CHI2025 Heartbeat Resonance: Inducing Non-contact Heartbeat Sensations in the Chest

HCI Deep Dives

Perceiving and altering the sensation of internal physiological states, such as heartbeats, is key for biofeedback and interoception. Yet, wearable devices used for this purpose can feel intrusive and typically fail to deliver stimuli aligned with the heart’s location in the chest. To address this, we introduce Heartbeat Resonance, which uses low-frequency sound waves to create non-contact haptic sensations in the chest cavity, mimicking heartbeats. We conduct two experiments to evaluate the system’s effectiveness. The first experiment shows that the system created realistic heartbeat sensations in the chest, with 78.05 Hz being the most effective frequency. In the second experiment, we evaluate the effects of entrainment by simulating faster and slower heart rates. Participants perceived the intended changes and reported high confidence in their perceptions for +15% and -30% heart rates. This system offers a non-intrusive solution for biofeedback while creating new possibilities for immersive VR environments.

Waseem Hassan, Liyue Da, Sonia Elizondo, and Kasper Hornbæk. 2025. Heartbeat Resonance: Inducing Non-contact Heartbeat Sensations in the Chest. In Proceedings of the 2025 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '25). Association for Computing Machinery, New York, NY, USA, Article 913, 1–22. https://doi.org/10.1145/3706598.3713959