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Remote social touch framework: a way to communicate physical interactions across long distances

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Abstract

Nowadays, living away from loved ones is a common practice due to various reasons such as work, study, or certain health-related concerns (e.g., infection diseases). Such practice aggregates certain negative emotions such as depression due to the loss of physical, mental, and emotional awareness about loved ones. Because of the importance of social touch for one’s wellbeing, this paper reports the research focusing on remote social touch (RST), as a way to stimulate the sense of touch remotely to regain some of the lost awareness. The research identified various dimensions of RST and the process of communicating social touch remotely through a product. This is done through an extensive literature survey, online diary keeping, and interviews. The paper also presents the early proposed RST framework that consists of three elements (actors, product, and communication) and their dimensions, that explain the process of how RST communications can be successfully achieved through a product.

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Funding

No funding was received for conducting this study.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Industrial Design, Middle East Technical University, Ankara, Turkey

    Ali Abdulrazzaq Alsamarei &  Bahar Şener

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  1. Ali Abdulrazzaq Alsamarei
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Correspondence to Ali Abdulrazzaq Alsamarei.

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Appendices

Appendix 1: Remote social touch (RST) aspects from the literature

User count

One to one

One to many

Many to one

[3, 10, 11, 19,20,21,22,23,24,25,26,27,28,29,30,31,32,33,34,35,36,37,38,39,40,41,42,43,44,45,46, 51,52,53, 67,68,69, 73]

[17]

[18]

Direction of sending

1-direction (1D)

2-directional (2D)

[3, 18, 20, 23, 25, 29, 32,33,34, 37, 41, 53]

[10, 11, 17, 19, 21, 22, 24, 26,27,28, 30, 31, 35, 36, 38,39,40, 42,43,44,45,46, 51, 52, 67,68,69, 73]

Touch representation

Symbolic

Simulated

Both

Send

[10, 17, 18, 20, 23, 30, 31, 33, 37, 41, 42]

[3, 11, 19, 21, 22, 25, 26, 28, 29, 32, 34, 35, 38, 39, 43, 44, 46, 51, 52, 67,68,69, 73]

[24, 27, 36, 40, 45, 53]

Receive

[10, 17, 18, 23, 25,26,27,28, 30,31,32,33, 35, 41,42,43,44,45,46, 53, 69]

[3, 11, 19,20,21,22, 29, 34, 37,38,39, 51, 52, 67, 68, 73]

[24, 36, 40]

Message synchronization

Synchronous

Asynchronous

Both

[3, 10, 11, 17,18,19, 21,22,23,24, 26, 28,29,30,31,32,33,34,35,36,37,38,39,40,41,42,43,44,45,46, 51,52,53, 67,68,69, 73]

[20, 25]

[27]

Interaction type

Implicit

Explicit

[3, 10, 11, 18, 19, 21,22,23,24, 26, 28,29,30,31,32,33,34,35,36,37,38,39,40,41,42,43,44,45, 51, 52, 67,68,69, 73]

[17, 20, 25, 27, 46, 53]

Haptic rendering methods

Force*

Vibration

Temperature

Electrical muscle stimulation (EMS)

Movement

shaking

[3, 11, 19, 20, 22, 28, 29, 34, 37,38,39, 52, 68, 73]

[10, 17, 18, 24,25,26,27, 30,31,32,33, 35, 40,41,42,43, 45, 46, 53, 69]

[3, 23, 24, 26, 27, 30,31,32, 38, 41, 44, 52]

[31, 67]

[36, 51]

[21]

  1. *Force can include squeezing, air pocket inflation, and other force actuation

Haptic sensing methods

Force/pressure

Contact/touch/press

Movement/motion

Buttons

Flex

[3, 10, 11, 19, 21, 22, 26, 29, 32, 34, 35, 38, 39, 43, 44, 46, 68, 69, 73]

[18, 24, 25, 30, 31, 33, 37, 40, 42, 45, 46, 52]

[27, 28, 36, 46, 51]

[17, 23]

[32, 53]

Electromyogram (EMG)

Visual gesture tracking

Temperature

Text-based

[67]

[28]

[32]

[20, 41]

Gesture type

Arm wrestling

Shake

Handshake

Hand rolling

Contact/touch/abstract touch

Grip/grasp

Pressing/tap

[19]

[21]

[28, 38, 39]

[36]

[24, 25, 30, 33, 41, 43, 44, 53]

[26, 32]

[10, 17, 25, 45]

