An Illusion of Tactile Slip

Tactile slip is a common sensation that is interesting from the perspective of brain perception since it is susceptible to illusions. Here we create the illusion of slipping in a particular direction despite a net zero movement using a simple haptic interface consisting of only two moving parts. We further show that by superimposing net zero motions of different frequencies we can also control the illusion of movement speed. The latter extends previous observations where differential local skin displacement has been reported to cause illusions of surface roughness.