/ 
Emotion-0.05
/ Emotion

NAME

Emotion - discrete emotion annotation processing library

SYNOPSIS

This document describes the XML representation of 3rd person annotations, validation rules, and how the information is represented in perl for further processing.

DESCRIPTION

The minimum situation consists of the type of competition and two opponents.

abbreviation  type of competition (situation)
------------  -------------------------------
destroys      [-] destroys [-]
steals        [-] steals from [+]
uneasy        [-] is made uneasy by [0]
exposes       [+] exposes [-]
impasse       [+] and [+] are at an impasse
admires       [+] admires [0]
observes      [0] observes [-]
accepts       [0] accepts [+]
ready         [0] and [0] are at readiness

Each opponent is labelled either left or right, indicating on which side of the situation he or she participates. For example:

<observes left="student" right="teacher">
  A student watches the teacher make a presentation.
</observes>

<observes right="student" left="teacher">
  The teacher watches a student make a presentation.
</observes>

Of course a teacher is probably much more relaxed lecturing in front of a class than a student. This information can be captured by the intensity attribute:

<observes left="student" right="teacher" intensity="gentle">
  A student watches the teacher make a presentation.
</observes>

<observes right="student" left="teacher" intensity="forceful">
  The teacher watches a student make a presentation.
</observes>

Since no spin is involved, the emotion is roughly the same regardless of whether we empathize with the teacher or the student. To contrast, situations involving spin require some additional structure. For example:

<steals left="thief" right="child">
  The thief steals the teddy bear from the child's passionate grip.
</steals>

Here it is not clear which emotion is intended. Opponents experience the situation very differently. Perhaps the thief is drunk with accomplishment, but the child is probably quite angry. To avoid this ambiguity, situations involving spin follow a transactional pattern:

initiator:   (1) before ---+---> (3) after
                           |
                           v
victim:             (2) tension

Introduce id / answer XXX

Here is a hypothetical trace of a steals situation decomposed into the three transaction phases:

<steals left="thief" right="child" before="focused">
  The thief eyes the teddy bear maliciously.
</steals>

<steals left="thief" right="child" tension="focused">
  As the thief wrenches the teddy bear from the child's
  passionate grip, she becomes furious and starts crying.
</steals>

<steals left="thief" right="child" after="focused">
  The thief triumphantly stows the teddy bear in his backpack.
</steals>

Perhaps this situation is ghastly, but the goal here is merely to model emotions accurately. In this example, the three phases unambiguously correspond to "anxiety," "anger," and "drunk with accomplishment."

The attributes before, tension, and after describe the emotional tension. Tension modifies the general emotion to fit the precise sitations. For example:

<steals left="thief" right="child" before="relaxed">
  The thief eyes the teddy bear with abandon.
</steals>

<steals left="thief" right="child" before="stifled">
  The thief studies whether the teddy bear can be stolen.
</steals>

A tension modifier is either focused, relaxed, or stifled. Emotion correspondance charts can assist in fitting the most accurate modifier to the situation. Of course a thief is not always successful:

<steals left="thief" right="child" before="stifled">
  The thief studies whether the teddy bear can be stolen.
</steals>

<impasse left="child" right="thief" tension="focused">
  The child notices the thief and grips the teddy
  bear tightly.
</impasse>

The four situations involving spin (steals, exposes, admires, and accepts) mostly follow the three phase transaction pattern. However, flexibility offered by accepts shows the need to indicate an initiator. For example:

<accepts left="chef" right="child" before="focused">
  I am hungry.  Is dinner ready?
</accepts>

<accepts left="chef" right="child" before="focused">
  You are hungry!
</accepts>

Looking just at annotation, a reader cannot determine whether the child is making a demand, or the chef is voicing the child's facial expression of hunger. An initiator attribute eliminates the ambiguity:

<accepts left="chef" right="child" before="focused" initiator="right">
  I am hungry.  Is dinner ready?
</accepts>

<accepts left="chef" right="child" before="focused" initiator="left">
  You are hungry!
</accepts>

Now the situations can be distinguish. While the annotation is precise, it is also quite a lot of typing. To reduce the burden of the analyst, the library is capable of guessing reasonable defaults by consideration of who is talking. For example:

<talk who="child">
  <accepts left="chef" before="focused">
    I am hungry.  Is dinner ready?
  </accepts>
</talk>

Before venturing into layered combinations of situations, you might like to study a summary of the simple variations:

situation  variations
---------- ---------------------------------
steals     before/tension/after, initiator
exposes    before/tension/after, initiator
admires    before/tension/after, initiator
accepts    before/tension/after, initiator
uneasy     intensity, [initiator]
impasse    intensity, [initiator]
observes   intensity, [initiator]
ready      intensity
destroys   N/A

Another variation arises when people make silly comments about a person who isn't present to hear them.

<talk who="gossip1">
  <accepts left="gossip2" before="focused">
    <exposes right="June" before="focused" absent="right">
      June's hair looks terrible!
    </exposes>
  </accepts>
</talk>