Creating pseudo-tactile feedback in virtual reality using shared crossmodal properties of audio and tactile feedback

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18489/sacj.v33i1.883

Abstract

Virtual reality has the potential to enhance a variety of real-world training and entertainment applications by creating the illusion that a user of virtual reality is physically present inside the digitally created environment. However, the use of tactile feedback to convey information about this environment is often lacking in VR applications. New methods for inducing a degree of tactile feedback in users are described, which induced the illusion of a tactile experience, referred to as pseudo-tactile feedback. These methods utilised shared properties between audio and tactile feedback that can be crossmodally mapped between the two modalities in the design of a virtual reality prototype for a qualitative usability study in order to test the effectiveness and underlying causes of such feedback in the total absence of any real-world tactile feedback. Results show that participants required believable audio stimuli that they could conceive as real-world textures as well a sense of hand-ownership to suspend disbelief and construct an internally consistent mental model of the virtual environment. This allowed them to conceive believable tactile sensations that result from interaction with virtual objects inside this environment.

Author Biographies

Isak de Villiers Bosman, Department of Information Science, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa

Isak de Villiers Bosman is a Junior Research Officer at the Information Science Department at the University of Pretoria, South Africa, where he also holds a master’s degree in Information Science, specialising in Multimedia. His research interests focus on the role of audio in virtual reality.

Koos de Beer, bDepartment of Information Science, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa; Tampere University, Tampere, Finland;

Koos de Beer is a lecturer at the University of Pretoria in South Africa and is the head of the Virtual Reality and Interaction (VRI) lab. His research focusses on interaction design, user experience, extended reality technologies and games. He is also the package coordinator for the Multimedia degree.

Theo J.D. Bothma, Department of Information Science, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa

Theo Bothma is professor emeritus / contract professor in the Department of Information Science at the University of Pretoria, South Africa. He is the former Head of Department and Chairperson of the School of Information Technology (until his retirement at the end of June 2016). His research focuses primarily on information organization and retrieval, information literacy and e-lexicography.

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Published

2021-07-12

Issue

Vol. 33 No. 1 (2021)

Section

Research Papers (general)

License

Copyright (c) 2021 Isak de Villiers Bosman, Koos de Beer, TJD Bothma

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