Journal article
Affective Computing in Youth Psychopathology: Protocol for the Adolescent Communication of Emotions Study
Personalized medicine in psychiatry, v 55, 100181
Mar 2026
Abstract
The identification of objective, scalable markers of socio-emotional behavior represents a major challenge in pediatric mental health diagnostics. Few approaches exist to reliably and objectively quantify social reciprocity and negative emotional states, which characterize many psychiatric and neurodevelopmental conditions, including anxiety, depression, obsessive–compulsive disorder, and autism. Advances in computer vision, natural language analytics, and psychophysiology enable fine-grained, objective measurement of socio-emotional behavior along these transdiagnostic dimensions, yet their application to youth remains limited. This article presents multimodal affective computing as an innovative approach with the potential to quantify objective markers of psychiatric and neurodevelopmental conditions in adolescents. The Affective Computing in Youth Psychopathology (ACES) study is a multi-site investigation designed to develop and validate novel behavioral and physiological markers of socio-emotional functioning across autistic and non-autistic youth with or without anxiety or depression. The study combines a standardized experimental battery to elicit spontaneous emotional and social behavior with a clinical battery to capture diagnostic status and clinical characteristics. By integrating clinical assessments and experimental paradigms with advanced multimodal phenotyping, ACES seeks to identify transdiagnostic markers of social and emotional behavior during adolescence, a critical window for the emergence of many psychiatric conditions. We describe the rationale, design, and analytic framework of ACES, highlighting how innovative affective computing technologies can provide objective and scalable assessment tools that ultimately advance precision psychiatry.
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Details
- Title
- Affective Computing in Youth Psychopathology: Protocol for the Adolescent Communication of Emotions Study
- Creators
- Rachel E. Lee - Baylor College of MedicineCaitlyn J. Kim - Center for Autism and Related DisordersCalliana J. Faulk - Drexel UniversityDhilani Premaratne - Baylor College of MedicineYuen Yvonne Yu - Rutgers, The State University of New JerseyRebecca Greenberg - University of Florida HealthMeg Lyons - Center for Autism and Related DisordersJessica Foy - University of ConnecticutSamantha X.L. Tan - Baylor College of MedicineAdam C. Garcia - Baylor College of MedicineTe Qi - Baylor College of MedicineMarianna Messerli - Baylor College of MedicineRobert J. Zhou - Baylor College of MedicineCaroline E. Barron - Baylor College of MedicineLauren K. Steinbeck - Center for Autism and Related DisordersCasey J. Zampella - Center for Autism and Related DisordersLeandra N. Berry - Center for Autism and Related DisordersRobin P. Kochel - Center for Autism and Related DisordersAndrew D. Wiese - Baylor College of MedicineJulia Parish-Morris - Center for Autism and Related DisordersJohn D. Herrington - Center for Autism and Related DisordersEric A. Storch (Corresponding Author) - Baylor College of Medicine
- Publication Details
- Personalized medicine in psychiatry, v 55, 100181
- Publisher
- Elsevier
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- A.J. Drexel Autism Institute
- Web of Science ID
- WOS:001697324800001
- Scopus ID
- 2-s2.0-105030383677
- Other Identifier
- 991022197016204721