Passive human touch cannot recognize the shape of a pattern imprinted on the fingertip

Summary: While tactile spatial pattern recognition has been suggested to be qualitatively similar to visual recognition, our study challenges this notion, particularly under passive touch. Previous electrophysiological and behavioral research suggested that the tactile system can process complex spa...

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Main Authors: Scinob Kuroki, Takumi Hamazaki, Hiroyuki Kajimoto, Shin’ya Nishida
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Elsevier 2025-05-01
Series:iScience
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Online Access:http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2589004225005929
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author Scinob Kuroki
Takumi Hamazaki
Hiroyuki Kajimoto
Shin’ya Nishida
author_facet Scinob Kuroki
Takumi Hamazaki
Hiroyuki Kajimoto
Shin’ya Nishida
author_sort Scinob Kuroki
collection DOAJ
description Summary: While tactile spatial pattern recognition has been suggested to be qualitatively similar to visual recognition, our study challenges this notion, particularly under passive touch. Previous electrophysiological and behavioral research suggested that the tactile system can process complex spatial patterns in the same way as the visual system and can be modeled as a low-pass version of visual spatial perception. However, we found that when using energy-matched simple patterns, participants were highly dependent on local skin deformation and largely ineffective at distinguishing basic shape features, such as a closed triangle vs. an open arrow, or to discern the similarity of rotated versions of the same shape, regardless of whether they were presented as vibrotactile patterns or braille patterns. This study provides compelling evidence that tactile representation of spatial patterns differs not only in resolution but also in how the brain processes shape features compared to visual representation in standard passive viewing.
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id doaj-art-ae53ca717a31480cbae4c984a9346a94
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issn 2589-0042
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spelling doaj-art-ae53ca717a31480cbae4c984a9346a942025-08-20T02:13:12ZengElsevieriScience2589-00422025-05-0128511233110.1016/j.isci.2025.112331Passive human touch cannot recognize the shape of a pattern imprinted on the fingertipScinob Kuroki0Takumi Hamazaki1Hiroyuki Kajimoto2Shin’ya Nishida3Communication Science Laboratories, NTT, Atsugi, Kanagawa 243-0198, Japan; Corresponding authorDepartment of Informatics, University of Electro-Communications, Chofu, Tokyo 182-8585, JapanDepartment of Informatics, University of Electro-Communications, Chofu, Tokyo 182-8585, JapanCommunication Science Laboratories, NTT, Atsugi, Kanagawa 243-0198, Japan; Graduate School of Informatics, Kyoto University, Kyoto 606-8501, JapanSummary: While tactile spatial pattern recognition has been suggested to be qualitatively similar to visual recognition, our study challenges this notion, particularly under passive touch. Previous electrophysiological and behavioral research suggested that the tactile system can process complex spatial patterns in the same way as the visual system and can be modeled as a low-pass version of visual spatial perception. However, we found that when using energy-matched simple patterns, participants were highly dependent on local skin deformation and largely ineffective at distinguishing basic shape features, such as a closed triangle vs. an open arrow, or to discern the similarity of rotated versions of the same shape, regardless of whether they were presented as vibrotactile patterns or braille patterns. This study provides compelling evidence that tactile representation of spatial patterns differs not only in resolution but also in how the brain processes shape features compared to visual representation in standard passive viewing.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2589004225005929Social sciences
spellingShingle Scinob Kuroki
Takumi Hamazaki
Hiroyuki Kajimoto
Shin’ya Nishida
Passive human touch cannot recognize the shape of a pattern imprinted on the fingertip
iScience
Social sciences
title Passive human touch cannot recognize the shape of a pattern imprinted on the fingertip
title_full Passive human touch cannot recognize the shape of a pattern imprinted on the fingertip
title_fullStr Passive human touch cannot recognize the shape of a pattern imprinted on the fingertip
title_full_unstemmed Passive human touch cannot recognize the shape of a pattern imprinted on the fingertip
title_short Passive human touch cannot recognize the shape of a pattern imprinted on the fingertip
title_sort passive human touch cannot recognize the shape of a pattern imprinted on the fingertip
topic Social sciences
url http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2589004225005929
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