AI Simulation Gives People a Glance of Their Potential Future Self

In a preliminary user study, the scientists found that after connecting with Future You for about half an hour, individuals reported reduced stress and anxiety and felt a stronger sense of connection with their future selves.

“We don’t have an actual time device yet, but AI can be a type of virtual time machine. We can utilize this simulation to help people believe more about the effects of the options they are making today,” says Pat Pataranutaporn, a current Media Lab doctoral graduate who is actively developing a program to advance human-AI interaction research study at MIT, and co-lead author of a paper on Future You.

Pataranutaporn is joined on the paper by co-lead authors Kavin Winson, a scientist at KASIKORN Labs; and Peggy Yin, a Harvard University undergraduate; along with Auttasak Lapapirojn and Pichayoot Ouppaphan of KASIKORN Labs; and senior authors Monchai Lertsutthiwong, head of AI research at the KASIKORN Business-Technology Group; Pattie Maes, the Germeshausen Professor of Media, Arts, and Sciences and head of the Fluid Interfaces group at MIT, and Hal Hershfield, professor of marketing, behavioral choice making, and psychology at the University of California at Los Angeles. The research study will exist at the IEEE Conference on Frontiers in Education.

A sensible simulation

Studies about conceiving one’s future self return to a minimum of the 1960s. One early approach targeted at enhancing future self-continuity had people compose letters to their future selves. More recently, researchers made use of virtual reality goggles to help people envision future versions of themselves.

But none of these techniques were extremely interactive, limiting the effect they could have on a user.

With the advent of generative AI and large language designs like ChatGPT, the scientists saw a chance to make a simulated future self that might talk about someone’s actual objectives and aspirations during a regular conversation.

“The system makes the simulation very practical. Future You is much more in-depth than what a person could develop by simply imagining their future selves,” states Maes.

Users start by answering a series of questions about their existing lives, things that are very important to them, and objectives for the future.

The AI system uses this details to create what the researchers call “future self memories” which supply a backstory the design pulls from when interacting with the user.

For circumstances, the chatbot could talk about the highlights of someone’s future profession or answer questions about how the user got rid of a specific difficulty. This is possible since ChatGPT has actually been trained on substantial information including people speaking about their lives, professions, and excellent and disappointments.

The user engages with the tool in two methods: through introspection, when they consider their life and goals as they construct their future selves, and revision, when they consider whether the simulation reflects who they see themselves becoming, says Yin.

“You can picture Future You as a story search area. You have an opportunity to hear how some of your experiences, which might still be emotionally charged for you now, might be metabolized throughout time,” she states.

To help people envision their future selves, the system generates an age-progressed picture of the user. The chatbot is likewise created to supply brilliant responses utilizing phrases like “when I was your age,” so the simulation feels more like a real future version of the person.

The ability to listen from an older variation of oneself, rather than a generic AI, can have a more powerful positive effect on a user contemplating an unpredictable future, Hershfield states.

“The interactive, brilliant components of the platform offer the user an anchor point and take something that could lead to anxious rumination and make it more concrete and productive,” he adds.

But that realism might backfire if the simulation relocates a negative direction. To avoid this, they guarantee Future You warns users that it reveals just one prospective version of their future self, and they have the company to change their lives. Providing alternate answers to the questionnaire yields a totally different discussion.

“This is not a prophesy, but rather a possibility,” Pataranutaporn says.

Aiding self-development

To assess Future You, they carried out a user study with 344 individuals. Some users engaged with the system for 10-30 minutes, while others either communicated with a generic chatbot or just completed studies.

Participants who utilized Future You were able to construct a closer relationship with their ideal future selves, based on an analytical analysis of their reactions. These users also reported less anxiety about the future after their interactions. In addition, Future You users said the discussion felt sincere which their worths and beliefs appeared consistent in their simulated future identities.

“This work creates a new course by taking a reputable mental technique to picture times to come – an avatar of the future self – with cutting edge AI. This is precisely the kind of work academics must be focusing on as innovation to build virtual self designs merges with large language designs,” states Jeremy Bailenson, the Thomas More Storke Professor of Communication at Stanford University, who was not involved with this research.

Building off the results of this preliminary user study, the researchers continue to fine-tune the methods they develop context and prime users so they have discussions that assist build a stronger sense of future self-continuity.

“We wish to direct the user to discuss particular subjects, instead of asking their future selves who the next president will be,” Pataranutaporn says.

They are also adding safeguards to prevent people from misusing the system. For example, one might a company producing a “future you” of a prospective client who achieves some terrific outcome in life because they acquired a particular product.

Moving forward, the scientists desire to study specific applications of Future You, maybe by allowing people to explore various careers or envision how their everyday choices might impact climate modification.

They are likewise collecting data from the Future You pilot to much better understand how people utilize the system.

“We don’t want individuals to end up being depending on this tool. Rather, we hope it is a meaningful experience that helps them see themselves and the world in a different way, and assists with self-development,” Maes says.