Electrotactile stimulation can evoke a wide range of sensations, including taps, squeezes, and strokes. Although verbal descriptors are available for vibrotactile and ultrasound stimuli, a comprehensive list has not been developed for electrotactile experiences. To address this, we used a text normalization approach to generate descriptors for wearable electrotactile research and design. In Experiment 1 (N=14), Dutch participants provided 504 open-ended descriptions in response to 36 electrotactile stimuli on the forearm. These were processed into 71 unique English descriptors with considerable inter-rater reliability. Experiment 2 (N=24) evaluated a reduced list of 42 descriptors under additional stimulation conditions, showing robust and consistent descriptor usage, also across varying stimulus intensities. This list partially overlaps with previous non-electrotactile descriptor lists but also includes terms that seem to be unique to electrotactile sensations. Altogether, our findings contribute to the development of common verbal descriptors for electrotactile stimulation, supporting future wearable haptic research and design.

The advancements of e-textiles have accelerated innovation in diverse fields such as wearable technology and safety but face several challenges in commercial viability. Within the field of Human–Computer Interaction (HCI), comprehensive textile knowledge is often underrated which could lead to issues with user-acceptability, and ununiformed design choices, neglecting the textile’s tactile qualities. Designers often overlook the balance between aesthetics and functionality, while manufacturing companies struggle with limited documentation and gaps between textile and hardware manufacturing. To facilitate multidisciplinary e-textile development, this study encourages the use of service blueprinting to enhance collaboration and knowledge transfer across disciplines, illustrated by a use case.