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Looking hot or feeling hot: What determines the product experience of warmth?

Anna Fenko *, Hendrik N.J. Schifferstein, Paul HekkertDepartment of Industrial Design, Delft University of Technology, Landbergstraat 15, 2628 CE Delft, The Netherlands

a r t i c l e i n f o

Article history:Received 18 August 2009Accepted 4 September 2009Available online 15 September 2009

Keywords:Multisensory product experienceWarmthPleasantness

a b s t r a c t

Warmth is an important characteristic for clothes, home interior and some leisure related products. Weused an experimental approach to determine the relative importance of material and colour for the prod-uct experience of warmth. We designed products (scarves and breakfast trays) using warm and cold stim-uli (colours and materials) in four different combinations and asked respondents to evaluate the warmthand pleasantness of each product. The results demonstrated that both colour and material contributeequally to the judgments of warmth in both products. However, the pleasantness of a product couldnot be predicted on the basis of the pleasantness attributed to its colour and material. A follow-up inter-view study distinguished between the literal and figurative meanings of warmth. The literal meaning isrelated to physical warmth and comfort. The figurative meaning is associated with social interaction, inti-macy and friendly atmosphere. The figurative meaning was mentioned more often in association withproducts than the literal meaning.

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1.Introduction

Our perceptual experience of the world is richly multimodal.People are able to extract information derived from one sensorymodality and use it in another. People can, for example, know ashape by touch and identify it correctly by sight [1]. Furthermore,people are able to integrate the impressions generated by differentsensory modalities into a unified, rich percept [2]. When usersinteract with products, more than one sensory system is usually in-volved in this interaction. People can see the product, touch it, hearthe sound it makes and smell it. All the senses are involved simul-taneously, but their contribution to the overall experience is notnecessarily equivalent. It is interesting to know which sensorymodality plays a leading role in a particular experience, so thatdesigners may concentrate on the creation of the most relevantproduct properties.

1.1. Experiencing warmth

The aim of our research is to investigate sensory dominance inthe product experience of warmth. In a literal sense, terms such as‘‘warm” and ‘‘cold” describe thermal properties of products andthus refer to tactual perception. However, warmth is a multisen-sory product experience that may also include visual, olfactoryand, in some cases, also gustatory and auditory components. The

factors that contribute to the subjective experience of warmth willbe discussed below.

Objects made of different materials feel thermally different. Forinstance, wood generally feels warmer than metal, even thoughboth materials are at room temperature. This effect is caused bydifferences in the thermal properties of these materials. An objectfeels cold if it extracts warmth from the skin. To produce this sen-sation, the object does not only need to have a temperature belowbody temperature, it also has to extract warmth at a fast rate: thematerial needs to have low temperature resistance. Examples ofsuch materials are glass and metal [3]. Materials with high temper-ature resistance, such as wood or plastics, generally feel ‘warm’even if their temperature is below body temperature. When thematerial is hotter than the observer’s hand, the subjective coldnessis reversed. For example, a copper sample that felt colder than awood sample at room temperature, will feel warmer than the samewood sample when both are felt at a high temperature.

The perceived warmth depends on the thermal conductivityand heat capacity of the material and on the object’s geometry.High thermal conductivity allows heat extracted from the fingerto spread quickly to other parts of the object, thus enabling the ob-ject to extract heat from the finger faster. A high heat capacitymeans that the object does not warm up very much from outsideheat, which enables it to continue extracting heat from the finger.The geometry of the object also plays an important role: a thick barcan conduct heat away from the finger more easily than a thin foil[4].

But the product experience of warmth goes beyond the percep-tion of thermal properties and is, therefore, not necessarily

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* Corresponding author. Tel.: +31 15 278 2879; fax: +31 15 278 7179.E-mail address: A.B.Fenko@tudelft.nl (A. Fenko).

