IEEE Trans Haptics. 2022 Apr-Jun;15(2):339-350. doi: 10.1109/TOH.2022.3162321. Epub 2022 Jun 27.
Haptic exploration strategies have been traditionally studied focusing on hand movements and neglecting how objects are moved in space. However, in daily life situations touch and movement cannot be disentangled. Furthermore, the relation between object manipulation as well as performance in haptic tasks and spatial skill is still little understood. In this study, we used iCube, a sensorized cube recording its orientation in space as well as the location of the points of contact on its faces. Participants had to explore the cube faces where little pins were positioned in varying number and count the number of pins on the faces with either even or odd number of pins. At the end of this task, they also completed a standard visual mental rotation test (MRT). Results showed that higher MRT scores were associated with better performance in the task with iCube both in term of accuracy and exploration speed and exploration strategies associated with better performance were identified. High performers tended to rotate the cube so that the explored face had the same spatial orientation (i.e., they preferentially explored the upward face and rotated iCube to explore the next face in the same orientation). They also explored less often twice the same face and were faster and more systematic in moving from one face to the next. These findings indicate that iCube could be used to infer subjects' spatial skill in a more natural and unobtrusive fashion than with standard MRTs.
触觉探索策略传统上主要关注手部运动，而忽略了物体在空间中的移动方式。然而，在日常生活情境中，触觉和运动是无法分离的。此外，物体操纵与触觉任务和空间技能表现之间的关系还不太清楚。在这项研究中，我们使用了 iCube，这是一个带有传感器的立方体，可以记录其在空间中的方向以及其表面接触点的位置。参与者必须探索有小销钉的立方体表面，小销钉的数量和位置各不相同，然后数出有偶数或奇数销钉的面的销钉数量。在这项任务结束时，他们还完成了一项标准的视觉心理旋转测试（MRT）。结果表明，较高的 MRT 分数与在 iCube 任务中的表现更好相关，无论是在准确性还是探索速度方面，并且确定了与更好表现相关的探索策略。表现较好的参与者倾向于旋转立方体，使得被探索的面具有相同的空间方位（即，他们优先探索朝上的面，并旋转 iCube 以探索同一方位的下一个面）。他们也较少两次探索同一个面，并且在从一个面移动到另一个面时速度更快、更系统。这些发现表明，与标准 MRT 相比，iCube 可以更自然、更不引人注目的方式推断出被试的空间技能。
