile application to monitor
their mental health on a daily basis.

"As awareness of the magnitude and severity of depression continues to mount,
technology like the Moodivator app represents a new and exciting frontier for
helping people with depression. The option to set, track and achieve personal
goals in the Moodivator app ties in nicely with cognitive behavioral therapy
techniques that I use often with my patients," said Susan Kornstein, MD,
professor of psychiatry at Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine,
who helped consult on the app's design. "The opportunity for patients to track
and export their mood and goal progress in easy-to-read charts is also very
useful, because the progress can then be shared with doctors to help inform care
decisions."

Mobile apps offer the potential to help address key barriers to accessing
real-time support for depression. Designed to fit into patients' schedules and
lifestyles, the Moodivator app uses a simple and accessible interface with
customizable features. Patients also receive encouraging and inspirational
messages in the app to help motivate them as they work to manage their
depression. This app includes a number of simple features that leverage some
best principles in managing depression:

* Goal setting: Ability to create customizable, manageable goals with clear
action steps to help patients achieve them, which can be made across one or
more categories, including work, home and family or social activities. Goals
can be adjusted over time and turned into helpful habits as part of an
ongoing routine.
* Mood tracking: A simple scale lets patients track how they are feeling when
it is convenient for them, whether multiple times a day or sporadically. Mood
tracking is an important tool for improving patients' emotional
self-awareness. Tracking mood through a mobile app also offers the
convenience of real-time reporting, which can make it easier to identify
long-term patterns with their care team.
* Sharing results: Opportunity for patients to share their goal progress with
their care team, showcasing their progress through clear charts.

The Moodivator app is not a treatment for depression. All patients should work
with their doctor to determine which course of treatment is right for them, and
even when patients start to feel better, they should continue their therapy and
work closely with their doctor until they reach an agreement to conclude the
treatment plan. This app includes information about a prescription treatment
option for depression.

15:32 Posted in Positive App | Permalink | Comments (0)

JUN 21, 2016

NEW BOOK ON HUMAN COMPUTER CONFLUENCE - FREE PDF!

Two good news for Positive Technology followers.

1) Our new book on Human Computer Confluence is out!

2) It can be downloaded for free here

Human-computer confluence refers to an invisible, implicit, embodied or even
implanted interaction between humans and system components. New classes of user
interfaces are emerging that make use of several sensors and are able to adapt
their physical properties to the current situational context of users.

A key aspect of human-computer confluence is its potential for transforming
human experience in the sense of bending, breaking and blending the barriers
between the real, the virtual and the augmented, to allow users to experience
their body and their world in new ways. Research on Presence, Embodiment and
Brain-Computer Interface is already exploring these boundaries and asking
questions such as: Can we seamlessly move between the virtual and the real? Can
we assimilate fundamentally new senses through confluence?

The aim of this book is to explore the boundaries and intersections of the
multidisciplinary field of HCC and discuss its potential applications in
different domains, including healthcare, education, training and even arts.

DOWNLOAD THE FULL BOOK HERE AS OPEN ACCESS

Please cite as follows:

Andrea Gaggioli, Alois Ferscha, Giuseppe Riva, Stephen Dunne, Isabell
Viaud-Delmon (2016). Human computer confluence: transforming human experience
through symbiotic technologies. Warsaw: De Gruyter. ISBN 9783110471120.

09:53 Posted in AI & robotics, Augmented/mixed reality, Biofeedback &
neurofeedback, Blue sky, Brain training & cognitive enhancement, Brain-computer
interface, Cognitive Informatics, Cyberart, Cybertherapy, Emotional computing,
Enactive interfaces, Future interfaces, ICT and complexity, Neurotechnology &
neuroinformatics, Positive Technology events, Research tools, Self-Tracking,
Serious games, Technology & spirituality, Telepresence & virtual presence,
Virtual worlds, Wearable & mobile | Permalink

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