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restricted to material properties. For instance, certain colours areexperienced as warm and others as cool [5–7]. Although thereare some inconsistencies and ambiguities, most psychological re-search has supported the conclusion that red and yellow are per-ceived as warmer than green and blue. For example, Lewinski [8]and Ross [7] found that projected red colours were rated warmerthan blue ones, and Tinker [9] and Newhall [10] found that surfacereds were consistently described as warmer than surface blues.Wright [11] and Wright and Rainwater [12] demonstrated thatthere is a well-defined effect of hue on judgments of the apparentwarmth of coloured squares, independent of brightness and satu-ration. They also demonstrated that darker and more saturated col-ours tended to be viewed as warmer.

It is still not clear if these associations are innate or if they areacquired through experience. Morgan et al. [13] explored age dif-ferences in the associations of temperatures with specific colours.Their results demonstrated the relatively late development (be-tween the ages of 6 and 12) and the fragile nature of the conven-tional associations between temperature and colour. The authorsargue that these associations are based on cultural norms, whichare learned only gradually during later childhood and adolescenceand are far from universal, even in college-age subjects. But moreresearch is needed to test this hypothesis.

Another interesting question is whether temperature associa-tions with colour exist only for abstract colour samples (paperchips) or can also be found in real products. In a colour-meaningstudy that used five objects painted in six different colours [14],consistent colour effects were found for warmth, e.g. all objectsappearing in red were consistently rated as warmer than those inother colours. Taft [15] compared semantic ratings of colour chipswith those of the same colours applied to a variety of familiar ob-jects. He reported that colours were rated nearly the same on thewarm-cold scale despite context differences, although the colourchips were rated as slightly warmer than the objects of the samecolour.

There is also evidence that colour can induce thermal sensa-tions. Michael and Roihion [16] asked subjects to sniff a bottle con-taining distilled water mixed with odourless yellow, green or redcolouring and one colourless solution. Participants reported feelinga cool sensation in their nasal cavity when they sniffed the greensolution and a warm sensation when they sniffed the red solution.

According to people’s self-reports, they find touch more impor-tant than vision for judging warmth. In a questionnaire study [17]respondents assessed the relative importance of five sensorymodalities for 34 product experiences. The dominant modalityfor the warm experience was touch (mean rating 4.6 out of 5), fol-lowed by vision (3.3) and taste (2.6).

In reporting their sensory experience people can use the terms‘‘warm” and ‘‘cold” either in a literal or in a figurative sense. Onlythe tactile component of warmth refers to its literal meaning. Theexperience of warm colours may be induced by associations withhot and cool elements (such as fire and water). Warmth in a figura-tive sense may also be associated with affection and tenderness,comfort and cosiness, sexuality, anger, and so on. Sensory terms thatdescribe physical properties of things also describe psychologicalqualities in different languages [18]. For example, the morphemefor ‘hot’ stands for rage or wrath (Hebrew), enthusiasm (Chinese,Malayalam), sexual arousal (Thai), worry (Thai), energy (Hausa, amember of the Sudanese family), or nervousness (Shilha, a Berberlanguage). In spite of the differences between languages, all psycho-logical meanings of ‘‘hot” refer to heightened activity, increased en-ergy and emotional arousal. In contrast, the morpheme for ‘cold’stands for self-possession (Hebrew), indifference or hostility (Chi-nese), loneliness (Thai), laziness or apathy (Hausa) [18, p. 33].

Asch [19] believed that when we describe psychological eventsin the same way as the physical aspects of things, we are referring

to functional properties they share. Contemporary cognitive lin-guists also believe that people conceptualize their psychologicalexperiences by analogy to the physical world [20]. According tothe theory of embodied cognition [21], mental metaphors, suchas positive is up, negative is down, become established as peopleimplicitly learn associations between physical experiences andemotional states that typically co-occur (people spontaneously as-sume upright body postures when they are feeling good). Embodi-ment theorists point out that objects and events that produce thesame quality of affective response are categorized together inmemory [22]. Therefore, the feelings of warmth when one drinksa hot coffee or takes a warm bath might activate memories of otherfeelings associated with warmth (trust and comfort).

