Altering distance perception from hitting with a stick by superimposing vibration to holding hand

Abstract

Distance perception by hitting objects with a handheld stick is an important cue for people with visual impairments who use a white cane in daily life. In a previous paper, we found that adding vibration to the thumb side of the cane shortened the perceived collision distance more than adding vibration to the little-finger side, which partly agrees with our hypothetical model. In this paper, we conducted a similar experiment, changing the real distance between the palm and the object to explore the robustness of our hypothetical model. The experimental results showed that perceived collision distance shortened regardless of the real distance, but may be easily induced when the object is placed far from the palm.