Multidimensional Matching of Tactile Sensations of Materials and Vibrotactile Spectra

Specifying the relationship between the sensations perceived by material surfaces and the tactile stimuli presented to human finger pad is often difficult in tactile texture studies. Both human texture perception and the physical stimuli presented to the skin are expressed as multidimensional information spaces. We developed a computational technique for matching these texture and physical stimulus spaces based on multivariate analysis approaches. The texture space is established via a semantic differential method. The physical space is based on vibrotactile spectrum information, one of the most commonly used principles for the analysis and artificial presentation of textures. The bases of the physical space were determined to ensure that the material allocations for the two spaces were similar, and we obtained well-matched spaces for 18 material samples. These successfully matched spaces will provide an analytic tool for material textures, and will help users of vibrotactile texture displays design virtual materials using adjectives or the names of materials.