App ‘to turn phone into a therapist’

The free app takes advantage of the fact phones are increasingly capable of collecting information about where we are, how noisy our environment is, how much we are moving around and who we communicate with.

It will invisibly monitor data such as a user’s calling and texting patterns to track their conversations and work out how they are feeling.

Using the phone’s built-in global positioning system, accelerometer and microphone, it 
will develop a pattern of that person’s habits, activities and routines.

The Emotion Sense programme, available for free on Android phones and developed by the University of Cambridge’s Computer Laboratory, will work as the phone’s owner goes about his or her normal life.

The app’s designers hope they can collect a precise record of what drives people’s emotional peaks, showing, for example, when they are likely to be at their most stressed.