Abstract
Users often perceive product functionality form sensory information provided by a product. Product sound works as one of such sensory information. For long years, Product designers have aimed to make product sound silent because it has been regarded as a noise. The problem is that the silent product sound does not provide users perception of functionality. In other words, the silent product sound may decrease perceived value of a product in a situation. This paper proposes a framework to design a product sound that enables users to perceive certain functionality without evoking unpleasant emotion. The framework assumes a heretical structure containing multiple layers such as value in a context of use, perceived functionality, structural sound feature of a product structure and sound parameters. Based on the framework, the authors propose a method to extract sound features and parameters affecting perceived functionality without unpleasant emotion. The authors demonstrate the effectiveness of the framework and the method using a vacuum cleaner sound as an application.
