Vibrotactile cues for conveying directional information during blind exploration of digital graphics

Graphics are useful in many contexts of daily life (education, mobility, etc.) and spread widely in digital media. However, accessing to digital graphical information remains a challenging work to people with visual impairments. In this study, we were interested in the transmission of vibrotactile cues allowing users to explore digital graphics more easily and faster. We have designed a vibrotactile matrix fixed on the hand for presenting directional information. Two vibrotactile displays - Spatiotemporal Vibrotactile Pattern (SVP) and Apparent Tactile Motion (ATM) - were compared. A study with sixteen blindfolded participants examined the efficiency and user preferences of proposed interaction techniques and showed that the recognition accuracy with SVP is significantly better. Final study involving six participants with visual impairments confirmed the improvement of digital graphics exploration with vibrotactile directional cues.