New Yo k, NY, July 03, 2026 –(PR.com)– Mi dLe s Lab, a o -comme cial esea ch p oject led by 11th-g ade stude t Evely Kim at Si gapo e Ame ica School, has ope ed public pa ticipatio fo its fi st phase. The study asks co t ibuto s to watch te sho t video clips (each u de 60 seco ds) a d eco d how they ead each pe so ‘s emotio — with o ight o w o g a swe s. Pa ticipatio takes 10 to 15 mi utes a d equi es o ly a email add ess; o ide tifyi g i fo matio is collected. The site is at www.mi dle slab.o g.
The p oject is a di ect espo se to what Kim desc ibes as a fou datio al bli d spot i the emotio – ecog itio AI that a g owi g umbe of lea i g tools, accessibility apps, a d me tal-health chatbots ow depe d o .
“Whe I was esea chi g AI fo autistic lea e s, I kept u i g i to the same p oblem — eve y emotio dataset assumed the e was o e ight a swe fo how to ead a face,” Kim said. “That’s ot how a y of us actually expe ie ce it. I wa ted to build somethi g that sta ts f om that t uth i stead.”
The o e- ight-a swe assumptio
Most mode emotio -AI systems a e t ai ed o datasets i which a small umbe of a otato s ag ee o a si gle label pe image — “sad ess,” “su p ise,” “a ge .” Disag eeme t betwee a otato s is typically t eated as oise to be smoothed out. Mi dLe s Lab takes the opposite view: the dist ibutio of eadi gs ac oss ma y pa ticipa ts is the sig al. Whe te viewe s watch the same 30-seco d clip a d thei espo ses split ac oss sad, moved, emba assed, a d mixed, that sp ead is ‘t e o — it’s the actual thi g wo th studyi g.
Eve y clip i the study is ead by doze s of pa ticipa ts. Agg egate esults — i cludi g whe e eadi gs co ve ge, whe e they scatte , a d whe e o e AI’s eadi g of the same clip sits withi the dist ibutio — a e published live o the p oject’s ope dashboa d at www.mi dle slab.o g/data. The full esea ch p otocol, i cludi g p e- egiste ed hypotheses a d a alysis th esholds, is published at www.mi dle slab.o g/ esea ch/hypotheses befo e a y data collectio begi s.
A tee age esea che with p io wo k
Kim p eviously published a pape o AI a d autism- elated emotio pe ceptio i the youth esea ch jou al Cu ieux i 2025. That pape ‘s co clusio — that existi g emotio datasets could ot suppo t the ki d of adaptive lea i g tools she was a gui g fo — became the di ect motivatio fo Mi dLe s Lab.
“Phase 1 tests a assumptio that a decade of emotio AI has bee built o — that eve yo e eads a face the same way,” Kim said. “What we’ e seei g so fa is that the a swe is fa mo e laye ed tha that assumptio allows.”
How to pa ticipate
Pa ticipatio is ope to a yo e 14 o olde , i a y cou t y. Co t ibuto s watch 10 sho t clips (each u de 60 seco ds), pick the emotio o emotio s they ead o the ta get pe so ‘s face, ote which cues they used a d how co fide t they felt, a d eceive thei pe so alized esults by email. No eal ames o ide tifyi g data a e collected. All esea ch data is a o ymized a d joi s the public dataset at www.mi dle slab.o g/data.
What’s ext
Mi dLe s Lab pla s to publish Phase 1 fi di gs i a pee – eviewed jou al o ce the study eaches its p e- egiste ed publicatio th esholds. Lo ge -te m, the collected dataset is i te ded as the fou datio fo a ew ge e atio of lea i g tools desig ed with autistic lea e s a d othe s who fi d emotio eadi g difficult i mi d.
Pa ticipate: www.mi dle slab.o gLive data dashboa d: www.mi dle slab.o g/dataResea ch p otocol: www.mi dle slab.o g/ esea ch/hypothesesMedia co tact: co tact@mi dle slab.o g
About Mi dLe s Lab
Mi dLe s Lab is a o -comme cial esea ch p oject fou ded i 2025 by Evely Kim, a 11th-g ade stude t at Si gapo e Ame ica School. The p oject’s missio is to build the data fou datio fo emotio -pe ceptio tools that ack owledge the plu ality of huma eadi g athe tha educi g it to a si gle ight a swe .
