[Noisebridge-discuss] Lend me a kinect / xbox For Science™?

[Sai]

I'm doing a master's thesis at U. Chicago; my research investigates
how real vs imagined empathy relates to motor imitation vs imagery.

I'm planning to use the Kinect Dance Central game* as a test of motor imitation.

Harmonix said they'd donate a copy of the game, but I haven't heard
back from Microsoft on donation or loan of xbox/kinect hardware, so…

… could you (or one of your friends) could lend either or both to me?


I'm starting with nothing xbox-related other than a monitor, so I need
to end up with a fully functional xbox/kinect system capable of
running Dance Central.

I'd pay for shipping both ways, give it back when I'm done running
subjects (which'll be probably around July if things work as
expected), and you'd be thanked in the resulting paper.

Thanks,
Sai


* Yes, seriously.

Why? All other motor imitation measures I've seen in the literature
are for kids and/or autistics, and are really crazy simple. Basically
any healthy adult would ceiling them, and I wouldn't get enough
variance to extract a correlation if one exists. So I'll screen out
people w/ movement problems and Dance Central experience, give 'em
5-10 minutes in the tutorial etc to get used to it, then use their
actual score on a medium-difficulty 10-minute run as my outcome
measure.

Also, this is easier to run (doesn't need me to do much), more fun for
subjects, a better hook for press, and a possible pointer to future
research (e.g. does training w/ DC improve empathy measures?).

If you want to know more than that, email me and I'll send you my
formal writeup.