From Usability to Pleasure: A Case Study of Difference in Users’ Preference

For past decades, research of designing “pleasure” into products in the academic community has produced a multitude of evaluation models and frameworks. These models address the critical issues of pleasurable product design leading to emotional design. This study is intended to explore the change from the need of “usability” for the product design to the need of “pleasure” for the user experience. The questionnaires were used to obtain data from 343 subjects. The four keyboard designs were adopted in the experiment to study the difference and the change from “usability” to “pleasure” of users” preference. The results show that the need for pleasure is higher than usability, as well as attractive things also transmit the feel of work better. Besides, preference is related to gender, age, major, and educational background. Results presented herein provide designers with a valuable reference for examining the way how to design “pleasure” into product and the interactive experience of users in the design process.