Researchers at Stanford are developing a special technology compatible to Google Glass that would allow the device to become a wearable behavioural aid to help treat children with autism. The device, researchers say, could help children born with autism recognize, classify, and basically “see” the emotions of other people.
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According to the Autism Glass Project, over 1 million children under the age of 10 have been diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder in the US alone. The illness makes recognition of facial emotions, which is essential for communication and interaction, difficult for these children. The new device will help autistic children in socializing and recognizing emotions through different social cues that the glass will provide.
Project founders Catalin Voss and Nick Haber of Stanford are developing the software. It uses the device’s video camera to capture facial expressions and then compares them with vast databases of photos of faces. The program then sends a text message that pops up right in front of the child’s eye, notifying them whether the person they are talking to is feeling happy, sad, angry, and so on.
According to Slate, the application operates like a game or, as Voss calls it, an “interactive learning experience.” Through the Google Glass eyewear, children are asked to, say, find someone who is happy. When they look at someone who is smiling, the app recognizes this and awards “points.”
The researchers have tested the software in a lab with about 40 children. Now, they are starting a clinical trial with 100 kids at home, with parents driving the software.
“First, we had make sure that a six-year-old would actually wear this,” Wall says. “We’ve been able to show that. But we’ve also been able to see change in these kids, at least in the lab.”
The researchers then monitor performance in the game and combine their analysis with video analysis and parental questionnaires to build a ‘quantitative phenotype’ of Autism for each participant in the study. By tracking this over time, the team can show how their device helps improve emotion recognition over the long term.
The project is still accepting participant for the study and interested parents can sign up here.

http://www.ischoolguide.com/articles/30856/20151023/google-glass-treat-autism.htm