Navigation Method Enhancing Music Listening Experience by Stimulating Both Neck Sides With Modulated Musical...

We propose a method that stimulates musical vibration (generated from and synchronized with musical signals), modulated by the direction and distance to the target, on both sides of a user's neck with Hapbeat, a necklace-type haptic device. We conducted three experiments to confirm that the proposed method can achieve both haptic navigation and enhance the music-listening experience. Experiment 1 consisted of conducting a questionnaire survey to examine the effect of stimulating musical vibrations. Experiment 2 evaluated the accuracy (deg) of users' ability to adjust their direction toward a target using the proposed method. Experiment 3 examined the ability of four different navigation methods by performing navigation tasks in a virtual environment. The results of the experiments showed that stimulating musical vibration enhanced the music-listening experience, and that the proposed method is able to provide sufficient information to guide the users: accuracy in identifying directions was about 20 ^°, participants reached the target in all navigation tasks, and in about 80% of all trials participants reached the target using the shortest route. Furthermore, the proposed method succeeded in conveying distance information, and Hapbeat can be combined with conventional navigation methods without interfering with music listening.