AI Simulation Gives People a Glance of Their Potential Future Self

In an initial user research study, the researchers discovered that after interacting with Future You for about half an hour, individuals reported decreased anxiety and felt a more powerful sense of connection with their future selves.

« We don’t have a real time device yet, but AI can be a kind of virtual time device. We can utilize this simulation to assist people think more about the consequences 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 undergrad; as well as Auttasak Lapapirojn and Pichayoot Ouppaphan of KASIKORN Labs; and senior authors Monchai Lertsutthiwong, head of AI research study 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, teacher 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 practical simulation

Studies about conceptualizing one’s future self go back to at least the 1960s. One early method focused on enhancing future self-continuity had people write letters to their future selves. More recently, researchers made use of virtual reality goggles to help people picture future variations of themselves.

But none of these approaches were very interactive, limiting the impact they could have on a user.

With the advent of generative AI and large language models like ChatGPT, the scientists saw a chance to make a simulated future self that could talk about someone’s actual objectives and goals throughout a typical conversation.

« The system makes the simulation really reasonable. Future You is much more in-depth than what a person might create by just envisioning their future selves, » states Maes.

Users start by answering a series of questions about their current lives, things that are crucial to them, and goals for the future.

The AI system uses this details to develop what the scientists call « future self memories » which offer a backstory the model pulls from when engaging with the user.

For circumstances, the chatbot might talk about the highlights of somebody’s future profession or answer questions about how the user got rid of a specific difficulty. This is possible since ChatGPT has been trained on comprehensive information including individuals discussing their lives, careers, and excellent and bad experiences.

The user engages with the tool in 2 methods: through self-questioning, when they consider their life and objectives as they construct their future selves, and memory, when they consider whether the simulation reflects who they see themselves ending up being, states Yin.

« You can picture Future You as a story search space. You have an opportunity to hear how some of your experiences, which may still be mentally charged for you now, could be metabolized over the course of time, » she states.

To assist people imagine their future selves, the system produces an age-progressed photo of the user. The chatbot is likewise designed to supply vivid answers utilizing phrases like « when I was your age, » so the simulation feels more like a real future variation of the person.

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

« The interactive, vibrant components of the platform give the user an anchor point and take something that could result in distressed rumination and make it more concrete and productive, » he adds.

But that might backfire if the simulation moves in a negative instructions. To avoid this, they ensure Future You cautions users that it shows only one possible version of their future self, and they have the firm to alter their lives. Providing alternate responses to the survey yields a completely different conversation.

« This is not a prophesy, however rather a possibility, » Pataranutaporn states.

Aiding self-development

To assess Future You, they carried out a user research study with 344 people. Some users engaged with the system for 10-30 minutes, while others either engaged with a generic chatbot or only filled out studies.

Participants who used Future You had the ability to construct a better relationship with their perfect future selves, based upon a statistical analysis of their responses. These users likewise reported less stress and anxiety about the future after their interactions. In addition, Future You users said the discussion felt genuine which their values and beliefs appeared constant in their simulated future identities.

« This work creates a brand-new path by taking a reputable psychological strategy to picture times to come – an avatar of the future self – with cutting edge AI. This is precisely the type of work academics must be concentrating on as technology to build virtual self designs merges with large language designs, » says Jeremy Bailenson, the Thomas More Storke Professor of Communication at Stanford University, who was not included with this research.

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

« We desire to assist the user to talk about certain subjects, rather than asking their future selves who the next president will be, » Pataranutaporn states.

They are likewise adding safeguards to avoid individuals from misusing the system. For circumstances, one might imagine a company creating a « future you » of a possible customer who achieves some excellent result in life because they bought a particular product.

Moving on, the scientists desire to study specific applications of Future You, perhaps by enabling people to check out different careers or visualize how their everyday options might affect environment change.

They are also gathering information from the Future You pilot to much better comprehend how people use the system.

« We don’t desire individuals to become reliant on this tool. Rather, we hope it is a significant experience that assists them see themselves and the world in a different way, and assists with self-development, » Maes states.