A device that gently strokes the forearm with a patch of synthetic fur has been shown to reduce anxiety during stressful situations. The finding suggests that incorporating passive touch into wearable devices like smart watches could improve the mental well-being of users.
Previous research has shown that slow, gentle touch – called affective touch – is pleasurable. So, at Cornell University in New York and their colleagues wanted to see if a wearable gadget that uses affective touch could soothe anxiety during high-stress situations.
They created a gadget in a flattened dumbbell-shape about half the length of a ruler with a small patch of synthetic fur attached to one side. Two straps fasten the gadget, fuzzy side down, to the forearm. When activated, a tiny motor in the device slides the fur patch back and forth, softly stroking the wearer’s skin. One person who wore it likened the sensation to “a teddy bear stroking [her] with [its] fingers”.
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To see if the motion eases anxiety, the researchers had 12 participants wear the activated device during a series of stress-inducing tasks such as counting backwards from 5698 in multiples of 37, and preparing for and giving a speech. An equal number of participants completed the same tasks with the device turned off.
Everyone completed a six-question survey that measured anxiety on a scale of 6 to 24 before the experiment and after each task. Higher scores indicated greater anxiety. They also wore a heart rate monitor to track fluctuations in the amount of time between heartbeats, a measure called heart rate variability, which gauges stress.
“There’s a little, fine difference between stress and anxiety,” says Zhao. “Stress is our body’s reaction to external stimuli, something we cannot control. Anxiety is our subjective interpretation of the stress we are experiencing.”
The researchers found no difference in heart rate variability between the two groups, indicating the device doesn’t reduce stress. However, participants in the control group reported greater increases in anxiety during each task than participants in the intervention group. For instance, during the arithmetic task, anxiety scores increased by an average of 6 points from baseline in the control group whereas the intervention group only saw a 3-point increase. This suggests that while the device doesn’t reduce stress, it does mitigate anxiety during stressful situations, says Zhao.
More work is needed to improve the device’s wearability and function before it can be tested in real-world circumstances, says at Cornell University, who presented this research on 4 March at a meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Washington DC.
For example, the final version of the device must be able to monitor for signs of stress, such as changes in heart rate variability, says at the University of Southern California who wasn’t involved in the work. That way it can detect when a user is stressed and automatically implement soothing touch to calm them, he says.
“The end goal is not to have people manually activate this device. My goal is to develop interventions that can help people while they are doing something else,” says Zhao.
Proceedings of the ACM on Interactive, Mobile, Wearable and Ubiquitous Technologies
