‘In-car distractions’ have always been a major cause of many accidents and in the world of cars, the best thing that could help to prevent these are Haptic Steering Wheels. Haptic is nothing but the study of touch and haptic response is given by sensation directed by device to you. This haptic feedback is feels same as a cell phone vibration.
The cars having touchscreen control increases chances of accidents. This is because normal touchscreens can’t be felt like buttons.
Now because they cannot be felt to senses thus driver would have to look at the car’s screen each time he presses a button to make sure that he has pressed over the right button. This mind diversion increases can often lead to an accident. Haptic touch-screen could minimize the issue as each time user needs to press the button, they will be popped out from the flat screens and user would need not to look at the screens.
Haptic technology have been employed in another form and a prototype of a steering wheel was developed jointly by AT&T Researchers along with researchers of Carnegie Mellon University which consisted a number of tiny motors in them which are similar to that in smartphones used to make them vibrate. Whenever there is a turn on road, these motors begin to vibrate with increasing frequency in directions depending on the turn. One of the researchers of AT&T, Kevin Li said that these vibrations play a significant role by triggering a sort of human perception trick. So, the brain will sense all the discrete vibrations just as single line of continuous motion. Thus, user will not only feel a vibrating wheel but also the direction where it points i.e. either clockwise or anticlockwise. He further explains that these haptic steering wheels are like spidey sense giving you the warning.
