Up to now, it was said that living organisms must maintain homeostasis to maintain life. It was also thought that living organisms are capable of maintaining homeostasis due to the automatic control systems of the negative feedback mechanism. When applying vital signs that are directly associated with our lives such as the heart rate, respiration, blood pressure and body temperature to the concept of homeostasis, it can be said feedback is triggered to compensate any disturbance that causes certain values to deviate from their normal values, and the more stable these values are the more efficient the control systems of the living organism are functioning. But the heartbeat of a healthy person, for example, is never constant even if the person is in a relaxed state of mind. On the contrary, it fluctuates quite irregularly (heart rate variability). This also applies to the respiration, blood pressure, body temperature, etc. In fact, we know that there is less fluctuation of the heart rate among the elderly and individuals with medical conditions. The same can be observed in pulse waves. For this reason, there were continuous reports in the field of physiology around the mid-1980’s indicating the possibility that such fluctuations including heart rate and brain waves are chaotic. Because no new knowledge could be gained when using the conventional method of linear analysis to analyze chaotic fluctuations, there was the need to analyze chaotic fluctuations using nonlinear methods. Recent advancements in computer processing speed and visualization capabilities have allowed us to analyze nonlinearly the chaotic properties of vital signs. Such technologies have opened new doors of understanding concerning information that was treated as error or simply unknown in the past to actually contain information that we wanted to know most.
Psychologists in the past have tried to examine the mental state of people through trial and error by asking a series of questions as there was no way to read a human mind. But if accurate information can be obtained by directly measuring vital signs and performing nonlinear analysis, such information should be greatly effective in the field of psychology that relies on the rules of thumb. Those involved in brain research conducted large-scale experiments such as directly inserting electrodes into the brain or taking video images based on the principle that all information can be found in the brain. However, we can now check with relative ease the various states of the mind by examining the pulse waves at the fingertip which contains information of the central nervous system. We are now able to assess the state of the sympathetic and parasympathetic nerves from pulse waves taken from finger plethysmogram. Combined with the information gained from nonlinear analysis of pulse waves we can also obtain other types information such as moods, etc. Such understanding was gained through many psychological and biological tests. In recent years, there has been an increase in the number of suicides resulting from depression as well as people causing social problems as the result of becoming mentally “high.” What kind of mental state are they in? We believe that a measurement device that allows us to check the various mental states of ourselves would contribute, to a certain degree, a safer and peaceful society. We also believe the need to develop a system so that people can check themselves in order to handle major issues in the increasingly complex human society such as how to rejuvenate people mentally incapable of fitting into society in the aging society where one in every four will be 65 years old or older, how to detect and deal at an early stage the bullying of children that has become a serious problem of communal life, etc. Furthermore, there is also the need to fully utilize the power of digital networks so that people and the people surrounding them are aware of such mental states.
Psychologists in the past have tried to examine the mental state of people through trial and error by asking a series of questions as there was no way to read a human mind. But if accurate information can be obtained by directly measuring vital signs and performing nonlinear analysis, such information should be greatly effective in the field of psychology that relies on the rules of thumb. Those involved in brain research conducted large-scale experiments such as directly inserting electrodes into the brain or taking video images based on the principle that all information can be found in the brain. However, we can now check with relative ease the various states of the mind by examining the pulse waves at the fingertip which contains information of the central nervous system. We are now able to assess the state of the sympathetic and parasympathetic nerves from pulse waves taken from finger plethysmogram. Combined with the information gained from nonlinear analysis of pulse waves we can also obtain other types information such as moods, etc. Such understanding was gained through many psychological and biological tests. In recent years, there has been an increase in the number of suicides resulting from depression as well as people causing social problems as the result of becoming mentally “high.” What kind of mental state are they in? We believe that a measurement device that allows us to check the various mental states of ourselves would contribute, to a certain degree, a safer and peaceful society. We also believe the need to develop a system so that people can check themselves in order to handle major issues in the increasingly complex human society such as how to rejuvenate people mentally incapable of fitting into society in the aging society where one in every four will be 65 years old or older, how to detect and deal at an early stage the bullying of children that has become a serious problem of communal life, etc. Furthermore, there is also the need to fully utilize the power of digital networks so that people and the people surrounding them are aware of such mental states.
