A Self-Paced Relaxation Response Detection System Based on Galvanic Skin Response Analysis

Authors
Raquel Martinez, Asier Salazar-Ramirez, Andoni Arruti, Eloy Irigoyen, Jose Ignacia Martin, Javier Muguerza
Publication
IEEE Access
Vol 7, pp. 43730 - 43741
Abstract

Relaxation helps to reduce physical, mental, and emotional pressure. Relaxation techniques generally enable a person to obtain calmness and well-being by reducing stress, anxiety, or anger. When a person becomes calm the body reacts physiologically, producing the so-called Relaxation Response (RResp) which affects the organism in a positive manner, no matter if it is during a state of relaxation or in the middle of a stressful period. The goal of this paper is to design a system capable of identifying automatically the RResps of a subject by analyzing a single physiological signal, the galvanic skin response (GSR). To do so, a team composed of psychologists, neurologists, and engineers designed two experiments for inducing RResps in the participants while their GSR signals were being collected. The team analyzed the data and identified three different levels of RResp that can be quantified using only two easily calculated GSR features. Moreover, the use of the surface produced by GSR and its linear approximation is totally novel. Finally, the data were classified using decision tree strategies for each of the experiments and, after seeing that the obtained trees were similar, the team synthesized them in a single classification system. The F1 values obtained by the generalized classifier scored between 0.966 and 1.000 for the data collected in both experiments.

Related Listings
Brain Activity at Rest Provides Clue to Intelli...
Journal
Neuroscience News
·
The ability of an adult to learn and to perform cognitive tests is directly linked to how active the brain is at rest, UNSW researchers have found.
Relaxation Response and Resiliency Training and...
Authors
James E. Stahl, Michelle L. Dossett, A. Scott LaJoie, John W. Denninger, Darshan H. Mehta, Roberta Goldman, Gregory L. Fricchione, Herbert Benson
Journal
PLOS ONE
·
Background Poor psychological and physical resilience in response to stress drives a great deal of health care utilization. Mind-body interventions can reduce stress and build resiliency. The rationale for this study is therefore to estimate the effect of mind-body interventions on healthcare utilization. Objective Estimate the effect of mind body training, specifically, the Relaxation Response Resiliency Program (3RP) on healthcare utilization. Design Retrospective controlled […]
Functional brain networks related to individual...
Authors
Luke J. Hearne, Jason B. Mattingley, Luca Cocchi
Journal
Nature Scientific Reports
·
Intelligence is a fundamental ability that sets humans apart from other animal species. Despite its importance in defining human behaviour, the neural networks responsible for intelligence are not well understood. The dominant view from neuroimaging work suggests that intelligent performance on a range of tasks is underpinned by segregated interactions in a fronto-parietal network of brain regions. Here we asked whether fronto-parietal interactions associated with intelligence are ubi […]