The Relationship between Operating Tactile Sensations and Onomatopoeic Expressions of Rotary Switches

Abstract

To apply onomatopoeia to product design, we investigated the relationship between the sound symbolism of onomatopoeia and physical quantities. The target of evaluation was the operating tactile sensation of rotary switches. First, a subjective evaluation experiment was conducted in which participants were asked to provide free answers using onomatopoeic expressions related to their impressions of the operating tactile sensation. The obtained onomatopoeia was analyzed by quantitative text analysis using mora as the unit of analysis, and it was found that the phonemes of onomatopoeia used by the participants differed depending on the magnitude of the click torque of switches. Next, we examined the impressions of the onomatopoeia when the click torque of the rotary switch was sequentially changed via 7-point scale evaluation experiments. As a result, the correspondence between tactile sensation and onomatopoeia was grasped quantitatively. This paper shows that onomatopoeia can be used for quantitative product design.