What Lies Beneath - A Survey of Affective Theory Use in Computational
Models of Emotion
Abstract
Affective computing encompasses the research and development of systems
that can recognize, express, and “have” emotions. Its literature is
already vast, which is a hindrance for newcomers. Those who wish to
create Computational Models of Emotion (CMEs) must first identify what
kind of system they want to build, then identify affective theories that
match its requirements. This survey aims to help designers of CMEs that
generate emotions in computer agents and user interfaces with
this latter task. We give an overview of 63 CMEs from different domains,
and identify which affective theories they use and why. Some of these
CMEs also use affective theories to express emotion and for
other design purposes. We also analyse these instances to better
understand the complete system. The survey closes with a brief summary
of how CMEs generally use each encountered theory. The survey is meant
as a guideline for deciding which affective theories to use for new CME
designs that generate emotions.