Effect of Visual Design on the Evaluation of Technology- vs. Design-Based Novel Interactive Products

Abstract Novel product evaluations are challenging in that they occur under pre-use conditions in which users cannot rely on their past experiences with the product to determine its quality. The reported study explores the effects of innovation type and design simplicity level on novel interactive product evaluations. The results show that the type of innovation interacts with the visual simplicity level and affects one’s judgment about a product’s instrumental attributes, namely, its ease of use and functionality. While technology-based novel products are judged to be more innovative and more creative compared to design-based novel products when the designs are relatively simple, this trend shifts for complex designs where there is no significant difference between judgments of the two types of products. Finally, while innovativeness is a salient predictor for preference variance regardless of innovation type and design visual simplicity level, creativity is a predictor for preference variance of design-based innovation, when the design is relatively simple.