A Morphological Design Approach to User-Efficient Design

The behaviour of users can have a negative impact on the energy efficiency of products. By using products unnecessarily or inefficiently even a product which has been designed and built with highly efficient technology or materials will still waste energy. This paper follows the work of the authors to develop a user-efficient design methodology which will allow designers and engineers to create products that will reduce or prevent this "inefficiency" of users. The results from a design exercise to create a user-efficient design for a refrigerator are examined, together with the observed behaviours from a user trial. The conclusions from the study have led to the proposed morphological design approach that tackles the energy losses related to use but also addresses the underlying needs of the user.