In touch with the future

Out of all the human senses, touch is the one that is most often unappreciated, and undervalued. Yet, the surface of the human body, the skin, is actually one huge sheet of tactile receptors. It provides us with the means to connect with our surroundings. Despite the important role that vision plays in our everyday lives, it is the skin that constitutes both the oldest, and by far the largest of our sense organs. The skin protects our body from the external world and, at the same time, informs us about what occurs on its surface. In Touch With The Future explores the science of touch, bringing together the latest findings from cognitive neuroscience about the processing of tactile information in humans. The book provides a comprehensive overview of scientific knowledge regarding themes such as tactile memory, tactile awareness (consciousness), tactile attention, the role of touch in interpersonal and sexual interactions, and the neurological substrates of touch. It highlights the many ways in which our growing understanding of the world of touch can, and in some cases already are, being applied in the real world in everything from the development of virtual reality (VR) environments, tablet PCs, mobile phones, and even teledildonics - the ultimate frontier in terms of adult entertainment. In addition, the book shows how the cognitive neuroscience approach to the study of touch can be applied to help improve the design of many real-world applications/products as well as to many of our everyday experiences, such as those related to the appreciation of food, marketing, packaging design, the development of enhanced sensory substitution systems, art, and man-machine interfaces. Crucially, the authors makes a convincing argument for the view that one cannot really understand touch, especially not in a real-world context, without placing it in a multisensory context. That is, the senses interact to influence tactile perception in everything - from changing the feel of a surface or product by changing the sound it makes or the fragrance it has. For students and researchers in the brain sciences, this book presents a valuable and fascinating exploration into one of our least understood senses "Kaleidoscopic in its reach, eclectic in its content, profound in its insight, and above all an evidence-based journey across a touch landscape few will have explored in such breadth and depth, by two cognitive neuroscientists with the perfect pedigree for such an ambitious task. This book will provide an invaluable resource-insights and references-for those researching in, or entering the field." Francis McGlone, Professor in Cognitive Neuroscience, School of Natural Sciences & Psychology, Liverpool John Moores University, UK "From the first pages we are convinced that human touch is something we can't live without: it brings physical and emotional benefits to all of us. Gallace and Spence give an inspiring vision of the future for touch studies. They thoroughly cover issues relating to touch from reality to virtuality, giving us an insight into how touch works and how it can transform our virtual worlds into engaging multisensory experiences." Monica Bordegoni, Politecnico di Milano, Italia "Touch (for neuroscientists the somatosensory system, from receptors to the brain) has been somewhat 'neglected,' as compared with the visual system. This is bizarre since our own body is at least as important as our eyes, for getting in touch with objects around us. The book by Alberto Gallace and Charles Spence now fills this lacuna. In Touch With The Future...is dispensable reading for neurologists, neuropsychologists and, more generally, for any scientist concerned with how we get in 'touch' with the world and the many and diverse objects which populate it" Giuseppe Vallar, Professor of Neuropsychology, University of Milano-Bicocca, ItaluTOUCH IN THE LABORATORY 1: INTRODUCING THE SENSE OF TOUCH ; 1. Introduction ; 2. The fundamentals of touch: The organization of the somatosensory system ; 3. Tactile perceptual organization ; TOUCH IN THE LABORATORY 2: THE HIGHER ORDER FACTORS THAT AFFECT TACTILE PERCEPTION ; 4. The awareness of touch ; 5. A memory for touch ; 6. Tactile attention ; 7. Caressing the skin: The social side of touch ; 8. Outside the boundaries of our bodies: The relationship between touch and the representation of the body in our mind ; TOUCH IN THE REAL WORLD 1: OVERCOMING THE LIMITATIONS IN TACTILE INFORMATION PROCESSING ; 9. Technologies of touch ; 10. Tactile and multisensory warning signals ; TOUCH IN THE REAL WORLD 2: ENHANCING THE AFFECTIVE DESIGN OF TOUCH ; 11. Touch in the marketplace: Selling by means of touch ; 12. Touch in the museum: Sculpture, art, aesthetics, and visual impairment ; 13. Touch in the bedroom: The role of touch in sexual behavior ; 14. Touch in the restaurant: A touch of gastronomy ; CONCLUSIONS ; 15. Touching the future ; References