Understanding Human Perception of Vibrotactile Feedback on the Foot in a Virtual Reality Framework for Applications in Sports Performance

The purpose of this study is to understand human perception of haptic feedback on the foot and validate a potential haptic-foot-feedback system for rehabilitation and virtual reality simulation. This study would provide insight into the design of haptic feedback systems and human perception involving vibrations on the sole and dorsal portion of the foot. The subject was set up with a disposable try-on sock and a haptic feedback device. The subject participated in 1 haptic feedback session that lasted approximately 1 hour. The haptic feedback was split into 5 procedures for 4 different conditions. The results of the experiment have shown subjects to have an average accuracy of 80% when trying to identify single motor vibrations on 12 discrete locations on the foot. When subjects experienced 2 simultaneous vibrations, they averaged 67.5% accuracy when identifying discrete motor locations. Subjects averaged accuracy of 57.4% during 3 simultaneous vibrations. The subjects averaged 79.8% accuracy when identifying the exact location and sequence of 3 motor vibrations spaced out by 0.5 seconds. The subjects averaged 67.9% accuracy when identifying 4 different shapes of vibrations on the sole. Overall, subjects averaged 71.2% accuracy throughout the entire procedure. An ANOVA concluded the type of motor was not statistically significant to the human perception and demonstrated a statistical significance on the number of simultaneous vibrations during feedback (p<.001). The results of this study show a basis for understanding human perception of vibrotactile feedback on the foot with potential applications in sports performance and rehabilitation.