**4.1 Role of Flip phone design complexity in the difficulties of its categorization and in nurturing uncertainty**

Most of the interviewees recognized the hybrid character of the Flip Phone, as the following quotes reveal: 'I think it's a multifunctional electronic device that has multiple uses. We can use it as a phone, for music, video, and as a computer'. 'This is an All-in-One product' (male, 31 years), 'There are several objects grouped into one' (male, 32 y.). 'There are a lot of things actually... We cannot know if it's a phone or a computer' (female, 18 y.), 'They are condensed [things] in a single product' (male, 52 y.), 'It looks ambivalent...There is frankly both laptop and phone' (female, 60 y.).

This hybrid character gives rise to many difficulties in categorizing this NHP, as the following respondents noted: 'I don't know. I'm making assumptions, I don't know the object. It is not written on it if it is a phone or a computer' (male, 49 y.). 'What could it be? I am annoyed because I have no clear idea' (female, 62 y.). 'I frankly do not see what it is' (female, 64 y.). 'Till now, I do not know what it is' (male, 36 y., n° 14). 'I see a mobile phone or an MP3 or... I have no idea... I can put it anywhere so I do not know at all" (female, 21 y.). 'It can be a keyboard; it can be a speaker… It is very difficult to say... I do not know what it is' (female, 60 y.).

Doubts about the categorization of the Flip Phone persist due to the product's design complexity and the interviewees' inability to infer its usage through any evident connection with known electronic devices. The following quotes illustrate this confusion and underline the perceived risk associated with its evaluation and its potential uses: 'There are two screens. I am no longer sure. There is a small part I'm missing' (male, 78 y.), 'I'm not sure at all, I'm not sure; I don't know... A computer or some kind of TV' (female, 24 y.), 'Maybe a phone...I'm not sure at all' (male, 36 y.). 'It looks like a mini TV... a computer. It looks like my clock radio actually...It is confusing' (female, 34 y.). 'Here we think half phone half computer but I am not sure, frankly' (female, 40 y.), 'I'm not sure that it is a computer, I even have some doubt' (male, 25 y.), 'I didn't understand, it is too technical... I'm afraid of not being able to use it properly because it's a little bit sophisticated' (male, 31 y.), 'Finally, it looks more complex... It looks very complicated to me... too many options. It will take a long time to learn to use it (male, 32 y.).

The variety of attributions of the Flip Phone to different categories reveals the great difficulty most of the respondents encountered in trying to make sense of this ambiguous hybrid product. This finding confirms the conclusions of past research [6, 7, 12, 29], which underline the complex, equivocal, and confusing character of such combined products because they can be categorized in several ways and hence give rise to struggle and uncertainty in the categorization process and output. Moreover, the role of the product design in producing such uncertainty and ambiguity can be derived from the respondents' answers when they attribute their confusion to the physical aspects of the product design contradicting the conclusion of the studies given in Refs. [22, 30, 31], which suggests that one main function of new product design is to facilitate membership categorization.

#### **4.2 Role of design affordance in the Flip phone attribution to a category**

At this stage, we identify two mechanisms that can lead to the categorization of new hybrid products and bridge design affordance and similarity-based categorization frameworks. In the following, we highlight and illustrate the mechanisms connecting affordance and similarity on one hand, and the underlying design holistic or components-based approaches that lead to the categorization on the other hand.

First, respondents mobilize analogical mechanisms (functional similarity), which relates to the overall family resemblance, to categorize the NHP on a holistic basis, as expressed in the following quotes: 'We have the latest iPad it could be closer to it because it looks like it; there are a lot of resemblance' (female, 28 y.), 'It makes me think of a radio because of the design' (male, 31 y.), 'It looks like a book' (female, 64 y.), 'It really

*Design Affordance Does Matter: A Spotlight on Categorization and Evaluation of Hybrid… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.112966*

looks like a phone' (female, 24 y.), 'It also looks like a laptop' (male, 43 y.), 'Apparently it looks like a computer' (male, 46 y.).

