Feedback Loops is an immersive performance based on the RADAR-CNS study which is investigating how wearable technologies and mobile phones can track and help prevent depression, epilepsy and multiple sclerosis.

The piece was guided by live body data taken from wearable devices with themes of expressing the entanglements of neurological conditions through movement.

The sounds were generated based on the information taken directly from the wearable technology (Empatica E4 wristband) that was recording the dancer’s biological data.

Throughout the performance the dancer’s movements controls which notes are being played. The blood volume pulse is controlling the probability of notes being played and the volume of the notes and the electrodermal activity (the amount of sweat on their skin) is controlling how the notes sound.

SEISMA Magazine review:

https://seismamag.com/theatre-dance/feedback-loops

The performance was developed for the Science in the City Festival Malta and it is inspired by the RADAR-CNS research study at King's College London, which looks at how wearable technologies and mobile phones can track symptoms of depression, epilepsy and multiple sclerosis:

https://www.radar-cns.org/

Excerpt from ‘Feedback Loops’ highlighting invisible symptoms of depression. Film link from King’s College London: https://youtu.be/KLZpeq6KuFU

RADAR-CNS was advertised to patients as a research study, whereas Feedback Loops was advertised to the Patient Advisory Board (people with lived experiences of these illnesses) and the rest of the team as an interdisciplinary public engagement project. The dancer, the musician, and producer held interviews with people with lived experiences with these illnesses. The patients kindly shared their experiences and offered them to inform the development of Feedback Loops storyline, choreography and music. Feedback Loops also contains quotes collected as part of the RADAR participant interviews.

The data from the performance was recorded for further research and, in future, the team hope to discover the extent to which the dancer’s physiological relates to the audience’s data, involving a running experiment to study and measure audience arousal (Vicary et al., 2017) using Empatica E4 and further, try to discover rapport and empathy between the two parties (Lumsden, Miled & Mcrae, 2014).

Additional Credits:

Video: Chris Scott Studio, Ioana Minulescu

Research & Software Development: Yatharth Ranjan, Callum Steward, Valeria de Angel, Andrea Biondi, Matteo Martinis

Stage Lighting: Ed Saunders