Title: How Affective Computing can Change our Future Health
Speaker: Rosalind Picard, Professor and Director, Media Arts & Sciences, MIT

Abstract:
AI – including machine learning providing emotional intelligence - is becoming embedded in our wearables and smartphones, enabling new insights and interventions for improving lives for many people, including those with Autism, Epilepsy, and Depression. The latter condition, depression, is growing and forecast to become the #1 disease burden by 2030. How close are we to forecasting changes in mood, stress, and physical health before they happen? Could AI help us prevent tomorrow’s worsening mood or ill health, and reduce the likelihood of diseases such as depression, helping people stay healthy instead of becoming sick? This talk will show the latest findings using machine learning and wearable + smartphone sensing, also highlighting ethical and privacy concerns.

Biography:
Rosalind Picard, Sc.D., is founder and director of the Affective Computing Research Group at the MIT Media Laboratory, co-founder of Affectiva, Inc., delivering Emotion AI technology, and co-founder and chief scientist of Empatica, Inc., creators of the first FDA-cleared smart watch used in neurology for detecting seizures. Picard is author of over three hundred peer-reviewed scientific articles in signal processing, computer vision, pattern recognition, machine learning, human-computer interaction, affective computing, and neurology. She is known internationally for her book, Affective Computing, which helped launch the research area by that name. She was a founding member of the IEEE Technical Committee on Wearable Information Systems, helping boot up the field of wearable computing. Picard is a fellow of the IEEE and an elected member of the National Academy of Engineering. She holds a Bachelors in Electrical Engineering from Georgia Tech and Masters and Doctorate degrees in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT. Picard leads research developing AI/machine learning algorithms, analytics, and sensors for advancing the basic scientific understanding of emotion, stress, and arousal, advancing both basic research and development to improve human health and wellbeing.