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Needs, affect, and interactive products – Facets of user experience
Marc Hassenzahl
a,b,*
, Sarah Diefenbach
a
, Anja Göritz
c
a
Ergonomics and User Experience, Design, Folkwang University, Essen, Germany
b
Media City, Åbo Akademi University, PB 311, Strandgatan 2, 65100 Vasa, Finland
c
Work and Organizational Psychology, University of Würzburg, Röntgenring 10, 97070 Würzburg, Germany
article info
Article history:
Available online 11 April 2010
Keywords:
User experience
Human needs
Emotion
Affect
Product evaluation
abstract
Subsumed under the umbrella of User Experience (UX), practitioners and academics of Human–Computer
Interaction look for ways to broaden their understanding of what constitutes ‘‘pleasurable experiences”
with technology. The present study considered the fulfilment of universal psychological needs, such as
competence, relatedness, popularity, stimulation, meaning, security, or autonomy, to be the major source
of positive experience with interactive technologies. To explore this, we collected over 500 positive expe-
riences with interactive products (e.g., mobile phones, computers). As expected, we found a clear rela-
tionship between need fulfilment and positive affect, with stimulation, relatedness, competence and
popularity being especially salient needs. Experiences could be further categorized by the primary need
they fulfil, with apparent qualitative differences among some of the categories in terms of the emotions
involved. Need fulfilment was clearly linked to hedonic quality perceptions, but not as strongly to prag-
matic quality (i.e., perceived usability), which supports the notion of hedonic quality as ‘‘motivator” and
pragmatic quality as ‘‘hygiene factor.” Whether hedonic quality ratings reflected need fulfilment
depended on the belief that the product was responsible for the experience (i.e., attribution).
Ó2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
‘‘I positively remember my first attempt to use arc-welding equip-
ment – an almost martial experience, which rekindled my interest
in mechanical engineering studies.”
‘‘I was on a short trip to Dublin. In the early hours, my mobile
phone woke me up. My boyfriend, who stayed at home, had just
texted a sweet ‘I love you.’”
‘‘It is just fantastic to see how our two little cats play and care for
each other. We captured this experience with our digital camera to
watch and relive it.”
The almost martial feeling of welding, the sweetness of a caring
wake-up message, the lasting memories of two beloved cats play-
ing – these are all experiences mediated by technologies, such as
arc-welding equipment, mobile phones and digital cameras. Expe-
rience is a stream of feelings, thoughts and action; a continuous
commentary on our current state of affairs (Kahneman, 1999, p.
7). Experience is ubiquitous, mostly unconscious, but still accessi-
ble to the person experiencing. The simple question of ‘‘How do
you feel?” prompts probing and reflection. Beyond these single
moments, people are able to summarize and memorize particularly
outstanding, rich, or touching experiences – just as first-time arc-
welding, being woken up by a love message, or observing beloved
cats.
Recently, the field of Human–Computer Interaction (HCI) has
witnessed a growing interest in an experiential perspective on
the design and evaluation of interactive products (see Hassenzahl
(2010) and Hassenzahl and Tractinsky (2006) for an overview).
Subsumed under the umbrella of User experience (UX), practitio-
ners and academics are looking for new approaches to the design
of interactive products, which accommodate experiential qualities
of technology use rather than product qualities. Even though far
from settled, many agree that UX is a dynamic, highly context-
dependent, and subjective account of human–technology interac-
tion (Law et al., 2009). In addition, the experiential stresses affect
and emotions. Emotions have a multitude of functions in the con-
text of interaction, ranging from shaping the interaction itself to
the evaluation and communication about product use (Forlizzi
and Battarbee, 2004). And also Kahneman’s (1999) notion of a
‘‘continuous commentary” refers to the pleasure and pain felt in
any given moment, which influences whether we go on with our
current activity, whether we cancel it or whether we will ever do
it again.
In their book on experience, McCarthy and Wright (2004)
emphasize, too, the ‘‘emotional thread” of experience, and they
note that emotion and experience are inseparable. They suggest
that all our actions are ‘‘shot through with values, needs, desires,
0953-5438/$ - see front matter Ó2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.intcom.2010.04.002
*Corresponding author. Address: Ergonomics and User Experience, Design,
Folkwang University, Essen, Germany, Campus University of Duisburg-Essen,
Universitätsstrasse 12, 45141 Essen, Germany.
E-mail address: marc.hassenzahl@folkwang-hochschule.de (M. Hassenzahl).
