Framework of product experience

In this paper, we introduce a general framework for product experience that applies to all affective responses that can be experienced in human-product interaction. Three distinct components or levels of product experiences are discussed: aesthetic experience, experience of meaning, and emotional experience. All three components are distinguished in having their own lawful underlying process. The aesthetic level involves a product’s capacity to delight one or more of our sensory modalities. The meaning level involves our ability to assign personality or other expressive characteristics and to assess the personal or symbolic significance of products. The emotional level involves those experiences that are typically considered in emotion psychology and in everyday language about emotions, such as love and anger, which are elicited by the appraised relational meaning of products. The framework indicates patterns for the processes that underlie the different types of affective product experiences, which are used to explain the personal and layered nature of product experienceIndustrial Design Engineerin

User-material-product interrelationships in attributing meanings

In selecting a material to create an intended product meaning, several factors, such as the material’s sensorial and technical properties, the product in which the material is embodied, and who the user is, may need to be taken into consideration. Each factor consists of a number of aspects (e.g., user covers aspects including gender, expertise, culture, etc.) with each playing a different role in attributing meaning to a particular material. The role that two product aspects (shape and function) and two user aspects (gender and culture) plays in attributing meaning to two materials, plastics and metal, is studied. The study demonstrates the contention that meanings of materials in a particular context are shaped by interactions of materials with aspects of products and users. On the other hand, the effect of a certain aspect (e.g., shape) may change depending on the meaning (e.g., feminine) aimed to be expressed. The results of the study, main effects and interactions are thoroughly discussed in this paper.Industrial Design Engineerin

Special issue editorial: Design and emotion

Industrial Design Engineerin

Beyond surprise: A longitudinal study on the experience of visual-tactual incongruities in products

When people encounter products with visual-tactual incongruities, they are likely to be surprised because the product feels different than expected. In this paper, we investigate (1) the relationship between surprise and the overall liking of the products, (2) the emotions associated with surprise, and (3) the long-term effects of surprise. We created products that were similar in visual appearance but that differed in their tactual characteristics. Participants evaluated the same products at three different points in time. Surprise was often followed by the emotions interest, fascination, amusement, confusion, indignation and irritation. We suggest that the liking for surprising products may be the composite effect of a decreased liking due to unfamiliar characteristics and increased liking due to positive emotions following surprise. Although the effect of surprise diminishes over time, it persists and can be demonstrated at multiple occasions.Industrial Design Engineerin

Appraisal patterns of emotions in human-product interaction

Emotional design, i.e., designing with an intention to evoke or to prevent a particular emotion, can be facilitated by understanding the processes underlying emotions. A promising approach to understanding these processes in the current psychological literature is appraisal theory. Appraisal theory can support this understanding because it explains how different emotions are elicited by different underlying appraisals. This paper reports a study that aimed to identify and specify appraisals that elicit emotions of product users for four emotion groups: happiness/joy, satisfaction/contentment, anger/irritation, and disappointment/dissatisfaction. The study started with a sensitizing task to make participants familiar with reporting their emotional experiences. With a combination of experience sampling and in-depth interviews, the emotions experienced when interacting with products and the causes of these emotions were captured. The results indicated that the appraisal patterns as proposed in general appraisal theory can also be traced in human-product interaction for all four emotion groups. On the basis of the results, an initia specification of those appraisals and design directions are proposedIndustrial Design Engineerin

Source selection in product metaphor generation: The effects of salience and relatedness

To generate a product metaphor, designers must select a source, discern a property (or properties) of this source, and transfer this property to the product they design. The selection of any source in particular is affected by the extent to which it represents the meaning the designer intends to convey (i.e., its salience), and the strength of its association with the product (i.e., relatedness). In this paper, we tested how different levels of salience and relatedness influenced source selection in a study conducted with design students. The results indicate that a source was chosen only when it had the intended meaning as a highly salient property, and was highly related to the target product. It was also found that being novel yet understandable, having application potential, and creating a complete, functional product were also considered as source selection criteria by designers. This study aims to relate linguistic theories on metaphors to the domain of product design, and help to clarify how designers create comprehensible and aesthetic metaphors.Industrial Design Engineerin