The Brain in the Wild: Tracking Human Behavior in Natural and Naturalistic Settings

This chapter discusses the use of a "people tracker" to study human behavior in the real world. Modern technology allows for the development of various "people trackers" using combinations of accelerometers, GPS, video, and other sensors (e.g., to measure cerebral activity, eye movement, heart rate, skin temperature) to make naturalistic observations of human movement and behavior. These devices can advance the goal of examining human performance, strategies, tactics, interactions, and errors in humans engaged in real-world tasks. Besides various issues of device development and sensor choice and placement, there is also a need to develop taxonomies for classifying likely behavior from sensor output, as well as the need to be able to analyze behavior sequences using new applications of classic ethological techniques.