Designing with chemical haptics

Abstract

Designers have developed a vast array of rich interactions to stimulate the mind and body. While much of the focus has been on creating visual systems (such as in VR), there is increasing interest in developing ways to reproduce touch sensations. This turn suggests a desire to create interactive experiences that involve our whole bodies and not solely our visual senses. However, a major part of the human sensorium has been neglected: our chemosensory systems, the sensory pathways that respond to chemical stimuli. Chemical receptors exist all throughout our body and are embedded throughout our skin. In this paper, I discuss my recent explorations in chemosensory interfaces for the skin and what possibilities it enables for the interaction design community. I outline my process of designing with these sensations, discuss how the chemical haptics approach induces uniquely complex sensations, and speculate on chemosensory design futures.