Big brother is watching you!

Companies in China have begun using technology to monitor the emotions of their employees. From the outset, the thought of such a scenario would probably make the majority of individuals nervous. It paints a picture of an Orwellian society, where people’s iPods tell them to ‘cheer up’ and order them to stop thinking negatively about corporations. To be honest, the more you read into the situation, the more totalitarian it appears.

The Technology
The key to the monitoring of employee emotions in China, are the helmets provided to the workers. They feature most prominently in construction, manufacturing, and transport companies, with the aim of monitoring stress levels. Scientists have attached brain sensors to the helmets to track the emotions of the wearer and identify dips and/or variations in brain waves that might indicate stress or negative emotions.

By doing so, companies are able to monitor the stress levels of their employees in what might be considered the more high-risk occupations e.g. high-speed train conducting, or electricians working on main power stations.

Creating these helmets is the government-funded, brain surveillance project, Neuro Cap. Who, from what we can see, might also suit the label, ‘Thought Police.’ They are based at Ningbo University, in China, and have advocated in favour of the technology in a number of interviews.

It seems that not everyone who was asked to wear the helmets was onboard with the programme at the beginning. Professor of Neuroscience at the university, Jin Jia, has been quoted saying that test subjects “…thought we could read their mind. This caused some discomfort and resistance in the beginning.” In fairness, it is unlikely that anyone could really blame the test subjects for possessing such reservations.

The professor went on to explain that, after some time with the helmets, the test subjects “…got used to the device…They wore it all day at work.” So, it appears that, after some time with the devices designed to monitor and eradicate negative emotion, the employees were okay with them! Whether or not this soothes any concerns you might have about such technology is up to you.