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Research
Affective Computing

Advancing human wellbeing by developing new ways to communicate, understand, and respond to emotion
Project Research

Theme | Attention, Memory + Learning

Projects related to the theme of how digital systems may support attention, memory, and learning.
Research
AHA: Advancing Humans with AI

AHA Program: Advancing Humans with AI
Project Research

NeuroChat

NeuroChat is a neuroadaptive AI tutor that combines generative AI with real-time EEG data to create a personalized, dynamic learning experi…
Research
Multisensory Intelligence

Creating human-AI symbiosis across scales and sensory mediums to enhance productivity, creativity, and wellbeing
Project Research

AI-Implanted False Memories

Conversational AI Powered by Large Language Models Amplifies False Memories in Witness InterviewsThis study examines the impact of AI on hu…
Project Research

Sleep++

Sleep++ aims to improve sleep quality by stimulating the brain to enter deep sleep. Currently, insufficient and poor quality sleep represen…
Project Research

BeWell Biomarkers

Working with leading neuroscientist Richard Davidson and the Healthy Minds Institute, we are developing objective biomarkers to interpret a…
Archived
Project Research

Frisson

Interoceptive Technologies: Inducing emotions from the body upInspirationThere’s a feeling that comes tingling down the spine in certain mo…
Archived
Research
Human Dynamics

Exploring how social networks can influence our lives in business, health, governance, and technology adoption and diffusion
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Sculpting Evolution

Cultivating wisdom through evolutionary and ecological engineering
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Responsive Environments

Augmenting and mediating human experience, interaction, and perception with sensor networks
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Personal Robots

Building intelligent personified technologies that collaborate with people to help them learn, thrive, and flourish.
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Opera of the Future

Extending expression, learning, and health through innovations in musical composition, performance, and participation
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Fluid Interfaces

Designing Systems for Cognitive Augmentation
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Camera Culture

Making the invisible visible–inside our bodies, around us, and beyond–for health, work, and connection
Project Research

Understanding impacts of companion chatbots on loneliness and socialization

Loneliness is a growing and global issue that affects approximately a third of individuals in industrialized countries. Given the…
Project Research

Cyborg Psychology: The Art + Science of Designing Human-AI Systems that Support Human Flourishing

This research aims to address the timely and timeless challenge of human-computer interaction by focusing on designing and studying human-A…
Archived
Project Research

Theme | Attention, Memory & Learning

Several of our projects aim to support learning and creativity. While some systems focus on a specific skill to be strengthened, e.g.,…
Archived
Research
Media Lab Research Theme: Life with AI

Life with AI | Designing the future of smart systems to improve the human experience
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Media Lab Research Theme: Future Worlds

Future Worlds | Design and action for the future we want to live in
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Media Lab Research Theme: Decentralized Society

Decentralized Society | Architecting the new internet for the good of the people
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Media Lab Research Theme: Cultivating Creativity

Cultivating Creativity | Catalyzing a global movement enabling everyone to unlock and unleash their individual and collective creativity
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Media Lab Research Theme: Connected Mind + Body

Connected Mind + Body | Revolutionizing the future of mental and physical wellbeing
Project Research

MemPal: Wearable Memory Assistant for Aging Population

We're living in an aging society with cognitive loss placing stress on caregivers to monitor older adults struggling with memory decline.&n…
Post Research

MemPal selected for 2024 Prototypes for Humanity exhibition

MemPal was selected in the Health category.
Project Research

Dyadic Affect in Multimodal Interaction - Parent to Child (DAMI-P2C) Dataset

Audio-visual data set containing around 21.6 hours of parent-child interaction during story reading.The DAMI-P2C dataset consists of audio-…
How software can act as an assistant rather than a tool, by learning from interaction and proactively anticipating the user's needs
Archived
Project Research

Co-designing Generative AI for Healthy Aging

The rapid advancement of Generative AI (GenAI) technologies presents new opportunities to support daily living for older adults. This proje…
Publication Research

Unraveling the Dynamics of Mental and Visuospatial Workload in Virtual Reality Environments