1.2. Sensory dominance

Previous studies have shown that people generally tend to con-sider vision as more important for product experience than othersensory modalities. For example, Schifferstein and Cleiren [23]demonstrated that consumers acquired most of the informationon products by vision and touch: this information was most de-tailed and the subjects were surest of their judgments. The exper-iment also showed that products were harder to identify by soundor smell than by vision or touch. A questionnaire study in whichparticipants reported the importance of the sensory modalitiesduring the usage of 45 different products [24] demonstrated thaton average the relative importance sequence of sensory modalitiesis vision, followed by touch, smell, audition and taste. In addition,when people were asked to rate how important they found the dif-ferent modalities in their lives in general, most of them selected vi-sion as the most important modality.

However, the importance ratings for the sensory modalities dif-fered greatly between products. For about half of the 45 products,the importance of vision was lower than for other modalities. Forexample, audition is the most important modality for a washingmachine and a coffee maker, which can be explained by the roleof the sound in signalling the different stages of the process ofwashing or making coffee. Touch is most important for a computermouse and a pen, and probably for any other hand tools as well.Smell plays a dominant role for a deodorant and (together withtaste) for food products. Furthermore, it has been demonstratedthat the dominant modality depends on the period of productusage. At the moment of buying, vision is the most importantmodality, but at later stages other modalities become more impor-tant [25].

Several hypotheses have been proposed to explain why specificsensory modalities dominate in different situations. The modalityappropriateness hypothesis [26] claims that dominance of a partic-ular modality depends on its appropriateness for a particular task.For example, vision is more appropriate for spatial perception,audition is more appropriate for the detection of temporal events[27], while touch is best suited for tasks that relate to the materialproperties of objects [28].

Another explanation for modality dominance points to mecha-nisms of selective attention. This hypothesis suggests that themodality that receives the observers’ directed attention becomesdominant [29]. Researchers have shown that people can con-sciously direct their selective attention to a particular sense [30].Attending to one sensory modality can facilitate the perceptionof stimuli in that modality relative to when attention is divertedto another sensory modality. Spence et al. [30] found that the costsassociated with shifting attention toward touch from either visionor audition were larger than the costs associated with shiftingattention in the opposite direction. These results suggest thattouch is, in a sense, ‘sticky’: once our attention has been directedto what we are feeling, we find it harder to shift our attention

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toward another modality. Spence et al. [30] argued that this mayoccur because it takes people longer to shift attention betweeninternal (touch) and external (vision, audition) perspectives.

1.3. Present study

People’s perception of the attributes of a product in a given sen-sory modality is frequently affected by the sensations that aresimultaneously being perceived by another modality. Consumersare typically completely unaware of the occurrence (or nature) ofthese crossmodal effects [31]. Thus, introspective consumer re-ports often fail to provide accurate insight into the relative impor-tance of sensory modalities. Therefore, experimental research onindividual cases of multisensory perception is necessary in orderto determine the sensory dominance in product usage situations.

In the present study we used an experimental approach todetermine the degree of sensory dominance in product experience.We manipulated product’s sensory properties of two modalities(vision and touch) to determine what was more important forexperiencing a product as warm: its tactual properties (such asmaterial, fabric and texture) or its visual properties (such as col-our). In the pre-study we created a basis for multisensory compar-ison by asking respondents to assess the warmth of varioussensory stimuli on a 10-point scale. We assumed that a specific‘warmth’ rating of a visual stimulus is equivalent to the same tac-tual ‘warmth’ rating of a material measured with the same scale.

In the main study we created products using warm and coldstimuli of both modalities in four different combinations: (1) coldcolour + cold material, (2) cold colour + warm material, (3) warmcolour + cold material and (4) warm colour + warm material. Par-ticipants assessed the overall ‘warmth’ and ‘pleasantness’ of theseproducts on a 10-point scale. We expected the products with thecombination of warm material and warm colour to have the high-est warmth ratings, and the products with the combination of coldmaterial and cold colour to have the lowest warmth ratings. Weexpected the inconsistent combinations to have ratings in betweenthese two extremes. The dominance of touch or vision was deter-mined by investigating the differences between these ratings.