Furthermore, many interviewees mobilized a global perception of the design to infer the uses of the Flip Phone. Quotes illustrating this holistic perception include: 'I think it is an object that allows better communication of course… It records and stores information, I suppose' (male 78 y.), 'It is a multifunctional device that allows us apparently to connect to Internet' (male, 31 y.), 'This is the kind of schedule that rotates so we can turn it around' (female, 64 y.), 'I would say that this is something that allows us to enlarge the image or close it' (male, 43 y.), 'It might be another medium like an iPad or something like that... being able to expand and to add a part that is roughly similar in size will expand the object's vision possibilities' (male, 21 y.), 'It's a triangular digital device; I think we can hide things inside' (female, 24 y.), 'This is the kind of device that rotates' (male, 31 y.).

Affordance thus seems tightly linked to consumers' perceptions of NHP usages, based on the general product design, when the new product's similarity is founded on a holistic resemblance with existing products (analogy-based categorization). This result is congruent with Normans' position [20], which implies that affordance refers to action potentialities that the user can perceive directly from the object (design).

Second, subjects mobilize homological process (analytic categorization) using design components-based similarity, to assign the Flip Phone to a product category. At this level, affordance process appears as based on a decomposed view of the design components of the NHP to suggest potential usages of the Flip Phone. Quotes illustrating this decomposed view of the design components include: 'As there is the keyboard that can make me think of a smartphone' (male 21 y.), 'Hence in this picture you can see that this is a keyboard and a screen, it is conceivable that it may be a computer' (female, 28 y.), 'What comprises a screen? There are televisions, computer screens; there are displays of children's games' (female, 62 y.), 'I can see the little dial and the touch screen face here, it is may be a directory' (female, 64 y.), 'It makes me think immediately of the Nintendo DS as it has two screens' (male 28 y.), 'It reminds me of a laptop as we can see a keyboard and a screen' (female, 24 y.), 'Because first there is a keyboard that immediately suggests something like a computer' (male 48 y.). Other excerpts reveal that respondents mobilize other decomposed perceptual indicators such as size, thickness, layout or structure to predict the uses of the Flip Phone: 'It's too small to do a professional job except for reading emails quickly' (male, 22 y.), 'The recognition criterion of iPad is the thickness… Given the way the product is presented in the picture, one can think of the iPad' (female, 28 y.), 'I feel that there are several layers so you can either turn pages, actually there are different positions' (female, 64 y.), 'Given the inclination of the screen compared to what I believe to be the wall. It seems to be intended to have a larger visual impact than for one person; several people could see it' (male 78 y.), 'The disposition (is interesting), precisely this story of screen and keyboard at the bottom' (female, 62 y.), 'Eventually everyone can participate with a keyboard that allows him/her to intervene or possibly to save or to edit data that have already been entered in it' (male 78 y.).

This result shows that affordance also plays a role when the new product's uses can be derived from some design components or properties (screen size, keyboard, thickness, inclination, and flexibility, etc.), such that the categorization of the NHP device is homology-based [11, 24] because it was driven from the constituents level of this new product.

Finally, affordance seems to act alongside similarity, at either a holistic or a decomposed level, to reduce ambiguity and to facilitate Flip Phone categorization through

its resemblance and inferred uses. Therefore, affordance provides a significant contribution, besides the similarity mechanism, to the evaluation and categorization of NHPs, especially when consumers perceive high complexity, ambiguity, or uncertainty in product use. Our results suggest that considered alone, similarity-based categorization theory is insufficient to explain how respondents evaluate, classify, and anticipate the uses of really new hybrid products.

This finding confirms and goes beyond the conclusion of [3, 12], who stress that the assessment and categorization of NHPs do not obey the same rules as the categorization of new conventional products. Instead of a simple transfer of knowledge from basic categories to hybrid products to assign meaning and assess performance (categorization theory), we show that consumers infer the nature and uses of a NHP from its form, structure, morphology, and ergonomics (affordance theory) and mix simultaneously holistic and constituents-based approaches to categorize, assess, and anticipate potential usages of the NHPs.

The conjunction of the similarity approach and the holistic and decomposed design affordance path used by respondents to categorize the new hybrid product and assess its potentialities contribute seemingly to lower initially perceived uncertainty and to make the intention to acquire and use of the Flip Phone less risky.