Bernal, Guillermo, Hahrin Jung, Ismail Emir Yassi, Nelson Hidalgo, Yodahe Alemu, Tyler Barnes-Diana, and Pattie Maes. 2024. "Unraveling the Dynamics of Mental and Visuospatial Workload in Virtual Reality Environments" Computers 13, no. 10: 246. https://doi.org/10.3390/computers13100246
Project Research

WearVibe

Specifically crafted sensory stimulation can influence brain function and potentially improve cognition. In this project, we developed soft…
Tool Research

WearVibe WearOS App

Source code for smartwatch app for improving attention via haptic rhythmic stimuli (WearOS)
Project Research

The Distance Between Us

Composed by Kimaya Lecamwasam and performed by Jessica Shand and Charlie Lovell-Jones on April 3, 2023. A preliminary d…
Publication Research

The Distance Between Us: Exploring the COVID-19 Intensive Care Unit Through the Soundscape of Biometric Monitoring

Kimaya Lecamwasam. 2024. The Distance Between Us: Exploring the COVID-19 Intensive Care Unit Through the Soundscape of Biometric Monitoring. In Proceedings of the 19th International Audio Mostly Conference: Explorations in Sonic Cultures (AM '24). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, 533–542. https://doi.org/10.1145/3678299.3678355
Project Research

Pharmamusicology: Exploring the Impact of Music on the Physiology and Psychology of Mental Health

As of 2020, approximately 40 million adults, or 18.1% percent of the adult population, in the United States suffer from anxiety disorders, …
Project Research

Transmutations

Do you hear the sound of a breath, or an ocean wave? A heartbeat, or thunder? Journey through a universe of shifting sonic identities …
Publication Research

Conversational AI Powered by Large Language Models Amplifies False Memories in Witness Interviews

Chan, S., Pataranutaporn, P., Suri, A., Zulfikar, W., Maes, P., & Loftus, E. F. (2024). Conversational AI Powered by Large Language Models Amplifies False Memories in Witness Interviews. arXiv preprint arXiv:2408.04681.
Thesis Research

Dissertation: Cyborg Psychology: The Art & Science of Designing Human-AI Systems that Support Human Flourishing
Project Research

ORGANOLOGY: Real-Time Biometrics x Sound Synthesis

Organology: Real-Time Biometrics x Sound Synthesis October 19th @ 8:00 PMMIT Media Lab 3rd Floor AtriumWhat role does the body pl…
Project Research

Creative Text-to-Audio Generation via Synthesizer Programming

Neural audio synthesis methods now allow specifying ideas in natural language. However, these methods produce results that cannot be easily…
Project Research

Synthetic Sensations

Electrical stimulation has long been used in medicine to induce phosphenes, or visual sensations, in patients with visual impairments. Rece…
Publication Research

Synthetic Visual Sensations: Augmenting Human Spatial Awareness with a Wearable Retinal Electric Stimulation Device

Valdemar Danry, Laura Chicos, Matheus Fonseca, Ishraki Kazi, and Pattie Maes. 2024. Synthetic Visual Sensations: Augmenting Human Spatial Awareness with a Wearable Retinal Electric Stimulation Device. In The Augmented Humans International Conference (AHs 2024), April 4–6, 2024, Melbourne, VIC, Australia. ACM, New York, NY, USA, 13 pages. https://doi.org/10.1145/3652920.3652932
Publication Research

Exploring the Use of Real-Time Camera Filters on Embodiment and Creativity

Leong, Joanne, et al. "Exploring the Use of Real-Time Camera Filters on Embodiment and Creativity." Extended Abstracts of the 2021 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. 2021.
Project Research

Synthetic Self-Perception

Perceptual illusions have the power to change our abilities and behaviours. Prior research in virtual reality (VR) has shown that transport…
Thesis Research

Investigating the Use of Synthetic Media and Real-Time Virtual Camera Filters for Supporting Communication and Creativity

