Emotional Engineering Volume 4

We, engineers, have been devoting tremendous efforts to achieve high-quality functions. But our primary focus has been on an individual product. Yesterday, changes were small and smooth so that they were predictable. We could foresee the operating conditions so that we could develop functions that worked well. But today, changes take place so frequently and extensively. The difference between the changes of yesterday and today is their differentiability. Today’s changes are sharp and angular so they are not differentiable. Thus, we cannot make predictions. As the outer world changes unpredictably, we have to proceed by trial and error. Thus, not only goals (products) are important, but how we can get to the goal, i.e., processes become increasingly important. Further, as products are used no more by themselves alone and their operating conditions are getting more and more networked, performance does not mean just functions of a final product anymore. We have to consider it through their product life cycle, i.e., life cycle of a group of products connected in operation. This chapter points out what an important role emotion plays in today connected world.

Up to now, we have been discussing performance, focusing our attention on an individual product or a product family at the utmost. But now as Internet of Things, Cyber-Physical Systems, Industrie 4.0, etc., are spreading very quickly, and products are getting more and more connected. So, we have to widen our view and consider products as a society and how each product can contribute to the society and what role it should play. This calls for a new perspective. We have to remember that connecting best performing products does not bring best performing society. We have to assign an appropriate role to each product and to make it serve its function for the society. In short, we need to orchestrate our products to achieve best performance as a team. To achieve this goal, emotion plays an important role, since performance is not just functions, but it means how much emotional satisfaction a product or a team of products provides to our customers. Thus, performance is quickly moving from functional performance to emotional performance, and again, it is no more that of an individual product, but that of a team of products or a product society.

Enjoyment is one of the positive emotions we expect to have when visiting environments that have been designed to provide us with entertainment experiences. However, enjoyment is also part of our daily life, whether we are at home, in our office environment, in public environments, or on the move from one environment to the other. Humor is important in our daily experiences. We ourselves and our daily conversational partners are expected to have a sense of humor. We cannot maintain friendly relationships with family members, friends, and colleagues without having this sense of humor. Humor is one of the most appreciated traits in human–human interaction. In this chapter, we investigate the possible role of humor in smart environments or, from an opposite perspective, how smart digital technology, its sensors, and actuators can help to introduce humorous situations and interactions in digitally enhanced physical worlds. With these words in mind, we discuss accidental, spontaneous, scripted, and staged humor. We will also draw upon humor as it appears nowadays in artificial physical environments, such as video game environments. Conclusions will be drawn about being able to include humorous interactions and about being able to participate in humorous activities in smart technology-supported environments and events.

We engineers are trying to let human’s life wealthier. Because a person will be able to carry out a more intellectual activity, it will be necessary to relieve the human of complicated work. The engineering have been developing for relaxing people as one subject until now. However, to be able to do something easily may take pleasure and a motivation from them. The system has to understand the relationship between the user and the system and the situation to motivate the person, and it is necessary to have the function that can change its service for adaptation to circumstances. In this chapter, an idea is demonstrated to design the system to achieve the motivation of the person.

Aesthetic of prosthesis design is a field of research investigating the visual aspect of the devices as a factor connected to the emotional impact in prosthetic users. In this chapter, we present a revised concept of perception and use of prosthetic devices by offering a view of ‘creative product’ rather than ‘medical device’ only. Robotic-looking devices are proposed as a way of promoting a new and fresh perception of amputation and prosthetics, where ‘traditional’ uncovered or realistic devices are claimed not to respond with efficacy to the aesthetic requirements of a creative product. We aim to promote a vision for a change in the understanding of amputation—and disability in general—by transforming the concept of disability to super-ability and to propose the use of attractive-looking prosthetic forms for promoting this process.

Nowadays, product design for the global market has to meet the needs and demands of more than a single group of users. Besides the required functionality, the emotional value of the product also plays an important role in user satisfaction. One of the aspects that an interdisciplinary design team should consider while developing a new product is the users’ cross-cultural differences in emotional responses toward product elements. The objective of this study was to use the adjusted Kansei engineering methodology, named the Kansei cross-culture (KCUL) model, in order to discover the differences or similarities in emotional responses toward shapes and colors of diverse groups of participants. This study demonstrates this methodology on two groups of students, one from Central Europe and the other from South Asia (India). We presumed that the observed participants will have different associations toward certain shape and color samples, as well as that they will differ in the intensity of responses. The data were collected through Semantic differential questionnaires and the five-level Likert scale. The survey results were then analyzed using the Factor analysis, the Independent t-test, and the Linear mixed models.

The aim of this chapter is to present a first understanding of the Kansei design approach and how it can be bridged within an industrial context. It proposes a theoretical point of view of our division build on researches still conducted to link Kansei philosophy and user experience in a first time and then to understand how an interaction can impact the full user experience. Furthermore, the automotive context of these researches leads us to develop and use several methodologies and tools that are presented in this chapter. We develop them in order to increase what users live with their products from an early design point of view, beyond the product itself.

