Extending Anxiety Detection from Multimodal Wearables in Controlled Conditions to Real-World Environments

This study quantitatively evaluated whether and how machine learning (ML) models built by data from controlled conditions can fit real-world conditions. This study focused on feature-based models using wearable technology from real-world data collected from young adults, so as to provide insights into the models’ robustness and the specific challenges posed by diverse environmental noise. Feature-based models, particularly XGBoost and Decision Trees, demonstrated considerable resilience, maintaining higher accuracy and reliability across different noise levels. This investigation included an in-depth analysis of transfer learning, highlighting its potential and limitations in adapting models developed from standard datasets, like WESAD, to complex real-world scenarios. Moreover, this study analyzed the distributed feature importance across various physiological signals, such as electrodermal activity (EDA) and electrocardiography (ECG), considering their vulnerability to environmental factors. It was found that integrating multiple physiological data types could significantly enhance model robustness. The results underscored the need for a nuanced understanding of signal contributions to model efficacy, suggesting that feature-based models showed much promise in practical applications.