Weight and Size Discrimination with Vibrotactile Feedback

Interaction is gradually moving from desktop computers to the open air thanks to depth sensors such as Kinect, Xtion and Leap Motion. In this new situation, in which the user is no longer holding any device, the simulation of the sense of touch is progressively gaining more interest. This paper describes how VITAKI, a VIbro Tactile prototyping tool Kit for Eccentric Rotating Mass (ERM) actuators, was used to test different hap tic properties of objects in two experiments. VITAKI has been successfully used in the identification of 2D shapes and textures, and 3D shapes. However, there are some hap tic properties of objects that have not been simulated using VITAKI yet. These are hardness, temperature, weight and size. This paper describes how VITAKI is used to assess whether differences in weight and size can be discriminated using vibrotactile technology. To analyze these new features, two different experiments were carried out by 18 participants. The results of the experiments are presented in this paper, and allowed us to successfully validate the introduced techniques with a success rate higher than 88% in the case of the size, and between 78 and 85% in the case of the weight, depending on the method used.