E-Tactile Flow: Exploring A Novel Path of Pain Relief through Interactive Electrotactile Stimulation

Chronic or recurrent pain significantly impairs quality of life, and conventional pharmacological treatments often produce side effects, motivating the search for non-pharmacological alternatives. This study introduces a novel paradigm — E-Tactile Tactile Flow (E-Tactile Flow)—which integrates electrotactile stimulation with attentional engagement and flow-related task design. Inspired by a bidirectional attention mechanism, the paradigm designed goal-directed task mode and stimulus-driven task mode to examine the role of cognitive engagement in pain modulation. A preliminary study validated the feasibility and safety parameters of an 8×8 electrotactile system. In Experiment 1 (n = 42), both attention modes effectively reduced pain perception, with the goal-directed task mode showing significantly stronger modulation of several physiological measures and a marginal trend toward lower subjective pain ratings than the stimulus-driven task mode. Building on this, Experiment 2 introduced adaptive difficulty modulation to better align task challenge with participant performance. Results showed that dynamic task adjustment significantly enhanced attentional engagement and reduced pain ratings. Overall, this study provides initial empirical support for an electrotactile interaction paradigm for non-pharmacological pain modulation.