Haptic displays are commonly limited to transmitting a discrete
set of tactile motives. In this paper, we explore the
transmission of real-valued information through vibrotactile
displays. We simulate spatial continuity with three perceptual
models commonly used to create phantom sensations: the linear,
logarithmic and power model. We show that these generic
models lead to limited decoding precision, and propose a
method for model personalization adjusting to idiosyncratic
and spatial variations in perceptual sensitivity. We evaluate
this approach using two haptic display layouts: circular, worn
around the wrist and the upper arm, and straight, worn along
the forearm. Results of a user study measuring continuous
value decoding precision show that users were able to decode
continuous values with relatively high accuracy (4.4% mean
error), circular layouts performed particularly well, and personalisation
through sensitivity adjustment increased decoding
precision
