Aesthetic intelligence - optimizing user-centred design

This paper discusses the concept of 'aesthetic intelligence' which acknowledges that we possess an innate, sometimes subconscious, ability to perceive a wide range of qualities in products that shape our responses to them. It argues that these qualities can be purposefully discussed and attempts to provide, for engineering designers, a way of structuring the complex field of aesthetic response. The author links sensorial qualities to cultural values and proposes a process of designing for the senses as a means to providing products with which customers can feel a greater degree of empathy.