The Influence of User Experience and Emotional Design on the Acceptance of Engineering and Industrial Products: A Psychological Perspective
Author : Malini Nandi Majumdar
Abstract :
The acceptance of engineering and industrial products has conventionally been explained through cognitive appraisals of usefulness and ease of use, whereas the emotional response that a product evokes has been treated as secondary. The present study examines whether the affective component of user experience contributes to product acceptance beyond these utilitarian beliefs and whether it also shapes the utilitarian beliefs themselves. A meta-analytic path analysis was conducted on open-access evidence identified through a systematic search of a large biomedical and life-science literature database. From 3,993 records, 19 independent samples comprising 7,326 users of engineered products were retained, including electric and autonomous vehicles, wearable devices, smart child restraints, electric scooters, medical syringes and wood-plastic composite products. Correlations among affective response, perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness and behavioural intention were pooled through random-effects models and submitted to a path model with Monte Carlo confidence intervals. Affective response showed the strongest pooled association with intention (r = 0.63), followed by usefulness (r = 0.59) and ease of use (r = 0.51). In the path model, affective response remained the strongest direct predictor of intention (β = 0.37) when usefulness (β = 0.29) and ease of use (β = 0.15) were controlled, and it added eight percentage points of explained variance beyond the two cognitive beliefs. Affective response was also associated with perceived ease of use (β = 0.53) and perceived usefulness (β = 0.44), yielding an indirect association with intention of 0.25. The pattern was stable across product categories and in leave-one-out analyses, although heterogeneity was substantial. The findings suggest that emotional design functions not as decoration but as a psychological determinant of acceptance that also colours how usable and useful a product is judged to be.
Keywords :
Emotional design, user experience, technology acceptance, affective response, product design, engineering products, meta-analytic path analysis.
