Spatiotemporal Perception of Single Overlapped Vibrotactile Stimulation to Multiple Body Locations.

Haptic information is useful in various fields, and presenting stimulation to multiple points en-riches the experience. Independent Vibrotactile Stimulation to multiple points (IVS) evokes a tactile apparent motion. We propose Single Overlapped Vibrotactile Stimulation (SOVS) with imagination to produce spatiotemporal perception like IVS. The SOVS combines the stimulation of IVS. We developed a pseudo-dribbling system that produces a feeling of an imaginary ball moving between the hand and the feet where the same stimulation was given. To examine the feeling by SOVS, the first experiment on changing the speed of the stimulation showed the SOVS can produce a similar feeling to the IVS, indicating SOVS allows participants to match the perceived stimulation to the stimulation according to the dribbling being imagined. The second experiment was conducted using an obstacle between the hand and the feet to interrupt the image. We controlled the interruption by controlling attention. Results showed that both IVS and SOVS overcome the obstacle to evoke a piercing feeling under the attention to the floor, whereas IVS still provided a piercing feeling under the attention to the obstacle but SOVS could not provide it, suggesting the possibility that the perception mechanism is different between the SOVS and IVS.