Hi, my name is Lydia. I am working for the Affective Computing Group
at the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence.
Today, my human colleague Tanja Schneeberger is going to present what she did with my
virtual colleague the social agent Gloria to help people how to cope with stress.
Thanks Lydia. Persistent mental stress
is a massive problem in today’s society as it has many negative long-term impacts.
One reason for that is that the body is not in balance.
With Stress management training we can bring the body back in balance.
One method in stress management training is biofeedback training.
It aims to have positive effects on stress coping
by raising awareness for usually unconscious physiological patterns.
By providing immediate and continuous feedback for variations in physiological activity
derived by several sensors, the trainee learns a voluntary control of physiological functions.
A trainer is present for the entire training to explain strategies how to get a better control
of physiological parameters for example by giving instructions how to relax.
Physiological functions chosen for biofeedback training can include muscle tension,
blood pressure, or heart rate variability. Unfortunately, there is often not enough
time for therapists to lead the trainee through the whole training.
Therefore, we developed a biofeedback training with a social agent in the role of a trainer.
As physiological parameter, we chose heart rate variability as an increase of its amplitude
is associated with improved physiological functioning as well as psychological benefits.
For the trainee, HRV is represented with an arrow. One factor that influences HRV and that is
relatively easy to control is respiration. By slowing the breathing rate most individuals can
quickly learn to increase their HRV amplitude. Therefore, we decided to use respiration as
second parameter that is feedbacked to the trainee with the help of breathing circles.
The arrow and the breathing circles form the biofeedback monitor.
The sensors are connected via bluetooth with the computer that runs the signal interpretation
and manages the content, behavior and interaction of the biofeedback monitor
as well as the social agent that overtakes the role of the human trainer.
Like a human trainer, the social agent introduces, leads and concludes the training.
As an addition to standard biofeedback training, we wanted to be able to show
stress inducing material to increase the generalizability of our training.
Therefore, we added an image display where we can show tasks, pictures or videos.
Together with a biofeedback expert, we developed a training procedure that includes four steps.
At the beginning of the training, the virtual coach Gloria
introduces herself and the topic of stress. This is followed by a five-minute baseline
measurement in which the trainee can relax and close her eyes in order to reach a relaxed basic
level, regardless of the situation from which she had just come to the training.
During the tutorial, the biofeedback technique is introduced.
The virtual biofeedback trainer explains the breathing circle and gives a five-minute testing
phase to practice an optimal breathing. Then the HRV biofeedback was introduced.
A yellow colored arrow visualizes the HRV. Every ten seconds, it gives feedback
in five steps on how the HRV develops. The goal is that the HRV is kept high.
After the tutorial, a 15-minute training phase follows.
During this phase, the trainee can experiment with the visual biofeedback
to learn how to influence heart rate variability.
Like a human trainer would do, Gloria suggests several relaxation techniques like conscious
muscle relaxation or the imagination of a positively associated place.
In the next training phase, the visual feedback is replaced by verbal feedback of Gloria.
As soon as the HRV decreases, Gloria reminds to relax.
In the last phase, the stress induction is added. As stress inducing task, one could imagine
everything that creates stress for the trainee. We chose affective pictures, the
Stroop task and a spontaneous talk. However, this tasks could be adapted,
for example to basketballers finding themselves in the situation of a free throw.
We evaluated our novel biofeedback training with an experiment.
To tests its effectiveness, we randomly assigned 71 participants in the experimental group,
receiving our training or the control group having a stress diary based training.
After the training, we brought all participants into a very stressful
task, the Trait Social Stress Test. In the TSST consists of two components,
a simulated job application interview and a challenging mental arithmetic task.
During the tasks, the participants are under steady observation of the experimenter
as well as video recorded with a big camera to enhance stress.
We measured stress before and after the TSST, the user experience after the training and task
stressfulness and self-performance after the TSST. Overall, we hypothesized that participants
will experience less stress when receiving the biofeedback training.
The biofeedback training that the experimental group received,
consisted of two training sessions on two days with one recreation day between the two sessions.
In both training sessions, participants received the biofeedback training as presented before.
Additionally to the training, on the first day, participants filled in the pre-questionnaires.
After the second session, we measured the dependent variables before and after the TSST.
The control group had the same procedure except
that they received a diary-based stress management training.
This training promotes conscious discussion,
reflection and mindfulness and brings order
and overview into situations that seem overtaxing.
The goal is to get aware of often unconscious triggers of stress.
Our results show that the stress level was dependent on the training type.
The group with the biofeedback training reported lower stress than the group
receiving the stress diaries. Regarding user experience,
we found that the biofeedback training was perceived as more novel than the stress diaries.
Task stressfulness was lower with the biofeedback training, but just missed the significance level.
Participants also rated themselves better
in the stressful task when they were in the experimental group.
Overall, the evaluation of the novel biofeedback training
gives evidence that it is a promising approach to learn how to manage stressful situations.
Lydia, can you maybe help me again with the conclusion?
Of course. Stress management is important for many people to remain healthy.
A stress management training with a social agent can be available to a
large target group for prevention and treatment of stress related problems.
As an adjunct, it can raise the effectiveness of therapies for both physical and mental disorders.
Sure, I am happy to take questions.