In this paper, we study the interactional organization of an instructed object exploration
among sighted and visually impaired people (VIPs) in order to contribute to
studies of instructional activities and the observable accomplishment of haptic perception.
We do this by showing the situated, interactional, and co-operative organization
of achieving object understanding. We focus on the dynamics of haptic perception
as being reliant on instructions, while at the same time being an observable
production that furnishes further instructions. We show the organization of visual
and verbal instructions versus the touching of objects for haptic perception. Based
on ethnomethodological conversation analysis of video data, we study a VIP’s haptic
actions in interaction with a professional, sighted ICT consultant who provides
instructions on what an object is and what it can do. We show how the instructions
are sequentially adjusted to make them relevant for a simultaneous, emerging exploration
in which the VIP uses their hands and fingers to perceive very specific details
of the object. We argue that achieving object understanding is accomplished in and
through the fine-tuned coordination of haptic exploration, both as a response to verbal
instructions and also as a means of conveying perception-related actions, which
the ICT uses to build new actions. The paper thus makes a case for instructed and
distributed haptic perception as observable in social interaction