We evaluated the suppressing effect of weak-acidic polyester on itching during sleep when wearing a sleep garment made of weak-acidic polyester for the patients with atopic dermatitis. The weak-acidic polyester knitted fabric was prepared from commercial weak-acidic polyester, and applied for a sleep garment. The degree of itching during sleep was evaluated by VAS, and it was confirmed that the degree of itching was lower in patients with atopic dermatitis when wearing a sleep garment made of weak- acidic polyester than when wearing that made of untreated polyester. When the patients with atopic dermatitis work up a sweat during sleep, the sweat contains histamine as an itching component so that they feel itchy while sleeping. The weak-acidic polyester has an antibacterial effect against Staphylococcus aureus by maintaining the skin pH around 5.5, and it is considered that itching could be inhibited by suppressing the growth of Staphylococcus aureus.

This study discusses the results of a literature survey and cross-tabulation analysis of the objects of kawaii emotions and causes of kawaii emotions. From ancient language dictionaries, historically, kawaii could be said to be mainly used to refer to one’s relatives and gradually to non-relative children, romantic partners, and artificial objects. Based on the descriptions from various ancient language dictionaries, this study presents four causes of kawaii emotions: the morphology of the object, its behaviors and facial expressions, relationship between human and it, and its perceived personality. The primary causes of kawaii emotions toward relatives and romantic partners are the relationship with the object and its personality, and the causes toward non-relative children are the morphology of the object, its behavior and facial expressions, and its personality, and the causes toward artificial objects are the morphology of the object, its behavior and facial expressions, and the relationship.

To establish an objective method of evaluating emotion which is applicable to the development of in-vehicle products, this study aims to detect driver’s “feeling of excitement” and “feeling of nervousness” by observed physiological indices. Assuming that “feeling of excitement” is to be considered a pleasant arousal emotion and “feeling of nervousness” is regarded as unpleasant arousal emotion, we carried out the experiment to verify whether the above two emotions can be distinguished by means of cerebral blood flow (CBF) and heart rate variability (HRV). Eight participants riding on a simulated self-driving car were presented with the visual stimuli with intention to evoke the above two emotions. The result showed that oxyhemoglobin increased in prefrontal cortex when “feeling of excitement” was evoked and decreased when “feeling of nervousness” was evoked, meanwhile SDNN/RMSSD increased in both situations. We clarified the above two emotions were distinguishable using measurement of CBF and HRV.

This research proposed a model of cerebral blood flow responses due to work in a work environment. Based on the model, features were proposed to capture the temporal changes and localization of cerebral blood flows, focusing on the periodicity of the task. A method to remove the effect of environmental noise in the features was also proposed. To verify the usefulness of the proposed method, we conducted an intellectual task discrimination test in an office environment under a color environment. In the verification experiment, we measured the cerebral blood flow of participants using NIRS when they performed three types of intellectual tasks in four different color environments. We used SVM to discriminate the data of cerebral blood flow using the features calculated for each arbitrary segment. The maximum correct response rate was 0.717 after comparing the segmented interval, type of hemoglobin, and type of kernel function.

The face pareidolia phenomenon, incorrect perception of something that is not a face as a face, affects human cognition and behavior. Although some face pareidolia studies focus on event-related potentials (ERPs) as the physiological indicator, most of them use stimuli uncontrolled context, spatial frequency, and contrast. The physiological response induced by this stimulus might be influenced by contexts other than face-likeness. The current study estimated the ERP component that affects the face pareidolia phenomenon by measuring EEGs while evaluating face-like abstract figures’ face-likeness. Multiple regression analysis was performed to predict the face-likeness evaluation based on EEG data. As a result, the N170 component at the left posterior temporal area and the N400 component at the right frontal area were related to the pareidolia phenomenon.

This paper reports on the results of a literature review and text-mining analysis conducted to understand how the kawaii emotion had been expressed in Japanese. The Japanese term kawaii can be translated to English as lovable, cute, pretty, and sweet comprehensively. In Japanese, the kawaii emotion had long been expressed using different words, many of which have multiple other meanings. In addition, some words that had been used to express the kawaii emotion took on new meanings. The words that had been exclusively used to refer to the kawaii emotion are megushi, utsukushi, rotashi, kahayushi, and shiorashi. In modern Japanese, nuances such as ‘sweet’ and ‘pitiful’ were removed from the concept of kawaii whereas others such as ‘smiling’ were added.

