A Personalized Approach to Understanding Human Emotions

Authors

Gregory A. LazenbyFollow
Kim WongFollow
Daniel W. Engels, Southern Methodist UniversityFollow

Abstract

In this paper we present the relationship between stress and emotions. While there exists copious amounts of research into stress and its contribution to our overall well-being, very little research has been done in understanding which emotions relate to stress. Through the use of self-reported questionnaires, we analyze individual responses during stress-induced and pleasant experiences. We show how some emotions that accompany stress vary by individual. Previous studies focus primarily on the physiological response as the leading indicator to stress \cite{3}. However, most people are not instrumented in their daily lives making multiple wearable sensors unreasonable as a stress detector. Emotions are always present and cannot be disconnected from the physiological symptoms of stress. By better understanding these emotions we can identify situations where stress is likely to occur thereby allowing better management. We examine ethical concerns with exploiting this knowledge and how technology may be used to learn a persons emotion and ways in which this is already being used in research and marketing. We conclude that stress is an exciting condition for all subjects but the underlying emotions and whether those are positive or negative vary by individual. This suggests that a personalized model would be best at identifying those conditions which lead to a physiological stress response.

Recommended Citation

Lazenby, Gregory A.; Wong, Kim; and Engels, Daniel W. (2019) "A Personalized Approach to Understanding Human Emotions," SMU Data Science Review: Vol. 2: No. 2, Article 6.
Available at: https://scholar.smu.edu/datasciencereview/vol2/iss2/6

Creative Commons License

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