Ghandeharioun, A., Azaria, A., Taylor, S., Maes, P., and Picard, R. "Promoting kindness and gratitude with a smartphone and triggers," Annals of Behavioral Medicine, March 2016, Volume 50, Supplement 1.

Abstract

Previous research has shown that gratitude positively influences psychological wellbeing and physical health. These findings call for the development of technologies to promote gratitude. This paper presents a novel system leveraging smartphones to naturally embed gratitude inspiration in everyday life. Smartphone sensor data is utilized to infer optimal moments for stimulating contextually relevant thankfulness and appreciation. We hypothesize that our approach leads to reoccurring instances of grateful emotion, and consequently, improves overall wellbeing.