The use of haptic technologies has recently become immensely essential in Human-Computer Interaction to improve user experience and performance. With the introduction of tactile feedback on a touchscreen device, commonly known as surface haptics, several applications and interaction paradigms have become a reality. However, the effects of tactile feedback on the preference of 2D images in visuo-tactile exploration task on touchscreen devices remain largely unknown. In this study, we investigated differences of preference score (the tendency of participants to like/dislike a 2D image based on its visual and tactile properties), reach time, interaction time, and response time under four conditions of feedback: no tactile feedback, high-quality of tactile information (sharp tactile texture), low-quality of tactile information (blurred tactile texture), and incorrect tactile information (mismatch tactile texture). The tactile feedback is rendered in the form of roughness that is simulated by modulating the friction between the finger and the surface and is derived from the 2D image. Thirty-six participants completed visuo-tactile exploration tasks for a total of 36 trials (3 2D images × 4 tactile textures × 3 repetitions). Results showed that the presence of tactile feedback enhanced users’ preference (tactile feedback conditions were rated significantly higher than the no tactile feedback condition for preference regardless of the quality/correctness of tactile feedback). This finding is also supported through results from self-reporting where 88.89% of participants preferred to experience the 2D image with tactile feedback. Additionally, the presence of tactile feedback resulted in significantly larger interaction time and response time compared to the no tactile feedback condition. Furthermore, the quality and correctness of tactile information significantly impacted the preference rating (sharp tactile textures were rated statistically higher than blurred tactile and mismatched tactile textures). All of these findings demonstrate that tactile feedback plays a crucial role in users’ preference and thus motivates further the development of surface haptic technologies.

The rise of virtual reality and haptic technologies has created exciting new applications in medical training and education. In a dental simulation, haptic technology can create the illusion of substances (teeth, gingiva, bone, etc.) by providing interaction forces within a simulated virtual world of the mouth. In this article, a haptic periodontal training simulation system, named Haptodont, is developed and evaluated for simulating periodontal probing. Thirty-two faculty members from New York University College of Dentistry were recruited and divided into three groups to evaluate three fundamental functionalities: Group 1 evaluated bi-manual 3 Degrees of Freedome (DoF) haptic interaction, Group 2 evaluated bi-manual 3 DoF haptic interaction with a finger support mechanism, and Group 3 evaluated bi-manual 3 DoF haptic interaction with finger support mechanism and vibrotactile feedback. The probe and mirror interactions were simulated with the Geomagic Touch haptic device whereas the finger support was implemented using the Novint Falcon device. The three groups conducted two probing tasks: healthy gingiva scenario with no pockets (2- to 3-mm depth) and periodontitis scenario with deep pockets (4- to 8-mm depth). Results demonstrated that experts performed comparably to clinical settings in terms of probing depth error (within 0.3 to 0.6 mm) and probing forces (less than 0.5 N). Furthermore, the finger support mechanism significantly improved the probing accuracy for periodontitis condition in the lingual region. The argument that probing the lingual region is more difficult than the buccal region is supported by quantitative evidence (significantly higher probing depth error and probing force). Further research is planned to improve the usability of the finger support, integrate the Haptodont system into the pre-clinical curriculum, and evaluate the Haptodont system with dental students as a learning tool.

The IEEE “Tactile Internet” (TI) Standards working group (WG), designated the numbering IEEE 1918.1, undertakes pioneering work on the development of standards for the TI. This paper describes the WG, its intentions, and its developing baseline standard and the associated reasoning behind that and touches on a further standard already initiated under its scope: IEEE 1918.1.1 on “Haptic Codecs for the TI.” IEEE 1918.1 and its baseline standard aim to set the framework and act as the foundations for the TI, thereby also serving as a basis for further standards developed on TI within the WG. This paper discusses the aspects of the framework such as its created TI architecture, including the elements, functions, interfaces, and other considerations therein, as well as the novel aspects and differentiating factors compared with, e.g., 5G Ultra-Reliable Low-Latency Communication, where it is noted that the TI will likely operate as an overlay on other networks or combinations of networks. Key foundations of the WG and its baseline standard are also highlighted, including the intended use cases and associated requirements that the standard must serve, and the TI's fundamental definition and assumptions as understood by the WG, among other aspects.

