Google Glass is the augmented reality-based hardware product with which Google tried to conquer the market of technology. However, at a price of $1,300, it was easy to see how quickly they disappeared.
In July 2017, we reported how Google tried to save this interesting technological experiment and focused the glasses on the industrial sector, especially on the assembly and maintenance lines. This project was called Google Glass Enterprise Edition (Glass EE) and cost $1,500, with companies like DHL showing interest in a takeover.
Now researchers have used these Augmented Reality glasses to develop a therapeutic routine for autistic children who find it difficult to understand the emotions of others.
Specifically, experts have developed an app for smartphones that, in combination with the face recognition integrated in Google Glass, delivers real-time updates on the emotions that people express through their gestures. In the pilot technology trial, 14 children with autism used this system at home for at least 10 weeks.
After treatment, the children showed better signs of socialization, including increased eye contact and the ability to decipher facial expressions. Autistic children can usually improve their ability to recognize facial expressions by interacting with others through behavioral therapy, in which the child is guided through structured activities, such as showing cards representing faces with different expressions.
Denis Wall, a biomedical data scientist and pediatric specialist at Stanford University, and his colleagues have developed the new Google Glass Program to enable children to have autism with home therapy to treat this part of their disease.
In terms of how the system works, the eyewear camera records the faces of people in the child’s field of vision and sends them to the mobile app, which in turn includes hundreds of thousands of faces, and is designed to detect expressions of happiness, anger, grief, disgust, surprise, contempt, fear and calm.
Once the app detects a specific emotion, it sends this data to the Google Glass user and displays an emoji on a small screen in the right corner of the glasses or simply displays it by voice.
Wall and his team have achieved encouraging results in their tests, but are already working on a new experiment with 74 children with autism aged 6 to 12. If Google Glass Therapy works well in future clinical studies and is licensed for use, it could be a powerful learning tool for many autistic children.