Visualising smartphone sensor data for psychology
An evolving use for smartphones (and other personal/wearable devices) of interest to the health and other sciences involves collecting and analysing data from the usage and sensors of such devices to infer information about users.
Particularly in the fields of psychology and psychiatry, this use of smartphones is the basis of what is known as personal sensing or digital phenotyping. The basic idea is that smartphone usage patterns and behaviours can be indicators of certain psychological states or conditions. In terms of psychiatry or clinical psychology, such information can be used to predict or determine the presence of mental health conditions.
This project will involve creating graphical and other visualisations of smartphone sensor data collected from the AWARE app (http://www.awareframework.com). Examples of such data include accelerometer, geolocation, application usage, screen usage and keyboard interaction. This data is stored in a MySQL database and you will use a suitable tool such as a JavaScript graphing library to create the displays.
As part of this project, you will work with a team of both computer scientists and psychologists to determine how the raw data from relevant smartphone sensors can best be visually represented for the intended purpose.