The present paper describes a multisensory virtual reality (VR) system built for the exploration of the bodily ultra-reality. First, we introduce a new term ‘ultra-reality’ which was advocated by a government committee to explore future media technology in Japan. The ultra-reality has been recognized from both the aspects of the super-reality and the meta-reality. The author proposed a hypothesis that the ultra-reality has its base on the VR (the second reality), and it is embodied as rational and emotional entity built on pieces of rendered reality. The ultra-reality is the third reality grasped at the cognitive level rather than perception level. The author placed the forth reality hypothesis where the self-body is virtualized by projecting information backward from the body input to the brain. The dynamic virtual body illusion is the objective of the research to create in which the self-body makes a part of VR media to duplicate experience of other person. We consider that multisensory presentation plays a principal role for this bodily ultra-reality. To provide a framework for realization of the ultra-reality, we introduced exhibit prototypes of the multisensory presentation system. The five senses theater system, the FiveStar, provides multisensory stimulations to the user for the creation of ultra-realistic experiences. The contents of the exhibits were the mixed reality bodily experience, the interaction with CG creature, and the virtual first-person trip to the tourist sites. The multisensory display devices that were used to create the bodily ultra-reality were described to show the method and characteristics of this hypothesis.

We propose a model for generating high-level cognitions, especially emotions and decisions. The development of virtual reality (VR) technologies has made it possible to re-create multi-sensory experiences with high accuracy and resolution. Many studies have tried to reproduce not only the environment but also the psychological experience, such as emotion and decision with VR technology. However, VR has not yet been realized to generate the absolute subjective experience because the influence of the environment on the human mind in the human information process has barely been discussed. On the other hand, in psychology or cognitive science, many studies have shown that the psychological state and self-body image interact mutually. The “body image,” which is the representation of one’s body recognized in the brain, is formed based on the perception of self-body (self-perception) through multi-sensory integration received from the environment and one’s body. Given this, appropriately providing artificial sensory stimuli seems capable of generating emotions and decisions in light of the influence of the environment on self-perception. Based on these findings, we propose a methodology “self-perception-based VR” for making emotions and decisions by affecting self-perception. The current paper discusses and offers a guide for “self-perception based VR.”

Maternal love, which may be the core of maternal behavior, is essential for the mother–infant attachment relationship and is important for an infant’s development and mental health. Therefore, maternal love can be considered a vital human emotion. Using video clips, we examined patterns of maternal brain activation in response to infant cues. We performed functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) measurements while 13 mothers viewed video clips of their own infants and other infants (all approximately 16 months of age) who demonstrated two different attachment behaviors. We found that a limited number of the mother’s brain areas were specifically involved in maternal love, namely orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), striatum, anterior insula, and periaqueductal gray (PAG). Then, we proposed a schematic model of maternal love, based on integration of the two systems in the OFC: the dopamine reward system (OFC, striatum) and the interoceptive information processing system (OFC, insula, PAG). Additionally, we found a strong and specific brain response in a mother viewing her distressed infant. The neural activation pattern was found in the dorsal OFC (dOFC), the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (VLPFC), dorsomedial prefrontal cortex (DMPFC), dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC), posterior cingulate cortex (PCC), caudate nucleus, supplementary motor area (SMA), and posterior superior temporal sulcus/temporoparietal junction (pSTS/TPJ). These results showed a highly elaborate neural mechanism, based on the above neural basis of maternal love, mediating the diverse and complex maternal behaviors that mothers engage in when raising and protecting their own infants.

A discrepancy between prior expectation and posterior experience evokes emotions, such as surprise, satisfaction, and disappointment, affecting the perceived product and service value. Furthermore, expectation affects perceived experience. This psychological phenomenon, called the expectation effect, is a key to designing the affective experience of a product and a service. Experimental findings of this effect exist in a variety of disciplines. In this chapter, the author presents computational models of the expectation effect using information theory and neural coding principles. These models estimate its occurrence conditions, its intensity, and two patterns of the expectation effect, i.e., contrast and assimilation. The author discusses an essential mechanism of human perceptions involving prior expectations based on simulation results of the models.

To adapt to rapid social changes in modern society, new communication forms and methods must be made with regard not only to logic but also to emotion. In particular in the design field, in which emotions and sensitivity enhance the impression of the intended recipients, designers are beginning to evoke the power of “emptiness,” which attracts attention and stirs the imagination. In Japanese society, “emptiness” is known as the concept of ma. Ma has had a lasting significance in Japanese society. However, this concept remains difficult to grasp, and consequently, it is not used efficiently in communication. Therefore, to promote the active use of ma, the methods for understanding the diverse uses of ma merit analysis. This study develops an analytical method to approach ma, which is hoped to engender a stronger grasp of the type, scope, and way of using ma in certain circumstances. Using this method, this research analyzed ma used in non-language vocal storytelling in US and Japan TED videos as a type of communication. The results reveal differences in the uses of ma and related trends with respect to storytelling.