Interacting with Computers 22 (2010) 353–362
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Interacting with Computers
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/intcom
Author's personal copy
and goals” (p. 85). The connection of action with values and needs
colours our experience, sets its emotional tone. Referring to the
three introductory examples, one can easily ‘‘see” the emotionality
through the descriptions of the experiences – feeling bold, strong,
loved, thrilled, or amused.
With their emphasis on ‘‘values, needs, desires and goals,”
McCarthy and Wright (2004) are in line with accepted psycholog-
ical theories (see Carver and Scheier, 1989), which understand ac-
tion as being permanently shaped not only by the context and
conditions on an operational level, but also driven by overarching,
universal psychological needs. The question at hand, however, is
what these ‘‘values, needs, desires” are. In fact, McCarthy and
Wright (2004) seem to explicitly avoid any commentary on the
content of ‘‘needs.” This is due to a critical view of attempts to re-
duce, what they call ‘‘felt experience”, to a set of generalized con-
cepts. Due to experiences’ highly situated, unique and inseparable
character – their ‘‘perpetual novelty” as Schmitt (1999, p. 61) calls
it – they lend themselves to description, but not to any type of cat-
egorization or reduction to a set of underlying principles. ‘‘Perpet-
ual novelty” implies that experiences can be described in
retrospect. However, in the moment of description, they are gone
and will never occur again. This actually would be the end of story
for experience in HCI, because designing for bygone and unrepeat-
able experiences is futile.
In contrast to McCarthy and Wright (2004), the present paper ar-
gues that although two experiences may never be alike, we may nev-
ertheless be able to categorize them. Schmitt (1999, p. 61) suggested
a categorization ‘‘in terms of their [experiences’] generic emerging
properties.” He proposed processes (e.g., think, feel, relate, etc.);
however, we suggest categorizing experiences on the basis of the
psychological needs they fulfil. To give an example: the positive
experience from arc-welding is a consequence of challenge, skills
and mastery – in short: competence. This competence experience
differs clearly from the experience of a sweet ‘‘I love you”-message.
Here the positive experience stems from feeling related to other peo-
ple and, thus, maybe thought of as relatedness experience.
The paper’s objective is twofold: it establishes need fulfilment
as a major source of positive (emotional) experiences with technol-
ogy (see Hassenzahl, 2010) and clarifies the links between needs,
affect, and product perception. In addition, it looks at the notion
of a categorization of experiences based on the primary need it ful-
fils and explores qualitative differences between experiences. By
that, we offer a structural model of positive experience, which dif-
ferentiates experience based on the psychological needs fulfilled
through technology use. In addition, we gain first insights into
the process, which links experience to product perception, and
we provide an alternative approach to the measurement of experi-
ence: from the indirect quantification of user experience through
product perception and evaluation to the direct quantification of
experience beyond the mere affective.
We first describe and discuss a set of potential psychological
needs. Based on this, we present an online questionnaire study of po-
sitive experiences with technology, and we analyse the structure of
need fulfilment, links between needs, affect and product and differ-
ences between categories of experience. We conclude with the
implications of the study for user experience, its measurement and
design.
2. Needs, affect and interactive products
Universal human needs are an ever-present topic in psychology.
One of the theories best known outside psychology is certainly Ma-
slow’s (1954) Theory of Personality, which lists five universal needs:
physical health, security, self-esteem, belongingness, and self-actu-
alization. Other authors compiled further lists such as Rokeach
(1973) or Reiss (Reiss and Havercamp, 1998). A prominent contem-
porary theory is Ryan and Deci’s (2000) Self-Determination Theory,
which restricts itself to a ‘‘big three”: autonomy, relatedness and
competence. Based on a review of the available theories, Sheldon
and colleagues (2001) compiled a concise list of the top 10 psycho-
logical needs (see Table 1 for an overview).
In a series of studies, Sheldon and colleagues (2001) explored
the relationship between those 10 needs and affect. Specifically,
they asked people to report on a recent, satisfying life event, and
to rate the affect (positive, negative) and feelings of need fulfilment
experienced during this event. Affect was measured with the Posi-
tive Affect Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS, Watson et al., 1988)a
widely used and validated questionnaire, consisting of 20 affect
adjectives, such as proud, excited, scared or hostile; 10 for positive
affect and 10 for negative. Need fulfilment was assessed by items
such as ‘‘During this event I felt that I was successfully completing
difficult tasks and projects” (competence) or ‘‘During this event I
felt close and connected with other people who are important to
me” (relatedness). The results (from the analysis of three indepen-
dent data sets) provided a number of insights into needs and their
relation to affect. First of all, the degree of need fulfilment was pos-
itively related to the intensity of positive affect. Except for luxury,
all needs showed correlations with positive affect in the range from
.20 to .50. Second, a principle component analysis showed the
needs to be relatively independent from each other. Hence, satisfy-
ing experiences are marked by particular needs and, thus, can be
classified accordingly. Third, needs differed in their saliencies:
autonomy, competence, and relatedness were especially noticeable
in the reported positive life events.
