Virtual Avatar Communication Task eliciting Pseudo-Social Isolation And Detecting Social Isolation using Non-Verbal Signal Monitoring In Older Adults

Ayumi Takemoto ^1* Miyuki Iwamoto ² Haruto Yaegashi ¹ Shan Yun ³ Risa Takashima ³

• ¹ Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan
• ² Doshisha Women's College of Liberal Arts, Kyotanabe, Japan
• ³ Hokkaido University, Sapporo, Hokkaidō, Japan

Social isolation and loneliness are two of the main causes of mental health issues or suicide not only in younger adults but also in older adults. Thus, identifying an effective method to detect social isolation is important in the field of human-machine interaction. However, to our knowledge, no effective method has been developed to elicit pseudo-social isolation tasks to evaluate social isolation detection systems for older adults.This study has two research aims: 1. To develop the virtual avatar conversation cyberball task to evoke pseudo-social isolation in older adults and, 2. To identify non-verbal indicators replacing social isolation in older adults. To reach the aims, twenty-two older men were recruited as participants. They were asked to communicate with two virtual avatars on a monitor, and then to rate the follow-up questions provided in order to evaluate the level of social isolation and emotions; meanwhile, facial expressions and gaze patterns were recorded by a camera and an eye tracker. In the results, the developed virtual avatar conversation cyberball task was shown to successfully induce pseudo-social isolation in older adults, and this social isolation can be detected by the intensity of inner/outer eyebrow and eyelid movements and the blink frequency.