Contribution of senses of foot for identification of shape, elasticity and tilt angle of ground

Despite the importance of the foot sense its roles in the motor / recognition skills have not been sufficiently clear yet. This study aim to assess the function of the foot senses for the environmental recognition. Three different senses of foot were investigated in this paper, which are planter pressure on the foot sole, vibration on it and ankle motion of ankle joints. Each of them or some of them were blinded by using special orthotic devices. Three testing groups with 4 different shapes, 4 different elasticities, and 4 different tilt angles were selected as testing samples, and human subjects without any health problems were asked to identify what kind of sample they stepped on. The numbers of collect answers were statistically analyzed and the contributions of the foot senses for the identifications were discussed. The result showed that the distribution of the plantar pressure is a possible resource to identify the shape, elasticity and tilt angle of the ground.