Identifying Psychological Symptoms Based on Facial Movements

Background: Many methods have been proposed to automatically identify the presence of mental illness, but these have mostly focused on one specific mental illness. In some non-professional scenarios, it would be more helpful to understand an individual's mental health status from all perspectiv...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Xiaoyang Wang, Yilin Wang, Mingjie Zhou, Baobin Li, Xiaoqian Liu, Tingshao Zhu
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Frontiers Media S.A. 2020-12-01
Series:Frontiers in Psychiatry
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2020.607890/full
Description
Summary:Background: Many methods have been proposed to automatically identify the presence of mental illness, but these have mostly focused on one specific mental illness. In some non-professional scenarios, it would be more helpful to understand an individual's mental health status from all perspectives.Methods: We recruited 100 participants. Their multi-dimensional psychological symptoms of mental health were evaluated using the Symptom Checklist 90 (SCL-90) and their facial movements under neutral stimulation were recorded using Microsoft Kinect. We extracted the time-series characteristics of the key points as the input, and the subscale scores of the SCL-90 as the output to build facial prediction models. Finally, the convergent validity, discriminant validity, criterion validity, and the split-half reliability were respectively assessed using a multitrait-multimethod matrix and correlation coefficients.Results: The correlation coefficients between the predicted values and actual scores were 0.26 and 0.42 (P < 0.01), which indicated good criterion validity. All models except depression had high convergent validity but low discriminant validity. Results also indicated good levels of split-half reliability for each model [from 0.516 (hostility) to 0.817 (interpersonal sensitivity)] (P < 0.001).Conclusion: The validity and reliability of facial prediction models were confirmed for the measurement of mental health based on the SCL-90. Our research demonstrated that fine-grained aspects of mental health can be identified from the face, and provided a feasible evaluation method for multi-dimensional prediction models.
ISSN:1664-0640