In a pilot study, Hassenzahl (2008) asked participants (N= 52)
to think of a recent, positive and satisfactory experience with an
interactive technology. A slightly adapted version of Sheldon and
colleagues’ questionnaire was used to measure the occurrence of
autonomy, competence, and relatedness in those experiences. In
addition, an abridged version of PANAS (Watson et al., 1988; Ger-
man version, Krohne et al., 1996) was used to assess affect. The re-
sults not only lent support to the notion of distinct experiences
based on the particular need fulfilled, but also revealed a clear link
between needs and affect.
To summarize, the fulfilment of particular psychological needs
can be understood as a source of positive experience. Note, how-
ever, that the implied causality is an assumption only. Positive
experiences can be distinguished based on the primary need
fulfilled.
The assumption that need fulfilment leads to a positive experi-
ence is apparent in a number of models of user experience in the con-
text of HCI. Jordan (2000), for example, suggested four distinct
‘‘needs” (he called it ‘‘pleasures”) based on work by Tiger (1992):
physio (e.g., touch, taste, smell), socio (e.g., relationship with others,
status), psycho (e.g., cognitive and emotional reactions) and ideo
needs (e.g., aesthetics, embodied values). Gaver and Martin (2000)
compiled a list of needs, such as novelty, surprise, diversion, to influ-
ence the environment, to extend knowledge and control, intimacy,
to understand and change one’s self, and mystery. Hassenzahl
(2003) suggested manipulation, stimulation, identification, and evo-
cation as important needs in the context of interactive technologies.
Table 1 presents a rough mapping of those constructs to Sheldon
and colleagues’ (2001) 10 needs. Although those three models use
different terminologies, they all address the themes of competence,
relatedness, popularity, stimulation, and meaning. The needs, thus,
unify different models and further clarify the psychological basis
of the assumed pleasures, needs or values. In addition, Sheldon
and colleagues’ (2001) work established a clear link between posi-
tive experience and need fulfilment in the context of satisfying
events, and Hassenzahl’s (2008) pilot study suggests that those re-
sults are generalisable to positive experiences with technology.
354 M. Hassenzahl et al. / Interacting with Computers 22 (2010) 353–362
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The present study seeks to further explore the role of need fulf-
ilment for the user’s experience. We selected 7 out of the 10 needs
that we considered the most important in the context of experi-
ences with technology, namely competence, relatedness, popular-
ity, stimulation, meaning, security and autonomy. The first five
are the ones that have been addressed already – at least implicitly
– by other models of user experience. We further added security,
due to its seemingly obvious link to usability issues, and auton-
omy, due to its central character in Self-Determination Theory
(Ryan and Deci, 2000). Luxury was excluded, due to its marginal
role even in Sheldon et al.’s studies. Self-esteem, although a dis-
tinct need in Sheldon and colleagues’ (2001) list, was excluded,
because it could be understood rather as an outcome of need fulf-
ilment than a need in itself (in line with Sheldon et al.’s own dis-
cussion, p. 336). For example, self-esteem can result from fulfilled
competence. Finally, physical thriving was excluded due to its
seemingly weak connection to interactive technologies in general
and its failure to emerge as a distinct need in Sheldon and col-
leagues’ study (2001). Note, however, that our set of needs is
not meant as a definitive selection; rather we were aiming at a
streamlined list, covering most of experiences without being
overly complex. Following Sheldon and colleagues’ (2001) and
our own pilot study (Hassenzahl, 2008) we asked people to report
a recent positive experience. We then asked them to rate need
fulfilment and affect, as well as product perceptions and evalua-
tions in order to explore the links between these different con-
structs. Note that due to our focus on positive experiences only,
results and according generalisations are limited.
3. Method
3.1. Participants and procedure
The questionnaire study was carried out online with Survey-
Monkey (www.surveymonkey.com). A link to the study was dis-
tributed via the WiSo-panel (www.wisopanel.uni-erlangen.de,
Göritz, 2007) and various email lists. All in all, 548 of the 668
(82%) participants (62% female, 35% male, 3% not specified) com-
pleted the questionnaire on the majority of the crucial measures.
We allowed for some missing values per participant, which led to
slight variations in sample size, depending on the measures in-
volved. A response rate could not be computed, due to the way
we distributed the survey. The sample’s median age was 32 (Min-
imum = 17, Maximum = 90).
