ongoing

completed

Fear Reflector

The Fear Reflector is a device to support emotional self-reflection that accompanies the user in situations where the user expects to confront his or her fears. It will consist of a physiological sensor that measures the level of the user's fear, wired to a lightweight camera. When the camera detects that the user is afraid, it begins to take pictures. The camera's pictures create an external and formal representation of situations in which the user feels fear, which users can use as a starting point for self-reflection. Users can consider what frightened them in different situations, perhaps noticing pictures of situations that are not actually frightening, or remembering a dangerous situation that, for some reason, they faced without fear and therefore remained unphotographed. In developing the Fear Reflector, we are facing several difficult technical and design challenges. How can we use physiological sensing for affective computing in a situation where users are in stressed physiological states (i.e. backpacking, not sitting placidly behind computers)? How can we sense fear accurately enough that the device is useful? How can we make sure the device does not substitute for the user's own judgement of his or her own emotions? We are grateful to Thought Technology, Ltd. for their technical support of this project.