BreathRelax: A Game-Based Breathing System Combines Stress Relief and Engagement

Breathing exercises have gained popularity as a stress management technique. They provide benefits such as improved lung function, reduced stress, and better quality of life. However, the repetitive nature of these exercises can become boring over time, decreasing people’s motivation to continue practicing them. In this work, we developed BreathRelax, a breath-based video game that integrates a temperature sensor to detect respiratory signals and provides real-time feedback through computer gaming. BreathRelax can achieve an accuracy rate of 95% in recognizing breathing patterns, with a response time of 0.23 s, demonstrating its reliable and responsive performance. To evaluate the effectiveness of BreathRelax, 60 participants were invited for a comprehensive experiment. ANCOVA analysis demonstrated BreathRelax’s superior stress reduction through significantly improved RMSSD, SDNN, and pNN50 stress indices. In addition, the usability evaluation revealed that participants experienced high enjoyment and engagement in the game while finding it easy to operate. BreathRelax delivered promising results in both relaxation effects and user experience.