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Perceived Comfort of Car Seats: A Research Methodology to Visual Cues Evaluation

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Design in the Era of Industry 4.0, Volume 3 (ICORD 2023)

Part of the book series: Smart Innovation, Systems and Technologies ((SIST,volume 346))

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Abstract

“The automotive industry is transitioning toward a more digital future. Not just in the form of digitalization of the product itself but also in the process of customer interaction, e.g., during product selection. These trends facilitate advanced manufacturing processes as well as new product designs. The interaction with design also includes an online buying experience, where customers explore and purchase a car with a digital reference to a physical vehicle. Research on customers’ perception of car seat comfort is limited. To better understand customer preferences related to the perceived comfort of car seats, we applied a visual appearance study by presenting exclusively digital information for physical components. In this study, we reflect on the visual appearance of the driver seats for entry segment car market vehicles, such as Opel Corsa, Renault Clio, Toyota Aygo, Fiat 500, and Ford Fiesta. We used the Geely Haoyue driver seat as a control point because of its premium quality and execution. To fulfill the study’s objectives, we implemented a quantitative survey with 164 respondents from Germany and Sweden. According to our hypothesis, respondents should be able to understand car seat features related to comfort just by looking at them.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Chalmers University of Technology, Göteborg, Sweden

    Kostas Stylidis & Rikard Söderberg

  2. Niederrhein University of Applied Sciences, Mönchengladbach, Germany

    Bastian Quattelbaum

  3. Royal College of Art, London, UK

    Cyriel Diels

  4. Geely Design, Global Design Support, Göteborg, Sweden

    Alina Braun & Florian Konrad

Authors
  1. Kostas Stylidis
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  2. Bastian Quattelbaum
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  3. Cyriel Diels
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  4. Alina Braun
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  5. Florian Konrad
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  6. Rikard Söderberg
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Kostas Stylidis .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Product Design and Manufacturing, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India

    Amaresh Chakrabarti

  2. Centre for Product Design and Manufacturing, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, Karnataka, India

    Vishal Singh

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Stylidis, K., Quattelbaum, B., Diels, C., Braun, A., Konrad, F., Söderberg, R. (2023). Perceived Comfort of Car Seats: A Research Methodology to Visual Cues Evaluation. In: Chakrabarti, A., Singh, V. (eds) Design in the Era of Industry 4.0, Volume 3. ICORD 2023. Smart Innovation, Systems and Technologies, vol 346. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-0428-0_21

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-99-0428-0_21

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Singapore

  • Print ISBN: 978-981-99-0427-3

  • Online ISBN: 978-981-99-0428-0

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