New Era in Marriage Counseling
Have you ever dreamed of having a crystal ball that can foresee the future? You might, for example, want to know if you will still be with your spouse. Will you be able to deal with the rough patches that life brings in order to persevere and build a healthier, stronger relationship or will you just drift apart?
Artificial Intelligence (AI) can now use data to interpret your relationship! In the following study, a spouse’s emotional responses have been found to be more important than the content of her/his conversations.
Shrikanth Narayanan, a founding member of Behavioral Signals, and his team of experts in the USC Viterbi School of Engineering have invented a new computer algorithm that can predict whether you and your spouse will have a stronger or weaker relationship based on the tone of voice used when speaking to each other. In fact, their results have done a better job of predicting marital success of couples with serious marital issues than advice provided by relationship experts! [Proceedings of Interspeech, September 6, 2015]
In their study, the researchers recorded hundreds of conversations from over one hundred couples taken during marriage therapy sessions over two years and then tracked their marital status. They found that in a couple’s relationship, it is more important how you say something, rather than what you say.
What effect will this new method have on the field of psychotherapy? In the 1980s, Canadian psychologist Sue Johnson developed a new field called Emotionally Focused Therapy. EFT is based on the concept that distress in intimate relationships is often related to deeply rooted fears of abandonment and an individual’s emotional response to these fears may put a strain on her/his relationship.
EFT is a non-directive approach in which individuals gain a better self-understanding through speaking to a therapist who listens carefully and empathically. This technique helps couples to not only understand their own emotions but also how the back-and-forth patterns of emotional reactions affect their relationship.
Yet can EFT be improved with the aid of AI? It is unlikely that EFT will continue to be implemented in the therapist/client relationship the “old-fashioned way.” In fact, the idea of an individual therapist providing face-to-face counseling without the aid of AI may go by the wayside. Clients will now be able to access the state of their relationship automatically. Once the problems are defined collaboratively, the couple will have the tools to delve deeper into their emotional state.
Furthermore, the task of Narayanan’s algorithm isn’t to determine the expiration date of a relationship but to help improve it by revealing its ups and downs. It provides a valuable set of cues for the psychotherapist, which, combined with their own expertise, could increase their chance of improving relationships for couples in therapy.
Depending on one’s viewpoint, the future of marriage therapy in the age of intelligent machines may be either exciting or frightening. People are becoming more attuned to, and dependent on, technology in everyday living. It seems inevitable that the fields of psychotherapy and AI will eventually be combined.
But just be reminded that the tone of your voice plays a vital role in relationships and interactions. Next time you want to have a discussion with your partner, make sure you pay attention to not only what comes out of your mouth but how you convey your message!
