HAPTICEMODEL · The Haptic E-Model: A Computational Model of Human Sensory-Motor Performance in Haptic Manipulation

Haptic interaction refers to the form of interaction with a real or virtual environment based on the sense of touch. As the user experiences and interacts with an environment through a haptic system, the haptic system directly or indirectly alters the user's perception and motor control. Therefore, understanding the effects of the haptic system on the perception and motor control is important. The purpose of this study is the development of a computational model of the human haptic sensory-motor system for quantitatively capturing the user performance in haptic manipulation tasks. The developed computational model, which we call the haptic e-model, will be an objective tool for evaluation of haptic systems with emphasis on human operator's sensory-motor performance. Specifically, the developed haptic e-model will be composed of a benchmark suite of representative haptic manipulation tasks, task performance measures, and models for human perception and motor control. The haptic e-model will be used as a benchmark evaluation model by the research community to evaluate effectiveness and performance of haptic systems, components, and algorithms. It will also be a computational tool that can be easily integrated into the design cycle of haptic systems, and facilitate quantitative analysis of design choices throughout system development.