Emotive engine and method for generating a simulated emotion for an information system

• US 9,189,879 B2
• Filed: 06/30/2014
• Issued: 11/17/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 04/26/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ford Global Technologies, LLC (Ford Motor Company)
• Original Assignee: Ford Global Technologies, LLC (Ford Motor Company)
• Inventors: Filev, Dimitar Petrov, Gusikhin, Oleg Yurievitch, Syed, Fazal Urrahman, Klampfl, Erica, Giuli, Thomas J., Chen, Yifan
• Primary Examiner(s): Tarcza, Thomas
• Assistant Examiner(s): Dunn, Alex C
• Application Number:
  US14/319,871
• Publication Number:
  US 20140313208A1
• Time in Patent Office: 505 Days
• Field of Search: 701/1
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/163 by tracking eye movement, gaze, or pupil change
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/165 Evaluating the state of mind, e.g. depression, anxiety
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/18 for vehicle drivers or machine operators
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/4803 Speech analysis specially adapted for diagnostic purposes
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/7264 Classification of physiological signals or data, e.g. using neural networks, statistical classifiers, expert systems or fuzzy systems neural networks per se G06N3/00; expert systems per se G06N5/00
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/744 Displaying an avatar, e.g. an animated cartoon character
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 2040/089 Driver voice
• CPC Class Codes: B60W 50/10 Interpretation of driver requests or demands
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3608 using speech input, e.g. using speech recognition
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2203/011 Emotion or mood input determined on the basis of sensed human body parameters such as pulse, heart rate or beat, temperature of skin, facial expressions, iris, voice pitch, brain activity patterns
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/011 Arrangements for interaction with the human body, e.g. for user immersion in virtual reality blind teaching G09B21/00
• CPC Class Codes: G06N 3/006 based on simulated virtual individual or collective life forms, e.g. social simulations or particle swarm optimisation [PSO]
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 13/205 driven by audio data
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 13/40 of characters, e.g. humans, animals or virtual beings
• CPC Class Codes: G10L 17/26 Recognition of special voice characteristics, e.g. for use in lie detectors; Recognition of animal voices

Abstract

Information about a device may be emotively conveyed to a user of the device. Input indicative of an operating state of the device may be received. The input may be transformed into data representing a simulated emotional state. Data representing an avatar that expresses the simulated emotional state may be generated and displayed. A query from the user regarding the simulated emotional state expressed by the avatar may be received. The query may be responded to.

Claims

1. An emotive engine for an information system of a vehicle, the engine comprising:

a computer configured to

receive input representing at least one of audio and visual characteristics of a user,

generate data representing an emotional state of the user based on the input representing the at least one of audio and visual characteristics of the user including analyzing at least one of a prosody, syntax and lexicon associated with the input representing the audio characteristics of the user,

receive input representing an operating parameter of the vehicle;

generate data representing a simulated emotion to be expressed by an avatar based on at least one of the data representing the emotional state of the user and the input representing the operating parameter of the vehicle,

output the data representing the simulated emotion to be expressed by the avatar for display by an output, and

generate data representing a query to the user regarding the user'"'"'s emotional state.

2. The engine of claim 1 wherein the computer is further configured to select which of the data representing the emotional state of the user and the input representing the operating parameter of the vehicle to use to generate the data representing the simulated emotion to be expressed by the avatar.

3. The engine of claim 1 wherein only the input representing the operating parameter of the vehicle is used to generate the data representing the simulated emotion to be expressed by the avatar if the vehicle is moving.

4. The engine of claim 1 wherein only the data representing the emotional state of the user is used to generate the data representing the simulated emotion to be expressed by the avatar if the user is a passenger in the vehicle.

5. The engine of claim 1 wherein the computer is further configured to receive input representing a response to the query and to select which of the prosody, syntax and lexicon associated with the input representing the audio characteristics of the user to analyze based on the response to the query.

6. The engine of claim 1 wherein the computer is further configured to receive input representing a parameter indicative of a quality with which an agent is performing a task or function.

7. The engine of claim 6 wherein the computer is further configured to generate the data representing the simulated emotion to be expressed by the avatar based on the input representing the parameter indicative of the quality with which the agent is performing the task or function.

8. An emotive vehicle information system comprising:

a computer configured to generate a user emotional state based on detected visual user characteristics and an analysis of a prosody, syntax or lexicon of detected user audio characteristics, to generate for display via an avatar an avatar emotional state based on a vehicle operating parameter or the user emotional state, and to generate for play an audio query regarding the user emotional state.

9. An emotive vehicle information system comprising:

a computer configured to generate a user emotional state based on detected audio and visual user characteristics, and to generate for display via an avatar an avatar emotional state based on the user emotional state, an operating parameter of a vehicle, and a quality parameter representing a quality with which an agent is performing a task or function.