NUCare and Personal Health Informatics present

Research Updates:
Progress in Personal Health Informatics

 

Monday, October 31, 2016

12:00 – 1:00 PM

177 Huntington Avenue, 12^th floor

Followed by a discussion with the speakers

 

Part 1: Time-Varying Dynamical Systems Modeling:
A New Method for Tracking Interpersonal Synchrony

Speaker: Oliver Wilder-Smith, Candidate for PhD, Personal Health Informatics

Abstract: Socio-emotional processes are traditionally studied using behavioral measures, however there is growing interest in the application of interpersonal synchrony (IS) research, the study of temporal coordination between individuals, to the study of affective and social processes. IS has been observed to operate at behavioral, affective, and physiological levels, in both rapid (e.g., autonomic) and longitudinal (e.g., daily affect) measures across various contexts studied (Palumbo et. al., 2016). Furthermore, physiological IS has been found to correlate with a range of social and affective constructs, including attachment, empathy, and co-regulation, suggesting that IS in measures can offer a complimentary means of assessing socio-emotional processes, as well as insight into underlying biological processes. In this talk I will present a novel time-varying dynamical systems modeling approach to quantifying synchrony, and validate the technique using two different data sets wherein autonomic data was simultaneously obtained from romantic couples in a controlled laboratory setting and children with autism and their therapists in a naturalistic interaction.

Part 2: Can micro-interaction self-report improve longitudinal measurement of behavior?

Speaker: Aditya Ponnada, Candidate for PhD, Personal Health Informatics

Abstract: Over the years, ecological momentary assessment (EMA) on mobile phones has been used to gather information on human behavior, context, and states. In EMA, a participant's phone is prompted several times a day, with a set of multiple choice questions related to research construct of interest. The method is being used extensively in behavioral research, but its primary limitation can be low study compliance resulting from high interruption burden. In order to reduce this perceived burden and still achieve high temporal density of self-report measurement, we propose µEMA. µEMA is microinteractions-based ecological momentary assessment, which is best implemented using a smartwatch. In µEMA, EMA surveys are reduced to simpler microinteractions, answerable with glance and a tap. With µEMA, responding to EMA prompts becomes as fast as checking the time on your watch. In a 4-week pilot study where µEMA was compared with EMA, µEMA had a significantly higher compliance rate, completion rate, and first prompt response rate, and µEMA was perceived as less distracting. The temporal density of data collection possible with µEMA could prove useful in health and ubiquitous computing studies.         

        

Join us every Monday at 12:00 PM, September 19^th through December 5^th
(Location subject to change.)

Upcoming seminars:

11/7       Human Computation Games and Citizen Science
Presented by Seth Cooper, PhD , Assistant Professor, College of Art, Media, & Design and College of Computer and Information Science

See the whole schedule.

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