Vibration is an efficient way of conveying information from a device to its user, and it is increasingly used for wrist or finger-worn devices such as smart rings. Unexpected vibrations or sounds from the environment may disrupt the perception of such information. Although disruptive effects have been systematically explored in vision and audition, they have been less thoroughly examined in the haptic domain. Here we briefly review the relevant literature from HCI and psychology, distilling principles of when distraction is likely. We then investigate these principles through four experiments, examining how the timing and modality of relatively rare or unexpected stimuli (surprise distractors) affect the detection and recognition of vibrotactile target patterns. At short distractor-target delays (<350 ms), both auditory and vibrotactile surprise distractors impaired performance. At a longer delay (1,050 ms), performance was not affected overall, even being improved with repeated exposure to the vibrotactile distractors. We discuss the importance of our findings in the context of HCI and cognitive psychology, and we provide design guidelines for mitigating the effects of distraction on haptic devices.

GooseBumps is a wearable device that enables users to get spatial information using haptic feedback through servo motors. By rotating the motors, spatial information on a single axis can be encoded and processed by the users in real time. In this demonstration, the participants will be trained to use the system to use a simple driving game similar to Out Run [2] while being blindfolded. Our system thus provides sensory substitution, where visual information (such as car position and road orientation) will be encoded with haptic information. GooseBumps has multiple applications, from Virtual Reality to Visually Impaired people. This demo, in a reduced form, has been presented previously at the 2016 HacknRoll competition, where it was presented with the first prize.