Emotion AI: The Digitization of Human Emotions
Can emotions replace active input for an optimized user experience?
From the creation of the internet that revolutionized human connectivity, to advanced robotics made in our very image, technology has come a long way. All of these technologies however, have a limitation that does not allow them to interact effectively with their users. They lack the ability to sense our needs and need to be told what to do. You can replace touch screens with voice recognizing AIs like Siri and Alexa but you’ll still have to give input in one form or another. This is not really an inconvenience, but nonetheless, it is a barrier that stops technology from serving us to the best of its potential.
So what if these smart technologies could read our emotions, interpret our needs and fulfill them without any active instruction from our part?
To this end Affectiva, an emotion measurement technology company is on a mission to humanize technology with artificial emotion technology or Emotion Artificial Intelligence: a technology that aims to accurately measure human emotions.
Affectiva does this by using standard webcams and computer algorithms to identify key landmarks on a person’s face for example the corners of your mouth or the tip of your nose. Then it classifies different combinations of those landmarks into emotions, even taking into account the intensity of those emotions.
The software development kit (SDK) offered by Affectiva allows any developer to embed Emotion AI into their apps, games and devices, enabling their products to sense human emotions and adapt accordingly.
By doing this Affectiva has opened the doors to a whole new digital experience. The sense of wonder lies in the fact that the integration of Emotion AI in other technologies makes them emotionally aware and hence allows them to cater to our needs like never before. It can enable video games to generate a tailor-made experience to get the most satisfaction out of each player, like the game Nevermind that becomes more challenging based on the emotional feedback it receives. Learning apps, like The Little Dragon can use it to alter their curriculum and teaching methodology to ensure the greatest possibility of student understanding.
As of this moment, more than 1400 brands are using this technology to test out various products, ads and different marketing approaches on customers. This can finally allow robots to build emotional intelligence, like Mabu and Tegu that employ Emotion AI to interact with humans. With machines looking to understand human emotions, it may not be long before they may be able to mimic actual human decisions.
