Chinese Schools Testing Attention-Detecting Headband To Monitor Students

From facial recognition cameras to built-in GPS uniform and bracelet, studying for Chinese students don’t seem to be simple. A new attention-detecting headband is the latest effort of the Chinese government in the education field to nurture talents. This special headband can measure the electrical activity of the wearer’s brain to detect whether students are truly focusing or not. The device sounds pretty similar to something out of a sci-fi movie. And users on Weibo, China’s Twitter, are criticizing this product.

The headband called Focus 1 is manufactured by BrainCo, a company in Boston, the U.S. The device has built-in EEG scanners to detect whether a student is daydreaming or focused. There is a tiny screen that can change color due to students’ current state: red for dazed, yellow for focused, and red for extremely focused. All the data is then sent to their teacher’s computer. And it doesn’t stop there. BrainCo even set up a leaderboard to see which student focuses for the most amount of time.

Brain waves measuring is not something new. Using EGG or electroencephalography, devices can track signals sent by neurons inside the brain. EGG has been used at hospitals for decades to monitor brain disorders, diagnose seizures or brain damages.

Recently, this technology has been utilized for device detecting wearer’s mental condition. Although there are proofs that EEG can be applied for this purpose, it can still be inaccurate. Different aspects like sweat, muscle movement, or outside environment can affect the results.

Responding to all the criticism on the Internet, BrainCo says that they only provide this headband to schools as part of selective courses on focusing ability. Moreover, the company has no official distribution plan for public schools, but rather in the form of renting for trial.

BrainCo was founded by Bicheng Han, a Chinese engineer. For the last three years, the company has attended CES. Previously, feedbacks on the products of BrainCo are quite positive. One time, a piano artist used a fake hand controlled by her brainwaves to play the piano.