Product emotional design method based on image metaphor: a technical note

Similar to product design of function and quality, product emotional appeal becomes a more and more important factor influencing consumer purchases. This paper proposes a two-step method for product emotional elements reasoning based on image metaphor. It aims to solve the depth deficits and boundary constraints of traditional methods. Firstly, based on image metaphor and guided interview, the emotional needs of consumers for products are initially extracted. Secondly, tacit emotional needs are transformed into explicit design elements by using a three-level image metaphor decoding method of symbolic-index-perceptual. The effectiveness of the proposed method is implemented and verified by taking the emotional design of electric vehicle as an example. The results could be a reference for electric vehicle development. The findings suggest that image metaphor could be one of the ideal ways to reduce the deviation between designers’ goals and users’ emotional needs, and the proposed method can provide more innovative support for designers and engineers.Highlights The concept of image metaphor is introduced into the field of product emotion design, and a cross-domain mapping method of emotional needs based on image metaphor is proposed. This method can describe consumers’ emotional needs easily and provide the possibility to mine extra-domain elements.A three-level emotional needs decoding method based on image metaphor is proposed, which can convert users’ implicit emotional needs into explicit product design elements.The feasibility of the proposed method is verified by a case study of emotional design of electric vehicle.The findings suggest that image metaphor can solve some depth deficits and boundary constraints of traditional methods in emotional design, so as to provide more innovative support for product designers and engineers.