Ever found yourself yearning for a hug with nobody there to give you one? Chances are, you have. Inventors at the University of Electro-Communications (UEC) in Tokyo, Japan have developed a technology for the lonely folk, which combats ‘chronic intermittent huglessness’. Enter the Sense-Roid jacket.

The Sense-Roid jacket enables the wearer to hug themselves. The team of inventors at UEC originally developed the jacket for people who are lonely, single or in long distance relationships. The Kajimoto Laboratory (who also brought the world the ‘kissing device’) says that the feelings that we experience when hugging should also be able to be felt in the first person. They believe that by hugging oneself, people will be enlightened about “the value of caressing”. As arbitrary as that might sound, it seems to work.

The jacket works in 2 parts: the jacket the user wears and a silicon mannequin wearing a similar jacket. When the user embraces the mannequin, the 20 pressure sensors in the mannequin’s jacket send signals to the 6 McKibben actuators (artificial pneumatic muscles) in the user’s jacket which then tighten in the same position and with the same force as what the pressure sensors detect. This is how the feeling of a hug is reproduced.

The jacket can also sense vibrations in the stroking sensation. The back of the user’s jacket is embedded with pager motors which respond to the micro switches in the back of the mannequin’s jacket. Once again, the force and position of the stroke is reproduced in the user’s jacket, creating a stroking sensation. A video demonstration can be viewed here.

Although the jacket is said to be a technological achievement in science and useful for long distance affection, it introduces the fear that it is encouraging isolation in an already lonely global community. While this device may seem slightly auto-erotic, Werner Bohmke, social psychology lecturer at Rhodes University, South Africa is doubtful of the positive effects of it. “I personally, can't see this jacket working as a long-term, effective substitute [for partners in long-distance situations] because there are too many relationship and human contact factors that it does not seem able to mimic/reproduce effectively.” While the creators say that they developed this device for tactile communication purposes only, they have insinuated that if further developed, it might be used for therapeutic and emotional purposes.

Although not yet on the market, there are some concerns about the isolating nature of the device. “My worry is that this device, as a consumer product, is likely to become just one more thing to buy to fill the void in what Phillip Cushman has called the 'empty self' of contemporary consumerist society. The product-as-substitute only exacerbates the problem of social isolation” says Bohmke about the effects it might have on an individual’s social behaviour. Essentially, the device would be contradicting its supposed purpose.

Bohmke does, however, believe that the jacket may be useful for something such as therapy for autistic children. “Used as a therapeutic tool in a process, I think it may be a worthwhile technological development.” The knowledge that they are administering tactile communication to themselves might give autistic children who fear unfamiliar touch a sense of security and help them deal with that phobia.

While the Sense-Roid jacket may be a great development in tactile communication technology, it has its implications on interpersonal constructs of human interaction. While being of some therapeutic purpose, it has yet to prove its validity in the societal interactions of people in the supposed age of loneliness we are experiencing.