CHI '12 (Note)
How do couples use CheekTouch over phone calls?
Young-Woo Park
Seok-Hyung Bae
Tek-Jin Nam
In this paper we introduce CheekTouch, an affective audio-tactile communication technique that transmits multi-finger touch gestures applied on a sender's mobile phone to a receiver's cheek in real time during a call. We made a pair of CheekTouch prototypes each with a multi-touch screen and vibrotactile display to enable bidirectional touch delivery. We observed four romantic couples in their twenties using our prototype system in a lab setting over five consecutive days, and analyzed how CheekTouch affected their non-verbal and emotional communication. The results of the user study showed that CheekTouch could effectively support audio-tactile communication in various ways - persuading, conveying status, delivering information, emphasizing emotion/words, calling for attention, and being playful.
Keywords: Affective communication; on-the-cheek interaction; multifinger touch; vibrotactile feedback; remote touch; mobile phone
