Session: DTM-03-01: Perception, Prototyping, and Inspiration in Design

Paper Number: 115059

115059 - Identifying a Relationship Between Design Concept Representation Style and Consumer Product Preference 

Product designers are constantly seeking insight into the mind of the consumer in efforts to get a better idea as to what the market demands. Feedback from consumers informs designers on changes that need to be made to a product and can provide information about what end-users expect. This process has a great deal of room for improvement. One area where it is lacking at present is that the effect of representation style on consumer judgement is not well understood. To explore possible design process improvements, a study was conducted on concept representation style and its effects on consumer preferences. The study employed statistical significance testing to identify a relationship between representation style and consumer preference consistency, lending insight into the best practices for conveying critical information throughout the design process. The study described in this paper consists of conducting a series of surveys, introducing hand drawings, solid models, and realistic renderings as representations of eyeglass frames to participants, eliciting preference data from those participants, and comparing their preference ratings to those of physical models of the same frames. This study was be supplemented with an eye-tracking system to establish a connection of where the effective details lie in the design representations, as well as suggest some decision-making strategies at play. Results indicate that a significant difference in consistency between representation styles does exist, and that CAD solid models are inconsistent with preferences of physical models. When only participants with an engineering background were evaluated however, this relationship does not exist, suggesting that a familiarity with a particular design practice may impact how individuals judge a representation from that practice. It is also suggested by eye-tracking analysis that participants were more likely to make semantic responses to the physical models due to their evaluation patterns.

Presenting Author: Brian Sylcott East Carolina University

Presenting Author Biography: Dr. Brian Sylcott is a faculty member in the Department of Engineering at East Carolina University. Dr. Sylcott’s research focuses on design theory and methodology, using a combination stated preference and physiological response data from human subjects to positively affect design outcomes.

Authors:

Jonathan Echerd East Carolina University
Brian Sylcott East Carolina University
Russell Lemken East Carolina University
Gerald Weckesser East Carolina University
Jinkun Lee East Carolina University