In the main study we did not specify which meaning of warmthwe wanted participants to evaluate: the literal one or the figurativeone. The participants were free to make their own decision aboutthe importance of each aspect of warmth for the experimentalproducts. To determine to what extent literal and figurative mean-ing contributes to the overall experience of warmth we performeda follow-up interview study. We asked participants about theproducts, activities and environments they associated with theexperience of warmth.

2. Pre-study

2.1. Participants

The participants were recruited from students and staff of TUDelft. Twenty one participants took part in the experiment, 30%of them were women. Ages ranged from 18 to 32, the mean agewas 24.

2.2. Materials

Two different products were chosen for which ‘warmth’ is animportant characteristic: a scarf and a breakfast tray. The functionof a scarf is to keep the body warm, and thus it refers to the literalmeaning of warmth. The breakfast tray, as a part of the home inte-rior and as a breakfast accessory, refers more to the figurativemeaning of warmth. It contributes to the cosy and intimate atmo-

sphere of a private home environment. Both products can be easilymanipulated experimentally.

For each product two sets of stimuli were prepared. Ten differ-ent materials were collected for a scarf: silk, viscose, nylon, denim,yarn, rumpled cotton, thin cotton, wool, thick wool, and fleece.Also, 10 different materials were collected for the breakfast tray:steel, aluminium, marble, tile, wood, pressed wood, ripple wood,plastic, polystyrene, and rubber. The material samples were aboutthe same size, 300 ! 300 mm, big enough to touch with a wholehand. We used the same 10 visual stimuli for both products: pur-ple, red, magenta, orange, yellow, light green, dark green, greenblue, cyan, and dark blue. Each colour was presented to the partic-ipants as a 90 ! 90 mm paper card.

2.3. Procedure

The experiment took place at the Faculty of Industrial Design ofTU Delft under natural lighting conditions. Tactile stimuli werepresented to the respondents one by one in a closed box, so thatthey could explore them by touch without seeing them. Visualstimuli were presented one by one on a light grey table. Half ofthe respondents assessed visual stimuli for both products first,and the other half assessed tactile stimuli for both products first.The sequence of the stimuli varied for each respondent. Partici-pants were asked the question: ‘‘How warm do you find this mate-rial (colour) for a scarf (a tray)”? They indicated their answers on ascale from 1 (‘very cold’) to 10 (‘very warm’). Spontaneous com-ments made by participants during the experiment were recorded.

2.4. Statistical analysis

For each product, repeated measures ANOVAs on warmth rat-ings were performed with material or colour as within-subjectsfactor. Post-hoc analyses with Bonferroni adjustment were per-formed to test the significance of the differences between means.

2.5. Results

The analysis showed significant main effects of both material(F(9, 171) = 16.8, p < 0.001) and colour (F(9, 171) = 12.8, p < 0.001)on the warmth ratings for the scarves and significant main effectsof material (F(9, 171) = 18.9, p < 0.001) and colour (F(9, 171) = 6.9,p < 0.001) for the trays.

Fleece and wool were found to be the warmest and viscose andsilk the coldest fabrics for a scarf (see Table 1). The thick woollenscarf with a lot of holes in it had the second highest warmth rating,while the three coldest fabrics had a dense structure. All samples ofwood and plastic, both rough and smooth, were found warmerthan the plates of metal for a tray. At the same time, the smoothplate of steel was found colder than the rough plate of aluminium.

The perception of warm colours in scarves was dominated bytwo factors: hue and brightness. The warmest colours for a scarfwere both reddish and dark. The colours that were perceived aswarm for a breakfast tray tended to be reddish and yellow. Bluecolours were experienced as the least warm for a breakfast trayand green colours as medium warm.