The questionnaire consisted of four parts: introduction, report of
a positive experience, needs, affect, product perception/evaluation
scales, and demographic details. All materials were in German. In
the introduction, we stated our interest in the experience of situa-
tions, in which technology (e.g., gaming, watching, listening to mu-
sic, communication) plays a role. Participants were then asked to
think of and write down a recent, outstanding, positive experience
with technology. They were asked to relive the experience and to
rate it on a series of scales: need fulfilment, experienced affect,
attribution, product perception and evaluation (for a detailed
description see below). Finally, participants provided some demo-
graphic information (gender, age, occupation), were thanked and
given an email address for further inquiries.
3.2. Need fulfilment
The experienced fulfilment of the seven needs (competence,
relatedness, popularity, stimulation, meaning, security, and
autonomy) was measured with a questionnaire adapted from
Sheldon and colleagues (2001). Each need was captured with
Table 1
Ten human needs (descriptions are taken from Sheldon et al., 2001, appendix) and models of User experience addressing those needs.
Need Description Jordan
(2000)
Gaver and Martin (2000) Hassenzahl
(2003)
Autonomy–
Independence
Feeling like you are the cause of your own actions rather than feeling that external forces or pressure are the cause of your
action
Competence–
effectance
Feeling that you are very capable and effective in your actions rather than feeling incompetent or ineffective Psycho-
pleasure
To extend knowledge and control; to
influence the environment
Manipulation
Relatedness–
belongingness
Feeling that you have regular intimate contact with people who care about you rather than feeling lonely and uncared of Socio-
pleasure
Intimacy
Influence–popularity Feeling that you are liked, respected, and have influence over others rather than feeling like a person whose advice or
opinion nobody is interested in
Socio-
pleasure
Identification
Pleasure–stimulation Feeling that you get plenty of enjoyment and pleasure rather than feeling bored and understimulated by life Psycho-
pleasure
Novelty, surprise, diversion. mystery Stimulation
Security–control Feeling safe and in control of your life rather than feeling uncertain and threatened by your circumstances
Physical thriving–
bodily
Feeling that your body is healthy and well-taken care of rather than feeling out of shape and unhealthy Physio-
pleasure
Self-actualizing–
meaning
Feeling that you are developing your best potentials and making life meaningful rather than feeling stagnant and that life
does not have much meaning
Ideo-
pleasure
To understand and change one’s self, Evocation
Self-esteem–self-
respect
Feeling that you are a worthy person who is as good as anyone else rather than feeling like a ‘‘loser”
Money–luxury Feeling that you have plenty of money to buy most of what you want rather than feeling like a poor person who has no
nice possessions
M. Hassenzahl et al. / Interacting with Computers 22 (2010) 353–362 355
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three items (21 items in total). Participants responded on a five-
point scale ranging from not at all to extremely.
We performed a random split of the overall sample. On one
half, we carried out a principal component analysis (varimax
rotation) with an explicit extraction of seven components. Four
of the 21 items were problematic, having loadings on at least
two components higher than .30 without any clear primary com-
ponent. In addition, autonomy and meaning items largely loaded
on the same component, with the three meaning items being
more coherent. Based on this, we excluded the four items with
strong crossloadings and the entire autonomy scale (seven items
in total). To test the stability of this solution, we performed an-
other principal component analysis (varimax rotation, six com-
ponents extracted) on the remaining half of the sample. The
results were satisfactory.
Table 2 shows the final set of items and the results of a principal
component analysis on the whole sample (varimax rotation, six
components extracted). This solution explained 86% of the vari-
ance. All primary component loadings were high (.75–.93), with
only two crossloadings slightly greater than .30.
We computed mean scale values (Cronbach’s alpha from .79
[Popularity] to .88 [Meaning]; scale inter-correlations from .14
to .57) for each need by averaging the respective items for each
participant. In addition, we computed a General saliency of
needs by averaging all items. This score captures the extent to
which need fulfilment took place, regardless of the actual type
of need.
3.3. Affect
Affective experience was assessed with the Positive Affect Nega-
tive Affect Schedule (PANAS, Watson et al., 1988; German version
Krohne et al., 1996). It consists of 20 verbal descriptors of different
affective experiences, namely afraid, scared, nervous, jittery, irrita-
ble, hostile, guilty, ashamed, upset, and distressed for negative affect
and active, alert, attentive, determined, enthusiastic, excited, inspired,
proud, strong and interested for positive affect. Participants indi-
cated how much they experienced the particular affect on a five-
point scale ranging from not at all to extremely. PANAS assumes a
hierarchical structure (Watson and Tellegen, 1985), with two
broad factors capturing the valence of the experienced affect (posi-
tive, negative). Each descriptor itself captures the specific content
of the affect and, thus, expresses qualitative differences in
experience.
