This paper presents wearable sensors for detecting differences in chewing strength while eating foods with different hardness (carrot as a hard, apple as moderate and banana as soft food). Four wearable sensor systems were evaluated. They were: (1) a gas pressure sensor measuring changes in ear pressure proportional to ear canal deformation during chewing, (2) a flexible, curved bend sensor attached to right temple of eyeglass measuring the contraction of the temporalis muscle, (3) a piezoelectric strain sensor placed on the temporalis muscle, and (4) an electromyography sensor with electrodes placed on the temporalis muscle. Data from 15 participants, wearing all four sensors at once were collected. Each participant took and consumed 10 bites of carrot, apple, and banana. The hardness of foods were measured by a food penetrometer. Single-factor ANOVA found a significant effect of food hardness on the standard deviation of signals for all four sensors (P-value <.001). Tukey’s multiple comparison test with 5% significance level confirmed that the mean of the standard deviations were significantly different for the provided test foods for all four sensors. Results of this study indicate that the wearable sensors may potentially be used for measuring chewing strength and assessing the food hardness.

中文翻译：

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用于评估咀嚼强度的可穿戴传感器的比较

本文提出了可穿戴传感器，用于检测吃不同硬度食物时咀嚼强度的差异（胡萝卜为硬质食物，苹果为中等硬度食物，香蕉为软质食物）。评估了四种可穿戴传感器系统。它们是：(1) 气压传感器，测量咀嚼过程中与耳道变形成比例的耳压变化，(2) 连接到眼镜右侧太阳穴的柔性弯曲弯曲传感器，测量颞肌的收缩，(3)放置在颞肌上的压电应变传感器，以及（4）放置在颞肌上的带有电极的肌电图传感器。收集了 15 名同时佩戴所有四个传感器的参与者的数据。每个参与者吃了 10 口胡萝卜、苹果和香蕉。食品的硬度是通过食品针入度计来测量的。单因素方差分析发现食物硬度对所有四个传感器的信号标准偏差有显着影响（P 值 <.001）。Tukey 的多重比较测试（显着性水平为 5%）证实，所有四个传感器所提供的测试食品的标准差平均值均显着不同。这项研究的结果表明，可穿戴传感器有可能用于测量咀嚼强度和评估食物硬度。