Towards automated recognition of facial expressions in animal models

Gaddi Blumrosen, David Hawellek, Bijan Pesaran

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contributionpeer-review

11 Scopus citations

Abstract

Facial expressions play a significant role in the expression of emotional states, such as fear, surprise, and happiness in humans and other animals. The current systems for recognizing animal facial expression model in Non-human primates (NHPs) are currently limited to manual decoding of the facial muscles and observations, which is biased, time-consuming and requires a long training process and certification. The main objective of this work is to establish a computational framework for facial recognition systems for automatic recognition NHP facial expressions from standard video recordings with minimal assumptions. The suggested technology consists of: 1)a tailored facial image registration for NHPs; 2)a two-layers unsupervised clustering algorithm that forms an ordered dictionary of facial images for different facial segments; 3)extract dynamical temporal-spectral features;, and recognize dynamic facial expressions. The feasibility of the methods was verified using video recordings of an NHP under various behavioral conditions, recognizing typical NHP facial expressions in the wild. The results were compared to three human experts, and show an agreement of more than 82%. This work is the first attempt for efficient automatic recognition of facial expressions in NHPs using minimal assumptions about the physiology of facial expressions.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationProceedings - 2017 IEEE International Conference on Computer Vision Workshops, ICCVW 2017
PublisherInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc.
Pages2810-2819
Number of pages10
ISBN (Electronic)9781538610343
DOIs
StatePublished - 1 Jul 2017
Externally publishedYes
Event16th IEEE International Conference on Computer Vision Workshops, ICCVW 2017 - Venice, Italy
Duration: 22 Oct 201729 Oct 2017

Publication series

NameProceedings - 2017 IEEE International Conference on Computer Vision Workshops, ICCVW 2017
Volume2018-January

Conference

Conference16th IEEE International Conference on Computer Vision Workshops, ICCVW 2017
Country/TerritoryItaly
CityVenice
Period22/10/1729/10/17

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2017 IEEE.

Funding

6. Acknowledgments We would like to thank, Marsela Rubiano, Breonna Ferrentino, and Nia Boles for their efforts in tagging the lower facial expression video clips, Eshkol Fund Mr. Avraham and Mrs. Rivka Blumrosen encouragement (GB), Leopoldina Fellowship Programme Grant (LPDS/LPDR 2012-09) (DH), and an Award from the Simons Collaboration on the Global Brain (BP).

FundersFunder number
Simons Collaboration on the Global Brain
BP

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