Engineered sound quality: coupled subjective reactions to engineering choices

Product planners and designers are not comfortable with sound as an issue. Sound represents a complex set of attributes, both aesthetic and functional. Sound may enhance or detract from pleasure in possessing and using the product and may also indicate how well a product is working. The approach we used in dealing with the issues combines product sound analysis (a noise audit) with jury testing of a virtual array of product designs. This process was called ´engineered sound quality´ and provides specific design goals for the sound of a product in terms that product planners can specify and engineers can deal with. Engineered sound quality has been used in setting design goals for several appliance products. The experiences with the process are discussed