The Examination of Visuo-tactile Interaction in Material Category and Property Perception

Abstract

When seeing and touching objects, we recognize their material categories and properties. The material category and property information may be combined across vision and touch. However, visuo-tactile material perception is poorly understood. In this study, we asked 24 participants to rate stimuli in 13 material categories with 12 material properties under vision-only, tactile-only and visuo-tactile conditions. The results indicated interactions between vision and touch in material category perception when participants felt natural for visuo-tactile combination. On the other hand, visuo-tactile material property perception can be explained by the weighted average of visual information and tactile information.