Haptically Induced Illusory Self-motion and the Influence of Context of Motion

The ability of haptic stimuli to augment visually and auditorily induced self-motion illusions has in part been investigated. However, haptically induced illusory self-motion in environments deprived of explicit motion cues remain unexplored. In this paper we present an experiment performed with the intention of investigating how different virtual environments - contexts of motion - influences self-motion illusions induced through haptic stimulation of the feet. A concurrent goal was to determine whether horizontal self-motion illusions can be induced through stimulation of the supporting areas of the feet. The experiment was based on the a within-subjects design and included four conditions, each representing one context of motion: an elevator, a train compartment, a bathroom, and a completely dark environment. The audiohaptic stimuli was identical across all conditions. The participants' sensation of movement was assessed by means of existing measures of illusory self-motion, namely,...