TY - JOUR
T1 - Description and clinical studies of a device for the instantaneous detection of office-place stress
AU - Levine, James A.
AU - Pavlidis, Ioannis T.
AU - MacBride, Leslie
AU - Zhu, Zhen
AU - Tsiamyrtzis, Panagiotis
PY - 2009/12/1
Y1 - 2009/12/1
N2 - Occupational stress is universally experienced and is emerging as a major risk factor for physical and mental illness and a key factor in poor work performance and low job satisfaction. However, the technology does not currently exist to unobtrusively measure occupational stress in real-time. Here, we describe the design and clinical validation of an automated high-definition thermal imaging system that can be used to quantify human stress, remotely and instantaneously. Healthy human subjects underwent a computer-based version of the Stroop-color conflict test, which is a validated stress provocation test, in an experimental office facility. In separate experiments, the same subjects completed a mental arithmetic challenge. The thermal signal associated with stress provocation is near-instantaneous corrugator warming. The stress response was detected in all subjects for all stress-events compared to the respective baselines. Furthermore, there was remarkable inter-individual preservation of the corrugator signal with stress (R2= 0.96, P< 0.001). High-definition thermal imaging can be used for real-time detection of stress provocation. This technology may prove to be of help in ameliorating office-place stress.
AB - Occupational stress is universally experienced and is emerging as a major risk factor for physical and mental illness and a key factor in poor work performance and low job satisfaction. However, the technology does not currently exist to unobtrusively measure occupational stress in real-time. Here, we describe the design and clinical validation of an automated high-definition thermal imaging system that can be used to quantify human stress, remotely and instantaneously. Healthy human subjects underwent a computer-based version of the Stroop-color conflict test, which is a validated stress provocation test, in an experimental office facility. In separate experiments, the same subjects completed a mental arithmetic challenge. The thermal signal associated with stress provocation is near-instantaneous corrugator warming. The stress response was detected in all subjects for all stress-events compared to the respective baselines. Furthermore, there was remarkable inter-individual preservation of the corrugator signal with stress (R2= 0.96, P< 0.001). High-definition thermal imaging can be used for real-time detection of stress provocation. This technology may prove to be of help in ameliorating office-place stress.
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U2 - 10.3233/WOR-2009-0934
DO - 10.3233/WOR-2009-0934
M3 - Article
C2 - 20037251
AN - SCOPUS:77449158467
SN - 1051-9815
VL - 34
SP - 359
EP - 364
JO - Work
JF - Work
IS - 3
ER -