Participants’ comments given in the pre-study suggested thatthe product experience of warmth for a scarf had strong affectivecomponents related to the perceived pleasantness and comfort.For example, denim was often assessed as the least warm becauseof its stiffness, and fleece was judged as warmer than wool becauseit was very soft and did not irritate the skin. The comments sug-gested that the comfort of wearing a scarf affected participants’judgments of perceived warmth. Respondents noted that theydid not like rubber as a surface for a breakfast tray, because it feltsticky and unpleasant to touch. They also commented that they did

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not like a polystyrene surface for a tray because it felt dusty andunclean. But in case of the tray, pleasantness did not affect thewarmth ratings of materials.

3. The main study

3.1. Participants

The participants of the main study were 14 male and 8 femalestudents of TU Delft. Ages ranged from 19 to 27, mean age was 22.

3.2. Materials

Based on the assessments of stimuli made in the pre-study, wecreated four variants of scarves and four variants of trays, combin-ing two warm and two cold stimuli of the visual and tactile modal-ities, according to a full factorial (2 ! 2) design. We have chosencyan and red as cold and warm colours, respectively, for both prod-ucts. The materials were chosen to match the warmth ratings ofcolours for the product in question as closely as possible: viscoseand wool for a scarf, aluminium and wood for a tray. The mean rat-ings of the stimuli for the main study are shown in Table 1. All dif-ferences between cold and warm stimuli were significant at the0.01 level.

For scarves we used two white 100% viscose scarves (H&Mdepartment store) measuring 0.7 ! 1.7 m and two white 80% wool-len scarves (V&D department store) measuring 0.3 ! 1.9 m. Wedyed them in red and blue colours using ‘scarlet’ and ‘kingfisher’colours of the Dylon brand. Because of the differences in the fab-ric’s structure and material the resulting colours were slightly dif-ferent for viscose and wool: the colour of the red viscose scarf wassimilar to Munsell code 5R 5/12, the red woollen scarf 5R 4/12; theblue viscose scarf 5B 7/6, and the blue woollen scarf 7.5B 5/10.

The trays were constructed using textured wood and alumin-ium sheets. They were identical in size (500 ! 310 ! 10 mm) andpainted in ‘red’ and ‘fresh blue’ colours of the Gamma aerosolpaint. The resulting colours were identical for wooden and alumin-ium trays: red trays had Munsell code 7.5 R4/12, blue trays 7.5B 4/8. The resulting products are shown in Fig. 1.

3.3. Procedure

The experiment took place at the Faculty of Industrial Design ofTU Delft, in a room with natural lighting. Participants were givenproducts one by one in a random order (scarves and trays sepa-rately) and were asked to explore them. For each product partici-pants filled in a separate questionnaire assessing how warm andpleasant they found the product on a 10-point scale (from ‘‘notat all” to ‘‘very”). Additional questions were asked about the com-fort of wearing scarves and about the weight of trays to conceal thereal aim of the experiment. Participants were instructed to taketheir time to observe the products before filling in the question-naire. All participants put on the scarves and did not only holdthem in their hands. It took about 10–15 min for each participantto do the test. Participants’ spontaneous comments during theexperiment were recorded.

3.4. Statistical analysis

Repeated measures ANOVA was performed on warmth andpleasantness ratings with colour and material as within-subjectsfactors, for scarves and trays separately.

3.5. Results

Repeated measures ANOVA showed significant main effectsof both colour (F(1, 20) = 22.6, p < 0.001) and material (F(1, 20) =16.3, p < 0.001) on the warmth ratings for a scarf. The col-our !material interaction was not significant (F(1, 20) = 0.93,p > 0.20). The results for a tray also showed significant main effectsof colour (F(1, 20) = 27.6, p < 0.001) and material (F(1, 20) = 19.2,p < 0.001), but no significant effect of the colour !material interac-tion (F(1, 20) = 0.93, p > 0.20) on the warmth ratings.