In the present study, we calculated a positive affect (PA) and a
negative affect (NA) scale value by averaging the responses to the
10 affect descriptors for each valence. Internal consistency for PA
and NA was good (Cronbach’s alpha of .83 for PA and .87 for NA),
and the scale inter-correlation small (r= .07, p> .05). Both findings
lend credit to the reliability of the distinction between PA and NA.
Besides the two general valence factors, recent work (Egloff
et al., 2003) implies that positive affect can be further partitioned
into joy (excited, proud, enthusiastic), interest (interested, strong,
determined), and activation (active, inspired, alert, attentive). Based
on this, we calculated scale values for joy, interest, and activation
by averaging the respective descriptors. Internal consistency of
joy was satisfactory (Cronbach’s alpha = .79), but not of interest
(Cronbach’s alpha = .67) and activation (Cronbach’s alpha = .54).
The scale inter-correlations were in all cases substantial (ranging
from .45 to .67). An exploratory principal component analysis
(varimax rotation, Eigenvalue > 1) of the 10 positive affect descrip-
tors suggested a three factor structure, however, with an alterna-
tive grouping of descriptors: active, strong, proud, determined, and
alert formed one component (Eigenvalue = 2.77, 28% variance ex-
plained), excited, enthusiastic, and interested a second (Eigen-
value = 2.56, 16% variance explained) and inspired and attentive a
third one (Eigenvalue = 1.30, 13% variance explained). Although
this grouping differed from Egloff et al.’s (2003), we kept it for fur-
ther analyses because it reflected the given data.
A further principal component analysis (varimax rotation, Eigen-
value > 1) of the negative affect descriptors revealed two compo-
nents, one (Eigenvalue = 5.25, 53% variance explained) with
loadings of 9 out of the 10 descriptors and a second (Eigen-
value = 1.23, 12% variance explained) with a very high loading of
Table 2
Principal component analysis (varimax rotation) of the whole sample.
Scale/Item Component
I felt ... 123456
Relatedness
... a sense of contact with people who care for me, and whom I care for .92
... close and connected with other people who are important to me .93
... a strong sense of intimacy with the people I spent time with .90
Meaning
... that I was ‘‘becoming who I really am” .81
... a sense of deeper purpose .78
... a deeper understanding of myself+ .81
Stimulation
... that I was experiencing new sensation and activities .88
... that I had found new sources and types of stimulation for myself .87
Competence
... that I was successfully completing difficult tasks and projects .86
... that I was taking on and mastering hard challenges .84
Security
... that my life was structured+ .85
... glad that I have a comfortable set of routines and habits .31 .83
Popularity
... that I was a person whose advice others seek out and follow .32 .75
... that I’m someone, others take as a guidance+ .81
Eigenvalue 2.79 2.42 1.77 1.76 1.72 1.53
% variance explained 20 17 13 13 12 11
Notes: All items were originally in German; component loadings <.30 are suppressed; +) these items slightly differ from Sheldon et al. (2001).
356 M. Hassenzahl et al. / Interacting with Computers 22 (2010) 353–362
Author's personal copy
afraid (.94) and a secondary loading of ashamed (.49). However, this
did not justify a further partitioning of the negative affect
descriptors.
3.4. Product perception and evaluation
Hassenzahl and colleagues (Hassenzahl et al., 2000; Hassen-
zahl, 2001, 2003) argued that the perceived qualities of an inter-
active product can be divided into instrumental, pragmatic and
non-instrumental, self-referential, hedonic aspects (see also Batra
and Ahtola, 1990). Pragmatic quality refers to a judgment of a
product’s potential to support particular ‘‘do-goals” (e.g., to make
a telephone call) and is akin to a broad understanding of usabil-
ity as ‘‘quality in use.” Hedonic quality is a judgment with regard
to a product’s potential to support pleasure in use and owner-
ship, that is, the fulfilment of so-called ‘‘be-goals” (e.g., to be ad-
mired, to be stimulated).
The present study used an abridged version of the AttrakDiff2
questionnaire (see Hassenzahl and Monk, in press) to measure
product perceptions and evaluation. It consists of 10 seven-point
semantic differential items, four to measure pragmatic quality
(confusing–structured,impractical–practical,unpredictable–predict-
able,complicated–simple), four to measure hedonic quality (dull–
captivating,tacky–stylish,cheap–premium,unimaginative–creative)
and good–bad and beautiful–ugly as measures of general product
evaluation. Hassenzahl and Monk (in press) already used the
abridged version of the questionnaire on four, heterogeneous sam-
ples (number of participants = 607, number of products = 110). In
those study, internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha) for the com-
posite scales was good (ranging from .79 to .95), while scale in-
ter-correlation remained low (ranging from .00 to .52, with an
average of .24), suggesting good discriminant validity.
