An Affective Study of Design Style in Taiwanese Hakka Cultural Products

In recent years Hakka cultural and creative industries have arisen in both Taiwan and China. To promote these industries, research targeting Hakka cultural style by exploring public perception of the Hakka visual style can enable understanding of the meaning of Hakka aesthetics that previous quantitative Hakka studies have rarely explored. The purpose of this study is thus to research the Hakka cultural style to create a reference for Taiwan’s future development of the Hakka cultural industry. This study adopted the Affective/Kansei engineering approach as its principal tool for exploring public perception of the Hakka product design style, to identify important design characteristics affecting public perception of Hakka style. Based on the analysis results targeting the affective responses of 72 respondents towards Hakka-style commodities, this study shows that the
three key factors affecting affective judgment are color factor, personalization factor, and fun factor. Insight into the public’s affective responses toward the Hakka style at present and the characteristics and design approach of the Hakka visual style is conducive to the development of a Hakka cultural design database, which is important for the future development of the Hakka cultural style and creative design.