As predicted, woollen scarves were evaluated as warmer thanviscose scarves, wooden trays were warmer than aluminium trays,

Table 1Mean warmth ratings (+SE) of materials and colours for two products.

Material Mean (+SE) Colour Mean (+SE)

ScarfSilk 1.80 (.35) Cyana 2.65 (.47)Viscosea 2.00 (.51) Yellow 2.75 (.50)Nylon 3.30 (.50) Light green 4.10 (.55)Denim 4.20 (.55) Dark blue 4.50 (.53)Yarn 4.50 (.34) Green blue 5.90 (.40)Rumpled cotton 4.70 (.30) Dark green 6.35 (.48)Thin cotton 5.55 (.29) Magenta 6.40 (.58)Woola 6.75 (.44) Orange 6.65 (.48)Thick wool 6.80 (.46) Reda 7.30 (.57)Fleece 7.90 (.46) Purple 8.40 (.53)

TraySteel 1.90 (.34) Dark blue 3.40 (.67)Aluminiuma 3.80 (.56) Cyana 3.90 (.60)Marble 4.60 (.47) Green blue 4.45 (.48)Tile 4.70 (.41) Dark green 4.60 (.60)Wood 4.85 (.49) Light green 4.80 (.58)Plastic 5.05 (.67) Magenta 5.50 (.64)Pressed wood 5.50 (.43) Yellow 6.25 (.46)Ripple wooda 7.55 (.50) Purple 6.65 (.53)Polystyrene 7.90 (.34) Reda 7.50 (.55)Rubber 9.15 (.33) Orange 7.95 (.53)

a Stimuli chosen for the main experiment.

Fig. 1. Experimental products: (A) trays; (B) scarves.

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and red products were warmer than blue products (Fig. 2). Themean differences between the two inconsistent products (red vis-cose/aluminium and blue wool/wood) were not significant for bothscarves and trays (p > 0.20 in a separate T-test). This result suggeststhat touch and vision are equally important for the experience ofwarmth in these two products.

We also analyzed the pleasantness ratings of both products tosee if the interaction pattern of pleasantness matched the patternof warmth (Fig. 3). The main effect of material on the pleasant-ness ratings for a scarf was significant (F(1, 20) = 67.4,p < 0.001), but the effect of colour (F(1, 20) = 1.42, p > 0.20) andthe colour !material interaction were not significant (F(1, 20) =0.006, p > 0.20). This suggests that the pleasantness of scarveswas mainly affected by the material: woollen scarves of both col-ours were significantly less pleasant than viscose scarves. Therewere no significant effects of either colour (F(1, 20) = 3.8,p > 0.05), material (F(1, 20) = 1.5, p > 0.2) or colour !materialinteraction (F(1, 20) = 0.09, p > 0.2) on the pleasantness ratingsfor a tray.

4. Interview study

The experimental procedure we used in the main study re-vealed the composite assessment of warmth. But in their evalu-ation of product warmth participants relied both on the literaland on the figurative meaning of warmth. To determine to whatextent literal and metaphorical meanings contributed to theproduct experience of warmth, we did an additional qualitativestudy. We interviewed participants about the products, activitiesand environments they associated with the experience ofwarmth.

4.1. Participants

The participants were 20 native Dutch speakers. Ages rangedfrom 19 to 62, mean age was 37.

4.2. Procedure

The interviews were performed at participants’ homes, asone-to-one conversations. The interviewer explained that design-ers were interested in studying the experience of warmth inproducts and asked participants to name three products forwhich warm was important. Then the interviewers asked whatsensory properties (colour, shape, material, smell, sound, etc.)of the products mentioned were relevant for the experience ofwarmth. Next, the interviewer asked about the environmentsand activities that participants associated with the experienceof warmth, and what emotions they had in such environmentsand during such activities. Each interview took approximately20 min.

