Applying Kansei Engineering to Decision Making in Fragrance Form Design

The decision making process is usually vague and hard to describe clearly, which is regarded as something of a black box. It is essential for companies or manufacturers to comprehend the consumer’s thinking or feeling. In order to help product designer best meet the consumer’s specific feeling and expectation, we conduct an experimental study on fragrances using the Kansei Engineering approach and the Quantification Theory Type I analysis. The result of the experimental analysis shows that the quantitative models and design support information can be used to find out the optimal combination of product form elements in terms of a set of given product images. This approach provides an effective mechanism for facilitating the new product design process, and can be applied to other consumer products with various design elements and product images.