Passive Haptic Learning for Vibrotactile Skin-Reading: Comparison of Teaching Structures

This paper investigates the effects of using passive haptic
learning to train the skill of reading text from vibrotactile
patterns. The vibrotactile method of transmitting messages,
skin-reading, is effective at conveying rich information but its
active training method requires full user attention, is demanding,
time-consuming, and tedious. Passive haptic learning
offers the possibility to learn in the background while performing
another primary task. We present a study investigating the
use of passive haptic learning to train for skin-reading. Additionally,
a word-based learning structure is typically used for
this passive learning method. We expose trends that suggest
this word-based incrimental teaching may not be optimal.