Manage tactile experiences in retail outlets

« create and manage sensory
atmosphere of outlets: some insights on
the tactile experience »

Hoo-Ha Sensorimix Festival New-York City (Nov 2009)

who am I ?

research engineer in EDF (Électricité de
France)
worked on acoustic and thermal assessment
of HVAC appliances (Sensory interactions) –
more widely perception of indoor
environment (1997 – 2006)
developped the sensory sciences in EDF
(trained panels + consumer tests in a specific
« comfort laboratory »

introduction


vision dominates in outlets!


most of the time touching is forbidden!


touch can heal…


… touch can harm !

Dim Mak Power Striking points of the head

touch can provide affection


beyond « I believe what I see » (StThomas)


touch in virtual reality


then came the kill’app !


tactile experience in outlets


different types of touch


first type: neutral touch


second type: informational touch

Lederman & Klatzky (1991)

third type: autotelic touch


but tactile experience goes beyond
haptic interactions
somesthesia has 2 senses:
the perception of tactual or proprioceptive or
gut sensations
the faculty of bodily perception; sensory
systems associated with the body; includes
skin senses and proprioception and the
internal organs


but tactile experience goes beyond
haptic interactions
somesthesia involves 6 primary qualities:
touch- pressure (including temporal
variations such as vibration)
warmth,
coolness,
pain,
itch
the position and movement of the joints


sources of tactile experience in outlets


sources of tactile experience in outlets
the experience of the products sold in the manipulation of the products (possible or
outlet not)
other persons within the outlet (clients, inter-personal contacts
vendors)

the environment of the outlet contact with the physical environment (floor,
walls, objects, furnitures…)

contact with the hygrothermal environment

the actions the client has to make in the movements within the environment (stairs,
outlet escalators, heights of the merchandising,…)

carrying « things » (products, child…) within
the environment


manipulation of the products

Heslin & Alpert (1983) ; Peck & Childers (2003) ; McNabe & Nowlis (2003) ;
Grohmann, Spangenberg & Sprott (2007) ; Shu & Peck (2007) ; Fenko,
Schifferstein, Hekkert (2009)

manipulation of the products


inter-personal contacts

Erceau & Guéguen (2007) ; Kaufman & Mahoney (1999) ; Lynn, Le & Sherwyn (1998) ; Bohm
& Hendricks (1997) ; Hornik (1992)


inter-personal contacts


physical environment


hygrothermal environment


movements within the environment


carrying « things »


managing the tactile experience



first of all (as usual!), define a strategy: a bad
experience in one case can be a good in
another one, depending of the strategy!
positionning (luxury, low-cost, popular, …)
type of customers and their expectations,
motivations, unwanted features,…
purposes of the tactile experience and its
interaction with other sensory dimensions



then :
avoid / remove bad experiences
at least provide neutral experiences
enhance good experiences

… but no over-stimulations!



multi-sensory integration :
« … the integration of information from different
sensory systems is a fundamental characteristic of
perception and cognition… »
« … the neurobiological data reviewed here suggest
that much, if not all, of neocortex is
multisensory… »
« … this necessarily forces us to reconsider the
validity of probing the brain unimodally… »
Ghazanfar & Schroeder (2006)


managing the multi-sensory experience


managing the multi-sensory experience

different mecanisms of multi-sensory
integration to use :
cross-modal transfer
complementary integration
redundant integration
perceptual conflicts (uncongruencies)


cross-modal transfer

an information on one modality is giving
information on another modality

touching an object / material in the dark giving
you information to recognize the same object in
the daylight when you see it


complementary integration

this mecanism is here to preserve the unity of
an object / material you perceive

all the sensory dimensions of a object /
material(color, touch…) creating a unified feeling
of high quality


redundant integration

when different senses are able to give
information of the same feature

sight and touch giving information on the texture /
rugosity of an object / material


perceptual conflicts (uncongruencies)

it appears when an information given in a
modality is not confirmed by another
modality (positive or negative surprise)

give a visual impression of hardness of a material
which is not confirmed while touching the same
material


to know more…

Chapitre 6 (pp 171-206)
« Comment gérer les sensations tactiles ? »
Virginie Maille, Edouard Siekierski


thank you for your attention…

…… we keep in touch!
touch!
edouard.siekierski@edf.fr


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