The effectiveness of haptic cues as an assistive technology for human memory

Many people experience difficulty recalling and recognizing information during everyday tasks. Prior assistive technology has leveraged audio and video cues, but this approach is often disruptive and inappropriate in socially-sensitive situations. Our work explores vibro-tactile feedback as an alternative that unobtrusively aids human memory. We conducted several user studies comparing within-participant performance on memory tasks without haptic cues (control) and tasks augmented with tactile stimuli (intervention). Our studies employed a bracelet prototype that emits vibratory pulses, which are uniquely mapped to audio and visual information. Results show interaction between performance on control and intervention conditions. Poor performers on unaided tasks improve recognition by more than 20% (p<0.05) when haptic cues are employed. Thus, we suggest vibro-tactile feedback as an effective memory aid for users with impaired memory, and offer several design recommendations for integrating haptic cues into wearable devices.