By Lori Cameron

Rosalind Wright Picard is professor of media arts and sciences at MIT, founder and director of the Affective Computing Research Group at the MIT Media Lab, and co-founder of the startups Affectiva and Empatica. In 2005, she was named a Fellow of IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers). Picard is credited with starting the branch of computer science known as affective computing.

Affective computing is the study of emotion in intelligence, the vital role human emotion communication has to relationships between people, and the possible effects of emotion recognition by robots and wearable computers. Picard’s work in this field has led to an expansion into autism research and developing devices that could help humans recognize nuances in human emotions. It is also a fast-growing, multi-billion dollar industry.

We asked Picard about her work in affective computing.