Birds of a Rhythm: The Effects of Haptic Pattern Similarity on People's Social Perceptions in Virtual Reality

Virtual reality (VR) expands opportunities for social interaction, yet its heavy reliance on visual cues can limit social engagement and hinder immersive experiences in visually overwhelming situations. To explore alternative social cues beyond the visual domain, we verified the potential of haptic cues for social identification in VR by examining the effects of haptic pattern similarity on social perceptions. Unique haptic patterns were assigned to participants and virtual agents for identification, while the similarity of haptic patterns was manipulated (same, similar, distinct). The results demonstrated that participants maintained closer interpersonal distances and reported higher senses of belonging, social connection, and comfort toward agents as the similarity of patterns increased. Our findings validate the potential of haptic patterns in social identification and provide scientific evidence that homophily extends beyond the visual domain to the haptic domain. We also suggest a novel haptic-based methodology for conveying relationship information and enhancing social VR experiences.