In the study at hand, internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha) of
the pragmatic and hedonic quality scale was satisfactory (.70 and
.75, respectively). Scale inter-correlation was significant, due to
the large sample size, but clearly smaller than the internal consis-
tencies (r= .38, p< .01). A principal component analysis (varimax
rotation) with two components to be extracted revealed a satisfac-
tory solution, with cheap–premium as the only problematic item,
loading on both components. This suggests cheap–premium to be
close to the general evaluation of the product – its ‘‘goodness.”
We nevertheless kept the scales in their original form to facilitate
comparison with previous studies.
3.5. Attribution
Need fulfilment and affect are direct enquiries into experience,
whereas product perception and evaluation are rather indirect. The
former is felt in a particular situation (e.g., ‘‘I felt ... that I had
found new sources and types of stimulation for myself”), whereas
the latter is expressed through product attributes (e.g., ‘‘captivat-
ing”, ‘‘creative”). An attribute is the consequence of an attribution
process that relates an experience to a particular object and estab-
lishes it as the cause of this experience. This is akin to affect attri-
bution (see Russell, 2003), where felt arousal and negative valence
is, for example, attributed to a bear (‘‘I’m afraid of the bear”), which
will in turn become an attribute of the object itself (‘‘The bear is
frightening”, which actually means ‘‘the bear is able to cause fear”).
Accordingly, experiences should only be mirrored in product per-
ceptions and evaluation if the product was seen as – at least partial
– cause of the experience. In view of that, we asked participants to
assess the extent to which the product caused the experience on a
five-point scale ranging from very small to very large.
4. Results and discussion
4.1. Experiences
Participants reported a wide variety of experiences, involving
many different interactive products and activities. Frequent exam-
ples of interactive technologies mentioned were computers/lap-
tops, mobile phones, digital cameras, Internet chat, email and
instant messaging, software, television and DVD, mp3-players,
game consoles or navigation devices. The majority of the reported
experiences (72%) referred to one of those technologies, either di-
rectly or indirectly by describing a particular activity (e.g., ‘‘taking
photos”). More uncommon examples were coffee machines, an arc-
welding device, a helicopter, bicycles or a vibrator (11%). For the
remaining 17% of the reported experiences, the technology referred
to was either not stated or described too vaguely. The activities
mentioned in the experience reports ranged from utilitarian (e.g.,
installing a software, information search, problem solving) to he-
donic (e.g., exploring, communicating with friends, watching mov-
ies). Overall, the sample covered a wide variety of experiences and
is, thus, appropriate for further analysis.
Similar to Sheldon and colleagues (2001), we were not successful
in further classifying the content of experiences. The descriptions
were just too different in length, style and depth. However, we clas-
sified experiences as being social, depending on whether it men-
tioned other people explicitly. All remaining experiences were
classified as non-social. This resulted in 204 (of 548, 37%) social
experiences.
4.2. Saliency of needs
Table 3 shows the salience of each need expressed as the mean
experienced intensity, the standard deviation of this mean, and the
95% confidence interval.
Relatedness, stimulation and competence were the most salient
needs in the sample of positive experiences, followed by popular-
ity, security and finally meaning. In other words, if people experi-
enced technology as positive, it facilitated closeness and
communication between people, provided new stimulating in-
sights and opportunities for mastery.
A relation is plausible between certain products or activities
(e.g., TV, family TV watching) and particular types of experience
(e.g., relatedness experience). Unfortunately, the variety of activi-
ties and products in the sample did not allow for a further, prod-
uct- or activity-specific analysis due to difficulties in achieving
the necessary fine-grained categorizations from the reported expe-
riences. However, the classification of social versus non-social
experiences provided the opportunity to check the content validity
of the measurement, because social situations should result in a
higher saliency of relatedness and popularity (i.e., social needs).
In Table 3, the column ‘‘social” presents the point-biserial corre-
lation coefficients of the classification of situation (non-social, so-
cial) with each need. As expected, relatedness was significantly
more salient in social compared to non-social situations (as indi-
cated by the positive correlation). The other social need, popular-
ity, was also positively, but not significantly more salient in
social situations. The remaining individual needs were negatively
correlated (all significantly except stimulation). These results sug-
gest that the fulfilment of one need in a particular class of situa-
tions (here relatedness in social situations) inhibits the fulfilment
of other needs (see Kruglanski et al., 2002).”
