Parents may find this new iPhone app very helpful. The app can help detect early signs of autism in children by reading and interpreting the child's facial expressions.
"Autism & Beyond" is one of the newest iPhone apps developed by researchers at Duke University in North Carolina. Software engineers, together with several scientists, made use of algorithms that would be able to detect facial expressions. The phone's camera will capture the muscle movements of the face then transmit the captured data to the app for reading.
Yahoo News reported that a medical research is being conducted for six months to fully gauge and evaluate the app. Families who wish to become a part of the study can simply download the app from Apple's App Store.
As part of the study, children will be shown several video clips, with differing emotional themes, in order to elicit various responses from the little ones. Their responses to the clips will then be measured by the app.
According to Dr. Guillermo Sapiro, Duke University professor of electrical and computer engineering, "A core component of the app is emotion." He also added that it works "by following facial landmarks that are automatically detected and from classifying emotions as well as head position."
Sapiro also mentioned that the app can be utilized for children six years old and below. He clarified that the app must not be considered as a self-diagnosis tool, however, it has the capacity to be a "screening tool" for autism.
Signs of autism appear both in infancy and in childhood. Parents must be keen in observing the signs such as failure to make eye contact and not responding when his or her name is called. With more than 3.5 million of Americans affected by the disorder, the app may greatly help in detecting it early on.
The foray into developing useful apps that could help certain types of disorders is not new. Parenting has provided a list of some of the most useful autism apps that could help parents in their quest to finding the proper treatment for their children.
