Pan-ethnic-group product form design based on shape grammar

To inherit customers' affective responses of current product and to build differential product form, a theoretical model of pan-ethnic-group product was built based on anthropology and psychology. Target product was generalized as domestic ethnic group product and foreign ethnic group product. Form elements of pan-ethnic-group product that could reflect customers' affective needs were extracted and integrated with target product form to generate new schemes with shape grammar. The theoretical model and inference rules were discussed. In product form inference process, the inference algorithm was constructed by introducing constraints of target product dimensions and inference times. Moreover, the process of pan-ethnic-group product form design was researched. The electric scooter was taken as an example to decompose its form, and the form elements of both domestic ethnic group and foreign ethnic group were analyzed and extracted. Based on these, an inference engine of shape grammar was constructed to generate new product form automatically. By experimental comparison, the effectiveness of method was proved.