In product design field, metaphors are frequently used as an important and effective tool for communicating the meaning of a product and achieving cognitive and emotive effects in users. Designers create metaphors by taking an attribute(s) from one entity and transferring it to the product they design. However, we do not have the sufficient knowledge about how this process works exactly, and what makes a product metaphor better than the others.

In my PhD research, I mainly focus on the “generation” of product metaphors and aim to understand, (a) the specifics of the process that the designers go through when creating metaphors, and (b) the factors/decisions that lead to successful metaphors. To achieve these aims, I conduct workshops and experiments with the designers and try to bridge the gap between the linguistics domain and the design practice. At the end of my PhD, I hope to provide insights to designers about how to design successful (i.e. comprehensible, aesthetic, pleasurable, and so on) product metaphors.

Promoter: Paul Hekkert / Supervisor: Valentijn Visch