Clothing & HF/E

Abstract

Wearable technologies provide many opportunities for HF/E and have applications in a variety of contexts, particularly in consumer products. These devices must be safe and easy to use as they become increasingly complex in functionality. However, because these products are worn, they must meet the needs of clothing. HF/E has researched the safety and comfort needs of clothing, but these needs do not address the entire clothing experience. This is surprising as clothing serves as an ideal test-bed for a number of emerging issues in product design (e.g., research in designers’ expertise). Furthermore, hedonomic (Hancock, 2005) and eudaimonic (Szalma, 2014) design principles can provide an understanding of how to design pleasurable clothing experiences and the motivation behind people’s clothing decisions. In this paper, we will review what HF/E has contributed to clothing design, describe the clothing experience through a hedonomic and eudaimonic lens, present relevant non-HF/E clothing research, and suggest future research directions.