Affiliations: Department of Industrial Design, National Cheng Kung
University, Tainan, Taiwan, R.O.C. | Department of Arts and Design, National Dong Hwa
University, Hualien County, Taiwan, R.O.C.
Abstract: Consumers' demands for a product are always changing and vague;
even consumers themselves are not aware of this. How to elicit consumers'
demands and transform them as a reference to design development is a critical
issue. Empathic design is a new market research technique that aims to meet the
needs of consumers through analysis of detailed observations. However, it takes
considerable time and experience to implement the empathic design. Therefore,
the purpose of this study is to create a Systematic Empathic Design Method
(SEDM) based on Participant Observation, Laddering Interviews, an Implication
Matrix, Hierarchical Value Maps and Mind Mapping, in order to develop
customer-centered products. Through the exemplary application "workshop area
design", the authors developed a work environment that can provide employees
with more professional, thorough, and considerate services. Consequently, SEDM
is both feasible and practical. It effectively enables designers and consumers
to reach a common ground in product needs. In addition, each step of SEDM can
be executed clearly and is closely connected to the next step, and this can
shorten the design time. SEDM uses visual data for product innovation and
improvement, and it provides a technique that can be followed by firms and
designers to effectively forecast the trends of consumers' needs.