Squeeze

Stroke

Hug

Squabble

Massage

Movement

Hand holding

[27, 29, 34, 35, 46]

[25, 27, 45, 46, 51]

[3, 20, 23, 27, 28, 37, 41, 69]

[73]

[18]

[42, 46, 67]

[28, 52]

Poke

Pulling

Kiss

High five

Shoulder pat

Sexual stimuli

Tickling

[11, 45]

[68]

[22]

[28]

[28]

[31]

[40]

Location on the body

Upper-arm

Hand

Whole-body

Upper body

Feet

[29, 34, 67]

[10, 17, 19, 21, 26, 33, 35, 36, 38,39,40, 42, 43, 46, 51,52,53, 68]

[24, 25, 31, 44, 73]

[3, 18, 20, 25, 27, 28, 37, 41, 69]

[30]

Lower back

Cheek

Forearm

Lips

[23]

[11, 42]

[32, 45]

[22, 43]

Object characteristics

Stand-alone

Embedded in an object

Portable

Decorative*

Wearable

[3, 17,18,19,20,21,22,23, 26,27,28,29, 31,32,33,34, 36,37,38,39, 41, 43, 45, 46, 51,52,53, 67,68,69, 73]

[10, 11, 24, 30, 31, 34, 35, 40, 42, 44]

[17, 21, 22, 26, 28,29,30,31, 34, 37, 43, 45, 46, 51, 53, 67, 69, 73]

[22, 68]

[3, 18, 20, 23, 25, 28,29,30,31,32, 34, 37, 41, 45, 53, 67]

  1. *Include entertainment

Other modalities besides haptic

Visual

Audio

[3, 24, 27, 30, 38, 43]

[27, 38]

Appendix 2: Online diary keeping questions

Think about the loved ones you are currently living away from:

Have you contacted your loved ones today? (Yes/No)

 If YES: What medium(s) did you use to communicate?

 If YES: How many hours/minutes did you spend communicating?

 If YES: Can you briefly explain the reason for why you did contact them?

 e.g., Just to ask how they are doing today; I had a problem and I needed their help

 If NO: still did you want to contact them but you couldn’t? if yes why you couldn’t?

Did you feel you wanted to have some kind of physical contact with your loved ones today? (e.g., a hug or shaking hands) (Yes/No)

 If YES: How did you feel by the absence of the physical contact? [Using the ‘Pick-A-Mood’ wheel to pick one image]

Appendix 3: Interview questions

1. Introduction and consent

2. Questions—part 1

Reminding about daily assignment, then:

2.1 [in relation to diary assignment]. Can you please elaborate on your answer related to missing physical interactions?

For the next group of questions, please think about a loved one you lived away from for a certain amount of time (loved ones can include any kind of relationship that you define them in the circle of loved ones such as parents, friends, spouse, etc.)

2.2 What is the relationship with the loved one you are thinking of?

2.3 The maximum years/months lived away from loved ones?

2.4 During the time away from the loved ones, which medium did you generally use to stay in contact? [why]

2.5 What kind of physical interactions do you miss while being away from the loved one?

2.6 How do these physical interactions make you feel? [explain through PAM cards]

2.7 How did you feel missing these physical interactions? [Pick-A-Mood]

2.8 How often do you initiate or receive these PI: 1–5[never/rarely/sometimes/often/always]

3. Questions—part 2

Video clips [example technologies] and the prototype explaining RST

Knowing that everything is possible in this scenario:

3.1 [think about the physical interactions you provided before] How would you want technology to represent these physical interactions? If you: Receive it / Reply it/Send it/Save it

3.2 Do you want a single product to do all the functionalities (i.e., receive/reply/send/save) or one for each? What are the product characteristics? How would you want to interact with the product?

3.3 What kind of scenario would you use RST?

3.4 In your point of view, what advantages and disadvantages do you think RST may have?

The end

Appendix 4: Remote social touch (RST) card set

figure a
figure b
figure c
figure d

Appendix 5: Video clips

figure e

A screenshot from the introductory video clip prepared for the participants, it shows these terminologies: tactical feedback, low- and high-resolution tactile feedback grids, texture feedback, force feedback, contactless haptic feedback, joint manipulation feedback, temperature feedback, simulated feedback, symbolic feedback.

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Alsamarei, A.A., Bahar Şener Remote social touch framework: a way to communicate physical interactions across long distances. J Multimodal User Interfaces 17, 79–104 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12193-023-00402-z

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