Multi-digit Softness: Development of a Tactile Display to Render Softness Feeling on Multiple Fingers

摘要

This paper describes a new tactile display that can present softness sensations to multiple phalanges on multiple fingers. Contact width control through sheet wrapping is adopted as a softness rendering method for each finger. Three separate mechanisms for contact width control for three fingers are integrated in one device. Passive mechanical linkages are employed to provide sensations to the whole fingers. The paper reports on the design of the developed device, as well as the result of psychophysical experiment that investigated the contributions of each phalange and finger in softness perception on this display.