Haptic Perceptual Instruments

一个人在看不到东西的情况下，可以通过挥舞和摇动物体来了解物体的某些属性。同样，他或她可以通过手持工具敲击来了解看不见的表面的某些属性。这些通过使用身体来了解周围环境的例子，被称为触觉感知，是基于以复杂方式扭曲身体组织的机械力。大概，对于每一个感知到的环境属性，都有一个特定的机械属性。识别这些机械特性，并准确地理解人们如何使用它们来测量邻近环境的空间特征，这是一个巨大的挑战。这些实验将考察人们如何使用惯性张量作为触觉感知手中看不见的物体的长度、形状和方向的力学基础，以及他们将检验人们如何使用反作用力的合成作为触觉感知被撞击表面之间距离的力学基础。这项研究还将考察挥舞的模式，寻找特定的物体运用方式与个人试图测量的物体属性之间的关系。实验中的参与者将通过调整可见的、可移动的表面来量化感知的属性来做出反应。研究结果可以为感官和运动假肢、机械臂以及“智能”遥感仪器的设计提供有价值的见解。

A person, without benefit of seeing, can come to know about certain properties of objects by wielding and shaking them. Similarly, he or she can come to know about certain properties of unseen surfaces by striking them with a hand-held implement. These instances of knowing about the surrounding environment through the use of the body, known as haptic perception, are based on mechanical forces that distort the body's tissues in complex ways. Presumably, for each perceived environmental property, there is a specific mechanical property. Identifying these mechanical properties, and understanding exactly how people use them to measure spatial characteristics of the adjacent environment, pose significant challenges. These experiments will examine how people use the inertia tensor as the mechanical basis for the haptic perception of the lengths, shapes, and orientations of unseen objects wielded by hand, and they will examine how people use the resultant of reactive forces as the mechanical basis for the haptic perception of the distance between struck surfaces. This research will also examine patterns of wielding, looking for a relation between the particular way an object is wielded and the object property the person is attempting to measure. The participants in the experiments will respond by adjusting visible, moveable surfaces to quantify the perceived properties. Results could provide insights valuable in the design of sensory and motor prostheses, robotic limbs, and "smart" remote-sensing instruments.