4.3. Affect, needs, product perception and evaluation
Table 4 shows the bivariate correlations between affect, needs,
product perception and evaluation. Remember that the mean scale
M. Hassenzahl et al. / Interacting with Computers 22 (2010) 353–362 357
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values of the six needs as well as of pragmatic and hedonic quality
(PQ, HQ) were correlated (see Sections 3.2 and 3.4). To facilitate the
interpretation of the following correlational analyses, we com-
puted a component score (i.e., factor score) by regression for each
need as well as pragmatic and hedonic quality. In contrast to scale
values, component scores have the advantage of being uncorre-
lated. Thus, each bivariate correlation reported represents the un-
ique variance shared by the two constructs. We also computed a
component score to obtain a value for each facet of positive affect
(see Table 4, below row ‘‘Positive”). For positive and negative affect
we used the scale values, because they were nearly uncorrelated
(see Section 3.3).
All needs were significantly correlated to positive affect, ranging
from a low .12 (security) to a high .44 (stimulation) coefficient. In-
deed, the rank order of correlations – stimulation, competence,
relatedness, popularity, meaning and security – mirrors the sal-
ience of needs reported in Table 3. Security and meaning were
the two needs least related to positive affect. Security can be
understood as a ‘‘deficiency need”, i.e., a need that creates negative
affect if blocked, but not necessarily strong positive feelings if ful-
filled. This is in line with the notion that usability or pragmatic
quality is rather concerned with the instrumentality of a product,
but not a source of pleasure in itself. This is also apparent in the
correlations between positive affect, and product perceptions
(i.e., pragmatic and hedonic quality) and evaluation (i.e., good-
ness). Hedonic quality was more strongly related to positive affect
than pragmatic quality. Finally, the correlation between positive
affect and goodness emphasizes the role of experienced affect in
the evaluation of a product. In fact, one may think of product eval-
uation as a form of attributed positive affect. Being confronted with
the necessity to evaluate a product on a ‘‘good–bad”-dimension,
people may probe their experienced positive affect and then base
their judgment on the result of this probe. The correlations of neg-
ative affect with product perception and evaluation were small,
but nevertheless significant. Experienced negative affect was asso-
ciated with a less favourable overall evaluation and reduced prag-
matic quality. At first glance, the positive correlation between
negative affect and hedonic quality seemed puzzling. However,
taking into account the close association of need fulfilment with
hedonic quality (as a form of attributed need fulfilment, see Sec-
tion 4.4), this can be viewed as a consequence of the apparent po-
sitive correlation between negative affect, meaning, and
competence. In fact, for meaning, the correlation with negative af-
fect was stronger than with positive affect, that is, the more mean-
ing the more negative affect. One explanation for this is that
meaning might just not be important or even inappropriate in
the context of experiences with interactive products. For exam-
ple, ‘‘to feel a sense of deeper purpose” is surely an important
aspect of life events, however, to imagine situations in which a
contemporary mobile phone or a computer game creates such
an experience seems difficult. Another explanation would be that
meaning is predominantly created through negative experiences,
in the sense of an outcome of going through something emotion-
ally difficult. The relation between competence and negative af-
fect seems more straightforward, emphasizing the ‘‘bitter–
sweetness” of competence experiences. Other than stimulation
or relatedness, competence pleasure is derived from taking up
challenges and their subsequent mastery. This implies a certain
risk of failure as an integral part of the experience and a poten-
tial source of negative affect. Again, this emphasizes the qualita-
tive differences between categories of experience. The general
need fulfilment was substantially correlated with negative affect
(.24). This is in large part due to meaning. Given meaning was
removed from the general need fulfilment, the correlation
dropped to a low .12.
The further analysis of the facets of affect revealed a remarkable
qualitative difference. Affective experience as measured with PA-
NAS can be (1) active, strong, proud, determined and alert or (2) ex-
cited, enthusiastic and interested. The former was most closely
associated with competence needs, that is, action, challenge and
the successful attainment of do-goals. The latter was more closely
associated with stimulation and relatedness needs, that is, novelty,
curiosity and social relationships. This indicates an important qual-
itative difference in the experience of need fulfilment. Although
competence was definitely a source of pleasure, the resulting plea-
sure differed from the type of pleasure caused by stimulation or
relatedness. Thus, one may understand experiences as clusters of
particular situations, actions and feelings, revolving around a par-
ticular need, which ‘‘colours” the entire experience. The third facet,
inspired and attentive, was not strongly linked to need fulfilment.
