Virtual reality (VR) has been increasingly utilised as a simulation tool for human-robot interaction (HRI) studies due to its ability to facilitate fast and flexible prototyping. Despite efforts to achieve high validity in VR studies, haptic sensation, an essential sensory modality for perception and a critical factor in enhancing VR realism, is often absent from these experiments. Studying an interactive robot help-seeking scenario, we used a VR simulation with haptic gloves that provide highly realistic tactile and force feedback to examine the effects of haptic sensation on VR-based HRI. We compared participants' sense of presence and their assessments of the robot to a traditional setup using hand controllers. Our results indicate that haptic sensation enhanced participants' social and self-presence in VR and fostered more diverse and natural bodily engagement. Additionally, haptic sensations significantly influenced participants' affective-related perceptions of the robot. Our study provides insights to guide HRI researchers in building VR-based simulations that better align with their study contexts and objectives.

翻译：虚拟现实（VR）因其能够实现快速灵活的原型设计，已越来越多地被用作人机交互（HRI）研究的仿真工具。尽管在VR研究中已努力追求高有效性，但触觉感知——一种对于感知至关重要的感官模态，也是提升VR真实感的关键因素——在这些实验中却常常缺失。本研究通过一个交互式机器人求助场景，利用配备触觉手套的VR仿真系统（该手套能提供高度逼真的触感和力反馈）来探究触觉感知对基于VR的HRI的影响。我们将参与者的临场感及其对机器人的评估，与使用传统手持控制器的设置进行了比较。我们的结果表明，触觉感知增强了参与者在VR中的社会临场感和自我临场感，并促成了更多样化、更自然的身体参与。此外，触觉感知显著影响了参与者对机器人的情感相关感知。本研究为HRI研究者构建更贴合其研究背景与目标的基于VR的仿真系统提供了指导性见解。