4.3. Analysis

Free categorization was used to analyze the data. The process ofcategorization followed the procedure of inductive category devel-opment, which aims to reduce the contextual diversity of thematerial [32]. Products, situations, activities, and emotional associ-ations mentioned by participants were categorized in groups onthe basis of their similarity. Rare answers that did not fit in any cat-egory (such as ‘a stone’ for a product) were excluded from furtheranalysis.

Scarf

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loowesocsiv

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doowmuinimula

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Fig. 2. Warmth ratings for scarves and trays.

Scarf

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Fig. 3. Pleasantness ratings for scarves and trays.

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4.4. Results

Two product groups werementionedmost frequently as catego-ries for which perceivedwarmth is an important product character-istic: (1) clothes and textile (23%) and (2) home interior products(21%). Other product groups that were also mentioned frequentlywere (3) food (16%), (4) heat radiating products (16%), and (5) holi-day related items (9%). These results demonstrate that our choiceof experimental products was adequate: a scarf and a breakfast trayaremembers of the twomost frequentlymentioned product groups.

As regards the environments associated with warm experi-ences, home was mentioned most frequently as a warm place(36% of the answers). Holidays on a beach were also mentioned fre-quently as a warm environment (23%). Activities which were mostfrequently associated with a warm experience included: (1) spend-ing time with friends and family (having a family dinner, drinkingcoffee with friends, celebrating a birthday, walking a dog; 35% ofthe answers), and (2) physical relaxation (sleeping, taking a warmbath, having a massage, enjoying a work break; 30%).

The emotional experiences most often associated with ‘‘warm”can be divided in three groups. The first group had to do with phys-ical comfort and included associations with ‘‘comfortable” (13%),‘‘relaxed” (7%), ‘‘cosy” (7%), and ‘‘familiar” (3%). The second groupwas associated with intimacy and included ‘‘loving” (10%), ‘‘beingtogether” (11%), ‘‘atmosphere” (10%), and ‘‘memories” (4%). Thethird group was associated with energy and included ‘‘active”(10%), ‘‘energized” (8%), ‘‘excited” (8%), ‘‘creative” (3%), ‘‘proud”(3%), and ‘‘healthy” (3%).

Only 30% of all respondents provided emotional associationswith physical warmth and comfort. The rest associated warmtheither with activity (35% of respondents) or with intimacy, i.e. lov-ing atmosphere and being together (35%). These results may helpto understand why we found colour to be equally important asthe product’s material for the experience of warmth in the mainstudy: warm materials refer to the literal meaning of warmth(physical comfort), while warm colours are associated with themetaphorical meaning of warmth (activity, energy and excite-ment). Apparently, both literal and figurative meanings of warmthcontribute to its experience.

5. Discussion

5.1. Pre-study

The type of product was an important factor that influenced theexperience of warmth. There were inconsistencies in the warm col-our ratings for the two products. According to colour theory [5–7],dark green is not a warm colour. Nevertheless, for a scarf it was con-sidered as equally warm as magenta, probably because of its dark-ness. On the other hand, yellow is generally considered a warmcolour, but respondents found it too bright for a warm scarf. Cyanwas the least warm colour for a scarf, probably because it is bothcold and light. The colours that were perceived as warm for a break-fast tray tended to be reddish and yellow. In contrast to the resultsfor a scarf, they were more bright and ‘‘sunny”. The inconsistenciesbetween colour ratings suggest that the warmth of a colour de-pends on the product context. Similar product dependencies werereported for colour pleasantness judgements by Holmes and Bucha-nan [33], who showed that although people’s favourite colour wasblue, this was not the case for a sofa, walls, a carpet, or a chair.