The quantification is required about application feeling of the skin lotion when it is designed and evaluated. In this paper, we propose a system that estimates the application feeling by temperature measurement in order to realize an objective and quantitative evaluation. We measured the temperatures on the finger-shaped sensor and the applied table during the application of the lotion. The measurements were conducted by a proposed measurement system that simulates the application movement. Seven independent features were calculated from the measured temperature waveform, and the relationship with the five application feelings was modeled by multiple regression analysis. The resulting estimation model of the application feelings showed high accuracy. Therefore, we concluded that the proposed measurement system is applicable for estimation application feeling of the skin lotion.

In this study, the overall consultation records accumulated in Hospital A’s Cancer Counseling and Support Center, were analyzed to capture the changes and trends of the contents of consultations. For the 10-year consultation record at this center, the number of consultations and time taken for each item of the consultation content were evaluated. Text mining was also performed alongside analyzing the word frequency and co-occurrence relationship between words. As a result, we found that it was possible to grasp the changes in the quality of consultation content and changes in the number of cases efficiently. In specific, through text mining of the records on “social life” and “anxiety/mental distress,” we could confirm the trend of consultations regarding employment support and the side effects of drug therapy for cancer patients. Finally, the accumulation of practical knowledge would lead to knowledge sharing, alongside an improvement in the knowledge and skills of counselors.

This study aimed to obtain knowledge for improving usability through motion characteristics analysis based on peak velocity of drag on touch screens. We conducted an experiment in which an object was dragged to a target position. The drag direction and distance were adopted as experimental factors. Ten subjects participated in this study; their average age was 23.6 years. The results showed that the fingertip movement for drag corresponded well with the performance model based on Fitts’ law, and the usability decreased under the conditions with relatively long distance excepting the right direction. The peak velocity of dragging was almost linearly related to the distance to the target and was higher in the horizontal direction than in the vertical direction. Since the corrective movement for positioning at the target accounted for more than half of the drag movement, operation support for the corrective movement may improve usability.

One of the important Kansei values of automobiles is engine sound. Engine sound determines the character of a car and is an important element for branding. However, since popular cars sold around the world have diverse preferences for customers in each region, they will inevitably be developed to reflect the demand for improvement of mass production cars while compare with the level of competing cars. It is same for engine sounds, and when providing engine sounds with new Kansei values, a different approach is required. Therefore, in this research, we used Kansei engineering, devised a new process to realize engine sound of a new concept, and verified its usefulness. Specifically, we introduce an example of engine sound design based on the concept of “Woody sound”.

With the spread of digital games, board games as analog games are also popular. There are several discussions focusing on educational methods using board games. However, although it is said that it will have improved communication skills and educational effects, there is not much specific analysis. It is considered impossible to conduct social experiments that only control the use of board games, and it is generally difficult to measure them. Therefore, in this study, based on the hypothesis that it is effective, we set the “Fundamental Competencies for Working Persons” by METI as educational effects for 24 types of board games and analyzed the relationship. This paper describes the results. In addition, we discuss whether board games can be generalized for playing and learning, and the “Fundamental Competencies for Working Persons” for educational effects.

As factors determining roughness sensation of dot pattern, both spacing and curvature of dot are assumed. In this study, the relationship between these two dimensional parameters and the roughness sensation was investigated. We used a 3D printer to produce various types of samples with different combinations of curvature and spacing, and conducted sensory evaluation to select combinations with the same sense of roughness from among them. As a result of the experiment, as the dot curvature is larger (smaller), the smaller (larger) dot spacing is selected, and a contour map of roughness sensation is created on these two dimensional planes. It was found that roughness sensation is proportional to logarithm of dot curvature, assuming that roughness sensation is proportional to logarithmic value of dot spacing. By this experiment, the magnitude of the influence of dot shape in roughness perception and its individual difference were found.

In order to increase the number of videos playback, we researched on the thumbnail images and the titles which were selected by the viewers. We built the samples and conducted the questionnaires in order to reveal the factors that make a great influence on the evaluation and be clear about the positive levels. We revealed the viewers decide the videos under the influence of the images rather than sentences and words. Also, Images factors are particularly effective for males. On the other hand, females are more affected by sentences and words than males. This research revealed the guidelines that YouTuber creates thumbnail images and titles and the elements to incorporate according to the target the males or the females. As a starting point of this research, we will be able to conduct more detailed research on thumbnail images and titles.