Usability Research Method In Industrial Design

From long time practice and cooperation with foreign companies and design studios, our industrial design improves over time. Before design is more about decoration, but now we want to create something to make new experience for users. Maybe only a small number of companies know that and it is not the main design idea in China. Undeniably, users have higher and higher requirements for products. Designer have to understand the user's real needs. Using usability research to find the potential needs is a very available method. Our industrial design progresses very fast in such a short time. We can get plenty of information and knowledge, meanwhile we have more and more opportunities to learn from advanced experience.Chinese companies start to look for new way to create unique design of their own, so it is very of usability research for innovation. For my opinion, we should create functional form to avoid decoration. In the other hand, form can show the technology inside. It is very important for Local companies making the users feel the technology because it is very helpful for sale.In practical projects, usability research of product design is more about 3 directin below: I.User research. Foreign companies think it is very important to know the users. We should describe the user profile, familiar with their preferences before we design the products. 2. Environment research. A lot of products design should consider about the relationship with environment. Meanwhile we can get some new ideas from architecture and interior design. 3. Interface. Interface is a very important design element to create new ideas.Base on our experience of usability research, we could draw a conclusion of research methods to fit current situation. Consider about the limitation in China, our research might only a very beginning. But, we also believe usability research could be a rational theory supporting emotional design. Usually, our research is consist of 4 steps: discover problems, analysis and solve the problems...