Tactile Texture

The surface quality of a material or graphic element as perceived through touch, characterized by properties such as roughness, smoothness, density, height, pattern regularity, and directionality. In tactile graphics, different textures are used to represent different regions or categories of information, analogous to how colors distinguish regions in visual graphics. Effective tactile graphic design requires that assigned textures be sufficiently distinct from one another through touch—a challenge because visually different textures may feel similar, and tactile distinctiveness must be measured rather than assumed from visual appearance.