5.2. Main study

The results of the main study demonstrate that colour (vision)and material (touch) make an equal contribution to the experienceof warmth in scarves and breakfast trays. These results deviate

from people’s self-reports, in which touch was judged to be thedominant sensory modality for warmth [17]. This may suggest thatpeople tend to overestimate the impact of the literal meaning ofwarmth (touch) and underestimate the impact of its figurativemeaning (vision) on their product experience. Alternatively, thediscrepancy between the results of questionnaire and experimen-tal studies may be explained by the fact that in the questionnairestudy no specific products were mentioned. Participants wereasked to think of any relevant product, and possibly they thoughtof products for which tactile characteristics were more importantthan for a scarf and a tray.

We did not find correspondences between warm and pleasantratings for the final products. In the main study the pleasantnessof the scarves depended mainly on the material properties (viscosescarves were significantly more pleasant than woollen scarves),and not on the colour. These results indicate that the pleasantnessof complex products cannot be predicted from the pleasantness oftheir separate sensory properties. Instead, it may depend on othervariables. For instance, spontaneous comments suggest that partic-ipants in the present study assessed dark scarves as warmer, be-cause they considered dark colours more suitable for a winteroutfit than light colours.

5.3. Interview study

The semantic analysis of the associations with warmth demon-strated that the figurative meaning of warmth (social activity, loveand intimacy) was mentioned twice more often than its literalmeaning (physical warmth and comfort).

The importance of the social aspect of warmth is not surprising.In social psychology, the warm-cold dimension is considered thebasic criterion for social perception. The first research on this topicwas published in 1946 by Asch [34]. In his famous study under-graduates formed impressions of another person based on lists oftrait adjectives (e.g. determined, practical, industrious, intelligent,skilful), which also included either ‘warm’ or ‘cold’ depending onthe experimental condition. Warm and cold were ‘central traits’that dramatically altered impressions of people (in a positiveway for warm, and in a negative way for cold).

In the past few years, research has clearly established that per-ceived warmth is one of the two universal dimensions of humansocial cognition (the second is competence). The basic dimensionsof warmth and competence account for 82% of the variance in per-ceptions of everyday social behaviours [35]. The warmth dimen-sion captures traits that are related to perceived intent, includingfriendliness, helpfulness, sincerity, trustworthiness and morality[36]. Warmth is judged before competence, and warmth judg-ments carry more weight in affective and behavioural reactions.When judging faces after an exposure time of 100 ms, social per-ceivers judge trustworthiness most reliably, followed by compe-tence [37]. The importance of these fast visual impressions ofsocial warmth may explain why vision is also important for thejudgement of warmth in products.

Recently, Williams and Bargh [38] showed that people who hadjust briefly held a hot cup of coffee, perceived a target person asbeing significantly warmer than those who had briefly held a cupof iced coffee. In addition, participants primed with physical cold-ness were more likely to choose a gift for themselves rather than agift for a friend as a reward for participating in the study, whereasthose primed with physical warmth were more likely to choose agift for a friend. The authors argue that because of frequent earlylife experiences with loving family members [39,40] a close mentalassociation may develop between the concepts of physical warmthand psychological warmth.

The results of Williams and Bargh’s [38] experiment can be use-ful for product designers. Designers often try to create a warm

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atmosphere in home interiors or spaces used for relaxation andinformal meetings (bars, hotel lobbies, cafeteria, etc.). Williamsand Bargh [38] demonstrate that such warm environments canfacilitate pro-social behaviour. Our data are helpful in creatingwarm surroundings because they suggest that material and colourplay an equally important role in creating such warm experience.

6. Conclusion

Our research aimed to determine to what extent the productexperience of warmth depended on tactile and visual stimuli. Theresults demonstrated that both colour and material contributeequally to the judgments of warmth in two products, scarves andbreakfast trays. However, the pleasantness of a product could notbe predicted on the basis of the pleasantness attributed to its col-our and material. In a qualitative study we asked about the mean-ing people attribute to warmth in their product experience. Theresults revealed that the experience of warmth is a combinationof literal and figurative meaning. The literal meaning is related tophysical warmth and comfort, while the figurative meaning isassociated with social activity, intimacy and friendly atmosphere.The figurative meaning was mentioned more often in associationwith products than the literal meaning.

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