JUDGING THE ATTRACTIVENESS OF PRODUCT DESIGN - THE EFFECT OF VISUAL ATTRIBUTES AND CONSUMER CHARACTERISTICS

The objective of this study was to explore aesthetic aspects of product design. Judgments of the attractiveness of men's tailored clothing were analyzed focusing on the effects of visual attributes and consumer characteristics. An individual-subject analysis of variance, based on a conjoint model with interactions, showed that consumers' judgments were affected by visual attributes and configurations of visual attributes. Consistent with aesthetic theory, the most important main effect was one dimension of silhouette-jacket length The most important interaction effect was between jacket width and jacket pattern Judgments of attractiveness differed by age, with older consumers evaluating visual attributes differently from younger consumers.