Healthcare System Focusing on Emotional Aspect Using Augmented Reality: Control Breathing Application in Relaxation Service

Abstract

We proposed a new healthcare system that focuses on emotional aspects to deal with negative emotional health in daily life. Our healthcare system integrates augmented reality to display virtual objects in real environments and Kinect, which allows users to freely interact with them. We also employ biological sensors to measure and detect user emotions, and provide three services based on their expected emotions: Relaxation Service, Amusement Service and Exciting Service. To implement a small prototype of this system, we have developed one application in relaxation service: Control Breathing Application. This application applied deep breathing techniques of stress management to supports users when they experience stress. This application displays a virtual music box to assist them perform deep breathing. Virtual objects and music can increase user relaxation and decrease their stress. The experiment is performed to measure the effectiveness of the application. From the result, our application can effectively decrease users stress when they experienced our application for short time. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2013.