Could the pupil diameter predict which photos are more likely to be "swiped right" on dating apps? This is the subject of our latest publication "Towards Automated Decision Making in Dating Apps Through Pupillary Responses", which is available here.
Abstract
Decision making is a multi-stage process that involves a series of rational evaluations. Recently, bodily arousal has been identified as a factor that mediates individual decisions, particularly during partner selection. The current study investigates pupil size changes in response to facial images of the opposite sex from controlled eye-tracking data (Experiment 1) and by reading out signals from front-facing smartphone cameras in noisy environments (Experiment 2). The aim is to enable automated decision-making in dating apps using arousalbased information. The rating results showed a tendency towards moderate evaluations when coping with facial attractiveness, while pupil diameter did not clearly discriminate between all four rating categories. However, a ROCKET model was trained on the pupil data from Experiment 1 with a prediction accuracy of 77% for binary classification of clearly preferred and non-preferred images. Ambiguous responses will therefore continue to pose a problem for cognition-aware systems. Capturing pupil diameter from mobile phone cameras resulted in a high proportion of inadequate recordings, probably due to a lack of experimental control. However, an overly systematic approach should run contrary to the intended scenario of lifelike mobile dating app usage.
Ehlers, J., Alfonso, S. L., & Mazumder, A. (2024). Towards Automated Decision Making in Dating Apps Through Pupillary Responses. In VISIGRAPP (1): GRAPP, HUCAPP, IVAPP (pp. 522-529).