Tactile Change Blindness Induced by Tactile and Visual Distractors

Change blindness studies have revealed people's inability to detect changes between two consecutively presented scenes when they are separated by a distractor. This failure has been reported within vision, audition, and touch but also crossmodally. In particular, participants' performance in detecting changes in position between two tactile scenes is impaired not only when a tactile mask is introduced between the two to-be-compared displays but also when a visual mask is used instead. Interestingly, with similar procedure, there is no effect of auditory masks on a tactile task or of tactile masks on a visual task (Auvray et al., 2007, 2008; Gallace et al., 2006). Such crossmodal change blindness effect also occurs when participants perform a different task. In a recent experiment, participants had to detect changes in the frequency of presentation of tactile stimuli. The two to-be-compared sequences of three tactile stimuli were presented either at a same or at a different rate. They were presented either consecutively, separated by an empty interval, a tactile, visual, or auditory mask. The visual and tactile masks significantly impaired participants' performance whereas the auditory mask had no effect on performance. These findings are discussed in relation to the crossmodal nature of attention

An educational experience in ancient Rome to evaluate the impact of virtual reality on human learning processes

Immersive Virtual Reality technology has recently gained significant attention and is expanding its applications to various fields. It also has many advantages in education, as it allows to both simplify the explanation of complex topics through their visualization, and explore lost or unreachable environments. To evaluate the impact of immersive experiences on learning outcomes we developed an educational experience that lets users visit an ancient Roman Domus and provides information about daily life in Roman times. We designed a between-subjects data collection to investigate learning ratio, user experience, and cybersickness of participants through anonymous questionnaires. We collected 76 responses of participants (18–35 y.o.) divided into three conditions: a Immersive Virtual Reality experience, a slide-based lecture and a 2D desktop-based experience. Our results show that the virtual reality experience is considered more engaging and as effective as more traditional 2D and slide-based experiences in terms of learning

Development and Testing of a Small-Size Olfactometer for the Perception of Food and Beverages in Humans

Studies of olfactory perception and about the way humans interact with, and perceive food and beverages require appropriate olfactory devices. Moreover, small size, and portable interfaces are needed within the context of Human Computer Interaction (HCI), to enrich and complete the design of different mediated experiences. In this paper, the authors tested a new portable olfactory device for the orthonasal administration of smells. The main aim was to verify if the experience generated by the odors delivered through such device can affect people's taste perception. Once established that people could perceive odors using the olfactory device, a group of participants was asked to taste two different types of food (Experiment 1) and three types of beverages (Experiment 2) and to evaluate them on a number of perceptual-dimensions (such as pleasantness, freshness, sweetness, saltiness, and bitterness). The participants could taste the food and the beverage without the presence of additional olfactory stimuli, or under conditions where olfactory stimuli (the smell of chocolate or citrus) were also presented using the device. The results showed that the participants' evaluation of food and beverages was significantly modulated by the concurrently presented odors. The experimental results suggest that: (1) the device is effective in controlling the delivery of odors to human participants without the complexity of management that often affect larger odors delivery systems; (2) odors administered by means of such device can have an effects on food and beverage perception, without the need to change their chemical properties

Corrigendum: May I Smell Your Attention: Exploration of Smell and Sound for Visuospatial Attention in Virtual Reality

In the published article, there was an error regarding the affiliation(s) for Dario Pittera. Instead of having affiliation(s) ∗∗2,3,4∗∗, they should only have ∗∗2,4∗∗. The authors apologize for this error and state that this does not change the scientific conclusions of the article in any way. The original article has been updated

Design of a Wearable Tactile Interface to Convey Gravitational Information

This research aims to correct tilted body positions in pitch and roll, making the user’s body axis becoming parallel with the gravitational acceleration vector through the use of tactile cues. A device is designed for the purpose and consists of a corset-like vest equipped with some sensors and four vibrotactile motors: two on the torso and one per each shoulder. The actuators deliver tactile feedbacks proportional to the angular error between the body axis of the user and the gravitational direction: the larger the error, the higher the frequency

The sensorimotor Dimension of the Networked Flow: an Exploratory Study Using an Interactive Collaborative Platform

The ability to cooperate with another individual in order to achieve a shared goal is crucial for human survival and it is called joint action. It is noted that this process can originate when actors are synchronized at a sensorimotor level. However, experiential correlates of sensorimotor synchronization are nearly unexplored. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between the experience of flow and social presence in a sensorimotor collaborative task. 12 female couples (mean age = 22.33; S.D. = .815) and 12 male couples (mean age = 22.88; S.D. = .789) were involved in a tower-building task across 10 consecutive trials using the COLLEGO platform. Couple members alternated their leader/follower role. Platform recorded time stamp (ms) and position of each selected object when it was picked/released, providing a measure of performance. Thereafter, participants’ level of flow (Flow State Scale) and social presence (Networked Minds Social Presence Inventory) were assessed. Flow and Social presence correlated positively at a global level. Having clear goals and perceiving a balance between challenges and skills were associated with a higher performance. The autotelic dimension of flow was negatively related with global performance. At the same time, task duration correlated negatively with cognitive and behavioral dimensions of social presence, but positively with emotional dimensions. Results are discussed in light of the Networked Flow model that assumes a strong positive link between social presence and flow at the base of the highest levels of collaborative performance