Addressing user needs and preferences is critically important in developing innovative and successful engineered products and systems. The task is inherently challenging due to the heterogeneity of user needs and the difficulty of modeling human behavior and preferences. In addition, it remains a challenge to integrate user preferences with technical and economic requirements during the engineering design process. The past decade has seen a significant growth in user-focused design research that introduces principles from different domains, such as market research, economics, cognitive science, and social science. However, there is still a lack of integration of these methods, either qualitative or quantitative, for directly supporting engineering design decisions. It is therefore imperative to develop interdisciplinary design approaches to address “interface” issues among different domains and engineering design, considering market demand, usage context, social behavior, environmental impact assessments, and other factors.
With this in mind, we organized this special issue to gather...
