no, half and full. The subject was asked to push buttons twenty times as the buttons were shown one after the other on the desk as quickly as possible. Consequently, the reaction times for pushing the button for all haptic conditions, except for the half-force condition of "Attractive force," were significantly faster than no-force (without haptic information) condition. This result shows that the haptic information was advantageous for easy operation." />

Proactive Desk: New Haptic Interface and Its Experimental Evaluation

Shunsuke YOSHIDA
Kenji SUSAMI
Haruo NOMA
Kenichi HOSAKA

Publication
IEICE TRANSACTIONS on Communications   Vol.E89-B    No.2    pp.320-325
Publication Date: 2006/02/01
Online ISSN: 1745-1345
DOI: 10.1093/ietcom/e89-b.2.320
Print ISSN: 0916-8516
Type of Manuscript: Special Section PAPER (Special Section on Multimedia QoS Evaluation and Management Technologies)
Category: 
Keyword: 
haptic display,  tactile sensation,  force feedback,  virtual reality,  evaluation,  

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Summary: 
The "Proactive Desk" is a new human-machine interface for the desktop operations of computers. It provides users with tactile sensation in addition to visual sensation. Two linear induction motors underneath the desk generate a two-dimensional force to move objects and control their positions on the desktop using feedback control, and users feel tactile sensation while handling those objects. In this paper, we examined the effects of adding haptic information to simple mouse operation using the Proactive Desk. In our experiment, we used a button-type visual stimulus with and without haptic information. When using haptic conditions, three types of force feedback pattern were displayed: "Edge," "Resistance to motion" and "Attractive force," and each had three force strength conditions: no, half and full. The subject was asked to push buttons twenty times as the buttons were shown one after the other on the desk as quickly as possible. Consequently, the reaction times for pushing the button for all haptic conditions, except for the half-force condition of "Attractive force," were significantly faster than no-force (without haptic information) condition. This result shows that the haptic information was advantageous for easy operation.