Intuitive vibro-tactile feedback for human body movement guidance

Humans rely on the feedbacks they received from a teacher in learning a new motor skill. Tactile feedback is effective in motor learning as it is direct and real-time. We proposed a 3D Orientation Guide (3DOG) which is made up of three coin-sized vibrating motors (tactors) to create meaningful tactile feedback to give users easily interpreted instruction on how to adjust their forearm postures and inform users of the correct forearm motion. The tactors are circling around the forearm and each tactor is assigned two vibration patterns corresponding to an axial movement in positive and negative directions respectively. The layout and vibration pattern design is evaluated through the usability test. 3DOG is proved to be able to create an intuitive tactile feedback which directs motion effectively. When it is integrated with a motion capture system, the device can track and correct body postures that has application in diverse areas, such as rehabilitation, assisting learning motor skills that have requirement for movements with high accuracy. 3DOG has a promising future because of its wearability, effectiveness, small size, and low cost.