The Tactile Internet will enable users to physically explore remote environments and to make their skills available across distances. An important technological aspect in this context is the acquisition, compression, transmission, and display of haptic information. In this paper, we present the fundamentals and state of the art in haptic codec design for the Tactile Internet. The discussion covers both kinesthetic data reduction and tactile signal compression approaches. We put a special focus on how limitations of the human haptic perception system can be exploited for efficient perceptual coding of kinesthetic and tactile information. Further aspects addressed in this paper are the multiplexing of audio and video with haptic information and the quality evaluation of haptic communication solutions. Finally, we describe the current status of the ongoing IEEE standardization activity P1918.1.1 which has the ambition to standardize the first set of codecs for kinesthetic and tactile information exchange across communication networks.

Today, ubiquitous digital communication systems do not have an intuitive, natural way of communicating emotion, which, in turn, affects the degree to which humans can emotionally connect and interact with one another. To address this problem, a more natural, intuitive, and implicit emotion communication system was designed and created that employs asymmetry-based EEG emotion classification for detecting the emotional state of the sender and haptic feedback (in the form of tactile gestures) for displaying emotions for a receiver. Emotions are modeled in terms of valence (positive/negative emotions) and arousal (intensity of the emotion). Performance analysis shows that the proposed EEG subject-dependent emotion classification model with Free Asymmetry features allows for more flexible feature-generation schemes than other existing algorithms and attains an average accuracy of 92.5% for valence and 96.5% for arousal, outperforming previous-generation schemes in high feature space. As for the haptic feedback, a tactile gesture authoring tool and a haptic jacket were developed to design tactile gestures that can intensify emotional reactions in terms of valence and arousal. Experimental study demonstrated that subject-independent emotion transmission through tactile gestures is effective for the arousal dimension of an emotion but is less effective for valence. Consistency in subject-dependent responses for both valence and arousal suggests that personalized tactile gestures would be more effective.

Game development activity using Team-based Learning (TBL) was investigated in order to identify factors contributing to the usability of the product. In this study, three teams from two different countries are compared. As the related factors, the followings were examined to analyze the relationships with usability scores: (1) learning reflection, (2) social media communications within teams, and (3) participants' characteristics and information literacy. Usability scores were conveyed using a System Usability Scale (SUS) by evaluations from the other teams. The participants' characteristics and information literacy were measured before starting the project as a pre-test. The discussions and communications via social media of each group were categorized as: Proposal, Permission, Encouragement, and Acknowledgment, using protocol analysis to examine their contributions towards the usability scores. After completing the study project, a learning reflection questionnaire was completed by all participants to evaluate efficacy, satisfaction and achievement of learning, and difficulties.

The film industry continuously strives to make visitors’ movie experience more immersive and thus, more captivating. This is realized through larger screens, sophisticated speaker systems, and high quality 2D and 3D content. Moreover, a recent trend in the film industry is to incorporate multiple interaction modalities, such as 4D film, to simulate rain, wind, vibration, and heat, in order to intensify viewers’ emotional reactions. In this context, humans’ sense of touch possesses significant potential for intensifying emotional reactions for the film experience beyond audio-visual sensory modalities. This article presents a framework for authoring tactile cues (tactile gestures as used in this article) and enabling automatic rendering of said gestures to intensify emotional reactions in an immersive film experience. To validate the proposed framework, we conducted an experimental study where tactile gestures are designed and evaluated for the ability to intensify four emotional reactions: high valence-high arousal, high valence-low arousal, low valence-high arousal, and low valence-low arousal. Using a haptic jacket, participants felt tactile gestures that are synchronized with the audio-visual contents of a film. Results demonstrated that (1) any tactile feedback generated a positive user experience; (2) the tactile feedback intensifies emotional reactions when the audio-visual stimuli elicit clear emotional responses, except for low arousal emotional response since tactile gestures seem to always generate excitement; (3) purposed tactile gestures do not seem to significantly outperform randomized tactile gesture for intensifying specific emotional reactions; and (4) using a haptic jacket is not distracting for the users.