Leong, Joanne. Investigating the Use of Synthetic Media and Real-Time Virtual Camera Filters for Supporting Communication and Creativity. 2021. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, MS Thesis.
Publication Research

Influencing human–AI interaction by priming beliefs about AI can increase perceived trustworthiness, empathy and effectiveness

Pataranutaporn, P., Liu, R., Finn, E. et al. Influencing human–AI interaction by priming beliefs about AI can increase perceived trustworthiness, empathy and effectiveness. Nat Mach Intell (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42256-023-00720-7
Article Research

Inside your dreamscape

Dream-hacking techniques can help us create, heal and have fun. They could also become tools of commercial manipulation.
Publication Research

Dormio: Interfacing with Dreams

Haar Horowitz, Adam, Ishaan Grover, Pedro Reynolds-Cuéllar, Cynthia Breazeal, and Pattie Maes. "Dormio: Interfacing with dreams." In Extended Abstracts of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, pp. 1-10. 2018.
Article Research

That moment when you’re nodding off is a sweet spot for creativity

A new study finds people are more creative after waking from the earliest stage of sleep, especially when guided to dream about a topic.
Article Research

Here's how to use dreams for creative inspiration

Researchers from the Media Lab’s Fluid Interfaces group and Harvard Medical School find that brief naps appear to enhance creativity.
Article Research

Neuroscientists warn advertisers are trying to 'weaponize sleep' by plugging into your dreams

“The potential for misuse of these technologies is as ominous as it is obvious.”
Article Research

"Dream glove" boosts creativity during sleep

In a new study, researchers from the Media Lab’s Fluid Interfaces group & Harvard Medical School find that brief naps can enhance creativity
Article Research

Behind the veil of hypnagogic sleep

Media Lab postdoc Adam Haar Horowitz discusses using “dream engineering” techniques to give people more control over their dreams.
Archived
Project Research

Masca

InspirationDreams are fascinating personally, therapeutically, and scientifically. Who hasn't woken up in the morning and wondered how they…
Archived
Archived
Project Research

Essence Wearables: Biometric Olfactory Interfaces for Day and Night

Human-computer interaction (HCI) has traditionally focused on designing and investigating interfaces that provide explicit visual, auditory…
Archived
Project Research

Targeted Dream Incubation

Targeted dream incubation (TDI) is a methodology for guiding (or “incubating”) dreams towards specific themes. Please read the FAQ below to…
Project Research

Dormio: Interfacing with Dreams

InspirationSleep is a forgotten country of the mind. A vast majority of our technologies are built for our waking state, even though a thir…
Thesis Research

Pharmamusicology: Exploring the Impact of Music on the Physiology and Psychology of Anxiety Disorders and Well-Being

Lecamwasam, K.H.M. (2023). Pharmamusicology: Exploring the Impact of Music on the Physiology and Psychology of Anxiety Disorders and Well-Being. Master's Thesis, MIT Media Lab.
Article Research

Placebo effect shapes how we see AI

Research from the Fluid Interfaces group finds that users' perceptions of an AI chatbot influence their interactions with the technology.
Article Research

The assumptions you bring into conversation with an AI bot influence what it says

In Scientific American, PhD student Pat Pataranutaporn talks about how a user's impressions of AI chatbots may influence their interactions.
Project Research

Influencing human–AI interaction by priming beliefs about AI can increase perceived trustworthiness, empathy, and effectiveness

AbstractAs conversational agents powered by large language models become more human-like, users are starting to view them as companions rat…
Project Research

KALM: BCI Systems for Managing Anxiety and Stress

The KALM project consists of a multimodal dataset and a wearable system for managing anxiety.  With this set of tools we aim to make n…
Article Research

Does dream inception work?

Using Dormio, a project from the Media Lab’s Fluid Interfaces research group, poet Will Dowd set out to pioneer a new reading experience.
Article Research

Unlocking the Power of Goosebumps: The Surprising Emotional Effects of Aesthetic Chills

A new study suggests that experiencing aesthetic chills, or goosebumps, during stimuli like music and films can lead to increased emotions.