The Life2Well Project: Investigating the Relationship between Physiological Stress and Environmental Factors through Data Science, the Internet of Things and Do-it-Yourself Wearables

Abstract

This chapter reports a study conducted by students as an independent research project under the mentorship of a Research Scientist at the National Institute of Education, Singapore. In the Life2Well Project (Learning at the intersection of AI, physiology, EEG, our environment and well-being) identical units of a wearable device containing environmental sensors (such as ambient temperature, air pressure, infrared radiation and relative humidity) were designed and worn respectively by five adolescents from July to December 2021. Over the same period, data from these sensors was complemented by that obtained from smartwatches (namely blood oxygen saturation, heart rate and its variability, body temperature, respiration rate and sleep score). More than 40,000 data points were eventually collected, and were processed through a random forest regression model, which is a supervised learning algorithm that uses ensemble learning methods for regression. Results showed that the most influential microclimatic factors on biometric indicators were noise, and the concentrations of carbon dioxide and dust. Subsequently, more complex inferences were made from Shapley value interpretation of the regression models. Such findings suggest implications for the design of living conditions with respect to the interaction of microclimate and human health and comfort.