Monitoring voluntary blink magnitude through a wearable eye-tracking system: A preliminary study

Annu Int Conf IEEE Eng Med Biol Soc. 2017 Jul:2017:1583-1586. doi: 10.1109/EMBC.2017.8037140.

Abstract

This study proposes a novel approach to measure the contractile force of eye blink that is generally obtained from the orbicularis oculi activity through Ocular ElectroMyo-Graphy (O-EMG). Here, O-EMG is compared with the eye information acquired through a wearable head-mounted eye-tracking system in order to investigate the possibility of using the eye-tracking in place of the O-EMG. Eight subjects were simultaneously monitored through an O-EMG and the eye-tracker while they were performing a structured protocol implying a variation in the blink contractile strength. Results showed that eye-tracking features were able to statistically discriminate three kinds of contractile forces similarly to EMG features. The consequent correlation analysis revealed that all the EMG-related features were significantly correlated with the eye-tracking ones with a p-value <;10-6. Moreover, considering the extracted eye-tracking features, i.e. Integrated Gaze Path (IGP) and Eye-closed Duration (ECD), IGP reported a higher Spearman's correlation values with eye-blink reflex magnitude (EBM) than ECD. These encouraging results suggest that the ocular information extracted from the eye-tracking could be profitably used in non-invasive ecological environments where wearability and comfortability play a crucial role in detecting spontaneous response.

MeSH terms

  • Blinking*
  • Electromyography
  • Eyelids
  • Facial Muscles
  • Wearable Electronic Devices