Detection and classification of stress using thermal imaging technique

Kan Hong; Peter Yuen; Tong Chen; Aristeidis Tsitiridis; Firmin Kam; James Jackman; David James; Mark Richardson; William Oxford; Jonathan Piper; Francis Thomas; Stafford Lightman

doi:10.1117/12.830496

24 September 2009 Detection and classification of stress using thermal imaging technique

Kan Hong, Peter Yuen, Tong Chen, Aristeidis Tsitiridis, Firmin Kam, James Jackman, David James, Mark Richardson, William Oxford, Jonathan Piper, Francis Thomas, Stafford Lightman

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 7486, Optics and Photonics for Counterterrorism and Crime Fighting V; 74860I (2009) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.830496
Event: SPIE Security + Defence, 2009, Berlin, Germany

Abstract

This paper reports how Electro-Optics (EO) technologies such as thermal and hyperspectral [1-3] imaging methods can be used for the detection of stress remotely. Emotional or physical stresses induce a surge of adrenaline in the blood stream under the command of the sympathetic nerve system, which, cannot be suppressed by training. The onset of this alleviated level of adrenaline triggers a number of physiological chain reactions in the body, such as dilation of pupil and an increased feed of blood to muscles etc. The capture of physiological responses, specifically the increase of blood volume to pupil, have been reported by Pavlidis's pioneer thermal imaging work [4-7] who has shown a remarkable increase of skin temperature in the periorbital region at the onset of stress. Our data has shown that other areas such as the forehead, neck and cheek also exhibit alleviated skin temperatures dependent on the types of stressors. Our result has also observed very similar thermal patterns due to physical exercising, to the one that induced by other physical stressors, apparently in contradiction to Pavlidis's work [8]. Furthermore, we have found patches of alleviated temperature regions in the forehead forming patterns characteristic to the types of stressors, dependent on whether they are physical or emotional in origin. These stress induced thermal patterns have been seen to be quite distinct to the one resulting from having high fever.

Citation Download Citation

Kan Hong, Peter Yuen, Tong Chen, Aristeidis Tsitiridis, Firmin Kam, James Jackman, David James, Mark Richardson, William Oxford, Jonathan Piper, Francis Thomas, and Stafford Lightman "Detection and classification of stress using thermal imaging technique", Proc. SPIE 7486, Optics and Photonics for Counterterrorism and Crime Fighting V, 74860I (24 September 2009); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.830496

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