Measuring consumer perceptions for a better comprehension, specification and assessment of product semantics

Abstract

Relevance to industry The integrated framework proposed in this paper can be readily deployed in companies and used at different stages of the design of products. Firstly,our methodology provides a frame for describing how a given products family is perceived by users,and for storing and up-dating these data. Secondly, the data can be used to specify target requirements for a new product by qualitative comparisons to existing products. Finally,emerging product concepts may be directly assessed with regards to the requirements in a simple qualitative and comparative way.International audienceProduct semantics,the ''study of the symbolic qualities of man-made forms in the context of their use and application of this knowledge to industrial design'' is an important challenge in product design. Because of subjectivity, this particular dimension of the user's need is difficult to express,to quantify and to assess. This paper presents a general approach to assess product semantics in a sound way. It is based on usability tests,and involves several classical methods in marketing and decision-making theory,as multidimensional scaling,semantic differential method,factor analysis,pairwise comparison and analytical hierarchy process. As a result, our integrated approach provides designers with a tool which helps understand and specify the semantic part of the need; it rates and ranks the new product prototypes according to their closeness to the specified ''ideal product'',and it underlines the particular semantic dimensions that should be improved. To illustrate our approach,we have performed usability tests and applied our methodology to the design of table glasses. For the sake of clarity,each stage of the methodology is presented in detail on this particular example

Erratum

“…Therefore, it is more reasonable to consider the colour harmony as a relative comparison in a reference harmony distribution, rather than an absolute measurement. In the last few years, several articles have been devoted to study the colour harmony, including product design, vision design, and interior design, [8][9][10][11] but only few attempts have so far been made at ranking colour harmonies.…”

“…In the last few years, though several articles have been proposed on the study of the psychological preference of people reflecting on products, including their colours, [3][4][5][6][7] aesthetics, [8][9][10][11][12][13] and shapes, 14 the effect of one's physiological characteristic on the evaluated psychological preference was seldom taken into consideration. To overcome this shortcoming, the element of physiological characteristic is considered in this study such that the result is helpful for applying to product design for customization and personalization.…”

“…The psychological preference was quantified with image words based on Kansei engineering theory 15,16 and fuzzy set theory. 17,18 And the physiological characteristic was collected from skin colours of customers with face detection theory.…”

Application of Interactive Genetic Algorithm based on hesitancy degree in product configuration for customer requirement

“…With the rapid development of the market economy, many companies have begun to focus on their ability to quickly respond to customer demands and to design customer-oriented products [1][2][3] . Market competition requires product designers and manufacturers to pay increasing attention to their customers' personalized requirements.…”

Estrategia para la mejora de la gestión de la información ambiental de los productos de consumo. El ecoetiquetado como nexo entre consumidor, empresa y administración

“…En ellos, los mapas perceptuales son usados para captar las percepciones que se tienen en cuenta, para el control y posicionamiento del producto, pero la Comparación por Pares (PC) permite cuantificar los datos subjetivos (Petiot, Yannou, 2004). …”