Patent ID: 8369887

Claim:
A method of controlling a mobile terminal, the method comprising: detecting an occurrence of an event, the event occurring in response to a request for access to the mobile terminal by an external mobile terminal; determining whether the event is a haptic-effect-accompanying event; detecting an identification information of the external mobile terminal from the detected event when the event is the haptic-effect-accompanying event; determining whether a haptic-effect pattern corresponding to the detected identification information is set in advance in the mobile terminal when the detected identification information exists in a contact list of the mobile terminal, the haptic-effect pattern being varied according to the detected identification information; and when the haptic-effect pattern is set in advance in the mobile terminal, generating a haptic effect corresponding to the haptic-effect pattern, and varying an image displayed on a screen of the mobile terminal in accordance with the haptic-effect pattern while simultaneously generating the haptic effect corresponding to the haptic-effect pattern, wherein, when the event involves displaying a list of items with different importance levels in a display region of the mobile terminal, the step of generating the haptic effect comprises generating the haptic effect in an area in the display region where an item of the list having a high importance level is displayed, the method further comprises detecting a movement of a cursor toward the item with the high importance level, or detecting an object having a distance from the item with the high importance level that gradually changes, based on a signal provided by a proximity sensor, and the step of generating the haptic effect further comprises varying an intensity of the haptic effect according to a corresponding one of the movement of the cursor or the distance.