Watch and Feel: An Affective Interface in a Virtual Storytelling Environment

摘要

In this paper we describe a study carried out with SenToy: a tangible interface that has the shape of a doll and is used to capture emotions from its user whilst performing specific gestures. SenToy was used with an application named Fearnot!, which is a virtual storytelling environment, where characters act autonomously and in character, so that stories emerge from those autonomous actions. The integration of SenToy in FearNot! was evaluated in two ways: (1) if users were able to manipulate the tangible interface appropriately, even if engaged in storytelling situation and (2) if the emotions expressed by the users with SenToy were the same as the ones reported to have been felt after the session. The results of the study show that Sentoy can be used to understand how the viewers reacted to the stories portrayed, and at the same time that the emotions that were expressed with SenToy (apart from some exceptions, reported in the paper) are indeed similar as the ones reported to have been felt by the users.