Electroencephalogram signal analysis as basis for effective evaluation of robotic therapeutic massage

This paper proposes a robotics therapeutic massage evaluation system using electroencephalogram (EEG) signal analysis approach. An anthropomorphic dual arm robot is developed in this work for massage application. Compare to other massage systems, our dual arm robot can provides diversified massage techniques through the impedance control of both Cartesian space and joint space. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of robotic therapeutic massage, the experiments are conducted by recording EEG signals of subject before and after robotic massage. Independent Components Analysis (ICA) is used to filter out artifacts of EEG signals. After signal processing, the power of delta, alpha and beta rhythms are analyzed. The experimental results show an increase in delta power and a decrease in alpha power which represents the relaxation response of subjects. These results give the scientific proof of the effectiveness of robotic therapeutic massage.