In our previous work [1], we proposed an adaptive application layer communication framework, named Admux, for multimedia applications incorporating hap tic, video, auditory, and graphics information for non-dedicated networks such as the Internet. In this paper, the contribution is two-fold: first, we present a thorough description of Admux communication protocol and content access/communication management. Second, the evaluation of Admux, using an interactive multimodal 3D Office Slingshot game, is described. The 3D Office Slingshot game involves the communication of synchronous hap tic-audio-video media â" with both tactile and kinesthetic hap tic feedback. The performance evaluation shows that Admux is capable of delivering synchronous hap tic-video data while adapting to network conditions by allocating proportional resources to various media channels. The usability testing with 20 subjects has shown that players have expressed positive feedback about the game.

Traditional teleconferencing systems have enabled remote communications via audiovisual modalities. However, in real life, human touch such as encouraging pat plays a fundamental role to physical and emotional communication between persons. This paper presents a synchronous haptic teleconferencing system with touch interaction to convey affection and intimacy. We present a preliminary prototype called HugMe. In this system, two remote users could see as well as touch each other.

Multimedia technologies are reaching the limits of providing audio-visual media that viewers consume passively. An important factor, which will ultimately enhance the user's experience in terms of impressiveness and immersion, is interaction. Among daily life interactions, haptic interaction plays a prominent role in enhancing the quality of experience of users, and in promoting physical and emotional development. Therefore, a critical step in multimedia research is expected to bring the sense of touch, or haptics, into multimedia systems and applications. This article proposes a touchable 3D video system where viewers can actively touch a video scene through a force-feedback device, and presents the underlying technologies in three functional components: (1) contents generation, (2) contents transmission, and (3) viewing and interaction. First of all, we introduce a depth image-based haptic representation (DIBHR) method that adds haptic and heightmap images, in addition to the traditional depth image-based representation (DIBR), to encode the haptic surface properties of the video media. In this representation, the haptic image contains the stiffness, static friction, and dynamic friction, whereas the heightmap image contains roughness of the video contents. Based on this representation method, we discuss how to generate synthetic and natural (real) video media through a 3D modeling tool and a depth camera, respectively. Next, we introduce a transmission mechanism based on the MPEG-4 framework where new MPEG-4 BIFS nodes are designed to describe the haptic scene. Finally, a haptic rendering algorithm to compute the interaction force between the scene and the viewer is described. As a result, the performance of the haptic rendering algorithm is evaluated in terms of computational time and smooth contact force. It operates marginally within a 1 kHz update rate that is required to provide stable interaction force and provide smoother contact force with the depth image that has high frequency geometrical noise using a median filter.

In our previous work we introduced a novel application layer protocol, named ALPHAN, for haptic data communication. In this paper, we present a thorough evaluation of the protocol using a multi-user collaborative haptic application. The benchmark application consists of a simple game where three users attempt to lift a 3D triangular shape and place it in a triangular hole. The performance metrics and the test bed of the protocol evaluation are also discussed. It is found that a delay of 150 ms or higher caused the participating users not even to feel the existence of each other. Also a comparison between the two users and three users scenarios is considered. Finally, we comment on our findings and provide directions for prospective research.

This paper describes a haptic enabled UML CASE tool that enables software engineering developers to physically manipulate and touch the UML modeling elements and feel the force feedback. We propose an architecture and a software design for the tool. The current implementation of the tool uses the Omni Phantom device, a quite common haptic interface among the haptic research community. The CASE tool, from a user perspective, consists of three parts: a drawing area, a palette, and a tool bar. Our preliminary usability study demonstrated the potential of adding the haptic modality to UML development tools.

A wide range of haptic devices exist that possess the potential to offer users a rich experience in a virtual reality environment. This however depends on the haptic device to be used. Surely, removing the burden of users having to 'adjust to' operating haptic devices is welcomed. In this paper, we propose the creation of the Haptic Applications Meta Language - hereon HAML - which is an XML-based language created to describe Haptic-enabled frameworks to a high degree of detail. The envisioned goal of HAML is to allow for the creation of plug-and-play environments in which a wide array of supported haptic devices can be used in a multitude of virtual environments, with the compatibility issues being handled by automated engines instead of programmatically by the user. Therefore, we introduce the HAML framework and discuss its tentative structure, proof-of-concept implementation, and avenues for future work.