Identification and Classification of Design Attributes for a Product to Verify Ergonomic Factors in Office Chairs

Abstract

Prolonged seated posture in office work directly affects the safety and performance of the worker. Human sustainability refers to the care of people in their health and quality of life, and ergonomic design is one of the means to preserve human resources in workspaces. This chapter uses Kano Model and Factor Analysis to determine and classify the design attributes for an ergonomic factor tester product for office chairs. Two stages were considered in the development process; the first referred to the application of the Kano Model, applied to a sample of 29 office workers, and the second one, to the realization of the factorial analysis, applied to 87 users related to the use of office chairs. For both studies, the attributes were divided into two groups, one referring to the ergonomic chair's characteristics and the other to the testing product. As a result, a total of 9 ergonomic attributes for the chairs and eight design attributes for the product were obtained, which were classified mainly as attractive attributes for the user; in turn, they were grouped into 3 and 2 groups, respectively; therefore, the analyzed variables can be encompassed.