As tactile evaluation is an important assessment indicator for consumer product developments, the importance of objective tactile evaluation is increasing. However, individual differences among subjects in tactile research has not been sufficiently investigated. This paper focuses on individual differences in tactile perception and proposes a method for quantifying the similarity with a developed index. We compared three representative indicators, Euclidean distance, cosine similarity, and their hybrid index, for measuring the similarity in sensory evaluation data for tactile sensation of aluminum plates. Comparison of the conventional 2 indices revealed that opposite tactile sensations were observed, leading to the misjudgment of similarity between subjects. While, the proposed hybrid index provided better clustering of the subjects, resulting in extracting more accurate tactile factors than those obtained with the conventional indicators.

In this study, we developed a system to quantitatively evaluate self-study attitudes based on biometric information, with a specific focus on the number of blinks, head swaying, and brainwaves. The experiment involved 24 students from a Kanagawa Prefectural high school, and they participated in two sets of 20-minute self-study sessions. We compared the system evaluation values derived from biometric information with evaluations provided by teachers. “Teacher Evaluation” was based on the “Proactive attitude toward learning.” As a result, 95.45% of valid data aligned with teacher evaluations, providing data that could assist teachers (with a difference of 1 or less between Teacher Evaluation and System Evaluation). The utilization of system-calculated values for assessing learning attitudes has the potential to enable teachers to conduct fair and efficient grading processes.

Psychophysical and affective experiences while watching audiovisual content can be antecedents to determine the overall evaluation of viewing experiences. However, the layered relationships among these experiences have been hardly discussed. We investigated these experiences and their semantic structure while watching hug scenes. We selected 38 adjectives describing hugs and classified them into three layers: psychophysical, affective, and overall evaluation. Participants scored each of the 24 videos containing hugging scenes using these adjectives. The structure among the three layers was computed: the four psychophysical factors affected the four affective factors, which in turn affected the two overall evaluation factors, i.e., joyful and reassuring. The model was confirmed to have statistical validity by structural equation modeling and semantic validity by experiments using dummy links. The results will lead to the determination of measures to enhance affective experiences when viewing videos, and the formulation of criteria for measuring and evaluating affective experiences.