From esports teams to military tactical level communication: A pilot study of user experiences of dual-use smart sleeve technology

The positive effect of haptic information in enhancing communication has been shown in team sports and more recently its effects have also been studied with esports teams. Dismounted soldiers use, among other methods, hand-arm signals and also touch for communicating. In the current study we test the user experiences of a wearable smart textile, a smart sleeve, with dismounted soldier fire teams The smart sleeve was originally developed for esports teams, but it could possibly be used for communication in the military context. Technologically mediated touch could communicate and coordinate movement and other combat actions and manoeuvres. We studied user experiences and collected future development ideas with interviews in an outdoor live-firing exercise of three-person fire teams. The potential for silent communication was identified by the participants, but the durability of the technology raised some concerns. The results encourage the further studying of haptic communication methods for the dismounted soldier.