UPREN USED – User, product and environmental influences on usability and emotional product design

这份研究方案描述了先前项目的计划延续。在这个研究项目的第一阶段，开发了一种方法来获得关于生理和基于态度的用户需求的有形产品设计建议。由于可用性和情感化产品设计之间存在不平衡，需要一种结构良好和客观的方法来确保主观上用户友好的产品设计，同时又具有物理上合适的产品设计。尤其是面向残疾用户的产品往往只关注产品的可用性，而没有考虑到用户的主观需求。因此，可能会出现与产品相关的负面用户污名，导致拒绝或不使用该产品。应对失衡的一个根本挑战是它们所包含的相互冲突的目标。例如，虽然智能手机的轻薄设计会让人联想到优雅，但更坚固、更厚的外壳会更有利于易用性。为了确保愉快的用户体验，产品开发人员必须在这种冲突的情况下做出以用户为导向的决定。这需要可靠的知识，从用户的角度来看，情感设计或可用设计是否被认为更重要，从而允许专注于更重要的方面。在这项研究项目中，将彻底调查外部影响(如用户、情境)对可用性和情绪性权重的影响，以促进在双重用户集成这一紧张领域中相互冲突的设计决策，并进一步促进技术产品开发和用户体验的相互关联。因此，将开发一种方法，将特定的用户、产品和环境特征作为外部影响因素来考虑可用性和情感化产品设计的权重，从而首先在理论层面上以结构化的方式识别相关影响因素。下面对它们进行定量的实证研究，以便从根本上探索和建模个体因素在可用性和情感化产品设计之间的关系上的强度和/或重要性。新获得的知识最终为开发预期的方法提供了基础。然后将从第一阶段开始将其纳入现有方法并进行评估。

This research proposal describes the planned continuation of previous project. In phase 1 of this research project, a method to derive tangible product design recommendations regarding physiological and attitude-based user needs was developed. The need for a well-structured and objective method to ensure a subjectively user-friendly and at the same time physically suitable product design is necessary due to existing imbalances between usability and emotional product design. Especially products for disabled users often focus on a product’s usability without taking the subjective needs of the users into account. As a result, there can be negative product-related user stigmatisation leading to rejection or non-use of the product. One fundamental challenge in dealing with imbalances are the conflicting goals they contain. While a thin and slim design of a smartphone would associate elegance, for instance, a more robust and thicker housing would be more beneficial for ist usability. To ensure a pleasant user experience, product developers have to make a user-oriented decision in such conflictual situations. This requires reliable knowledge about whether an emotional or usable design is perceived as more important from the user's perspective, allowing to focus on the more important aspect. In this research project, the impact of external influences (e.g. user, situation) on the weighting of usability and emotionality will be thoroughly investigated in order to facilitate conflicting design decisions in the tense field of dual user integration and to further advance the interlocking of technical product development and user experience. Therefore, a method will be developed to consider specific user, product and environmental characteristics as external influencing factors on the weighting of usability and emotional product design, whereby relevant influencing factors will first be identified in a structured manner on a theoretical level. A quantitative empirical study of them follows in order to fundamentally explore and model the strength and/or significance of individual factors on the relationship between usability and emotional product design. The newly acquired knowledge ultimately provides the basis for developing the intended method. It will then be integrated into the existing approach from phase 1 as well as evaluated.