Emotion Navigation

Before automobiles were invented and widely adopted, animals like horses were the most common mode of transportation. While this change brought significant improvements in terms of reliability and efficiency, it also removed a core component: the emotional relationship that existed between the person and the animal.

While largely ignored, the emotional states of drivers are quite important, as they influence not only driving behavior but also the safety of all road users. For instance, driving can be quite an emotionally stressful experience and, while certain amounts of stress help the driver to remain alert and attentive, too much or too little can negatively impact driving performance and safety. Furthermore, stress in large doses has been linked to a large array of adverse health conditions such as depression and various forms of cardiovascular disease.

The Emotion Navigation special interest group from the MIT Media Lab was consolidated in 2018 with the goal of stimulating research efforts at the intersection of Affective Computing and Automotive. Some of the main questions that help guide the research are the following:

(*) What if current cars could sense relevant emotional states of drivers such as stress?

(*) What if cars and drivers could modulate the interaction based on implicit emotional responses instead of explicit interactions?

(*) What if cars could help drivers not only navigate to their final destination but also to their desired emotional state?