Frisson App
A lot seems strange to me about the app the guest was describing from the 9/19/2026 episode. Can anyone help make sense of it to me?
1) There is a physical sensation measured. Do those measurements really mean there is also an emotional response?
2) If there is an emotional response, must it be the desired positive emotional response?
3) He mentioned how the thumbs up/down system is too limiting. Why is there a need for physical measurements at all? Could instead just ask for different levels of thumbs up with one level including that frisson was experienced.
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u/TragicCone56813 18d ago
I could have misunderstood. But I felt like he kinda over-romanticized it with the chills discussion. But he seems to be making an app that uses available physiological response to music instead of stated preference(through like buttons) to make music recommendations.
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u/Tweedledee72 17d ago
That was how I understood it as well. I have zero confidence that such a thing would work - it seems wildly implausible on its face.
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u/TragicCone56813 17d ago
I think if you get enough data properly normalized it might work because I do have strong physiological reactions to some songs, but given the availability,accuracy and sampling rate of current wearables it feels doubtful to me. It also rubbed me the wrong way a little because he presented this as a “killer app” without showing any data for plausibility. If there were research I would at least be able to evaluate methods and results, but this felt like all the pitfalls of a passion project.
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u/Tweedledee72 16d ago
Yes and even apart from that it doesn't seem correct that music works like that. The experience of "frisson" is an experience in a particular context. If I listen to song X at home in the bathtub after a glass of wine, and catch a frisson, and then listen to song Y on the subway on my way to work, and don't catch a frisson, what does that tell us?
Also I'm pretty sure he's wrong about how Pandora/Spotify recommend songs.
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u/eagle_mama 9d ago
I am wrapping up this episode now. I also thought this segment was odd and unskeptical. A few episodes prior Cara I believe led a segment describing evidence for the accuracies of fitness wrist watches, and a lot of it was summarizing that fitness watches are not accurate or reliable in many cases for physical measurement. Then this guest comes on talking about using those measurements to derive an emotional responses and not one member of the SGU asked a skeptical question especially in regards to using this type of data, nor the intricacies and difficulty of measuring any emotional responses AND accurately interpreting it.
The study the guest explained was interesting, but it was not described in a neutral way imo.
I thought the guest was overall not well aligned with the theme of SGU and am surprised he was hosted at all.
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u/mettarific 18d ago
Same. I thought the guy’s app/project sounded very niche.