Table 3
Mean experienced intensity of needs (standard deviation, 95% confidence interval)
and their correlation with whether the situation was social.
Need Mean (SD) 95% CI Social
Lower Upper (0 = No, 1 = Yes)
Relatedness 3.26 (1.40) 3.14 3.37 .38
**
Stimulation 3.25 (1.26) 3.14 3.36 .08
Competence 3.09 (1.27) 2.99 3.20 .16
**
Popularity 2.69 (1.17) 2.59 2.79 .08
Security 2.63 (1.24) 2.52 2.73 .17
**
Meaning 2.40 (1.19) 2.30 2.50 .14
**
General 2.89 (0.90) 2.81 2.96
p< .05.
**
p< .01.
Table 4
Bivariate correlations between affect (positive, negative), needs and product perception and evaluation (pragmatic quality [PQ], hedonic quality [HQ], goodness [GOOD, bad–
good]).
Affect Needs Product perception and evaluation
Stimulation Competence Relatedness Popularity Meaning Security General HQ PQ GOOD
Positive .44
***
.29
***
.26
***
.24
***
.17
***
.12
**
.62
***
.46
***
.28
***
.45
***
Active,strong,proud, determined and alert
.21
***
.45
***
.01 .24
***
.24
***
.23
***
.57
***
.33
***
.21
***
.31
***
Excited,enthusiastic and interested
.47
***
.08 .33
***
.06 .02 .02 .31
***
.34
***
.23
***
.41
***
Inspired and attentive
.01 .03 .14
**
.07 .07 .12
**
.07 .06 .02 .03
Positive .03 .12
**
.02 .08 .32
***
.09
*
.24
***
.12
**
.09
*
.16
***
*
p< .05.
**
p< .01.
***
p< .001.
358 M. Hassenzahl et al. / Interacting with Computers 22 (2010) 353–362
Author's personal copy
This is also supported by the missing links between this facet and
any measure of product perception and evaluation.
To summarize: need fulfilment was related to positive affect; it
might be understood as a source of pleasure. Here, stimulation,
relatedness, competence and popularity play a prominent role.
Our results further demonstrated qualitative differences between
experiences, which support the notion of different categories of
experience, each revolving around a particular need as well as pro-
viding a particular set of emotions attached to specific situation
and actions (e.g., the bitter–sweet experience of competence,
strongly tied to goal-oriented behaviour and challenge). Finally,
product perceptions and evaluation are clearly related to the expe-
rience of affect, highlighting the integral nature of emotions in the
context of product use and experience. As expected, hedonic qual-
ity was more related to positive affect than to pragmatic quality.
This supports the idea of hedonic quality as a ‘‘motivator”, captur-
ing the product’s ability to create positive experience and prag-
matic quality as a ‘‘hygiene factor”, enabling the fulfilment of
needs through removing barriers and, thus, dampening negative
affect but not being a source of positive experience in itself. The
following section further expands on the connection between
needs and affect on the one hand, and product perception on the
other hand.
4.4. Linking needs and affect to product perception
Hassenzahl (see Hassenzahl, 2003, 2008) understands hedonic
quality as a product perception directly related to fulfilment of
needs, that is, hedonic quality subsumes product attributes that
signal potential need fulfilment. In fact, the bivariate correlation
between the general saliency of needs and hedonic quality was
strong (r= .50, p< .001). Hedonic quality was also positively re-
lated to positive affect (r= .46, p< .001) (see Fig. 1a, coefficients
in brackets).
A question at hand is whether the effect of need fulfilment is
mediated by positive affect or whether there is a direct link be-
tween need fulfilment and hedonic quality. The mediation model
implies that need fulfilment leads to positive affect, which in turn
impacts hedonic quality. The direct model implies that people are
matching experienced fulfilment of needs with their product per-
ception, that is, they attribute a certain ability to fulfil needs to
the product directly in the form of particular product attributes
Notes: In brackets are bivariate correlations, all remaining coefficients are β-weights.
Need fulfilment
Positive affect
Hedonic quality
.35 *** (.50***)
(.62***).25*** (.46***)
Indirect effect= .12***
(a) Hedonic quality – Mediation
Need fulfilment Hedonic quality
.09
Attribution x Need fulfilment
.24* .19***
Attribution
(b) Hedonic quality – Moderation (Positive affect controlled)
Positive affect
Hedonic quality
-.14
Attribution x Positive affect
.65***
(c) Hedonic quality – Moderated mediation (Need fulfilment controlled)
Attribution
-.25
Fig. 1. (a) Mediation, (b) moderation, and (c) moderated mediation analyses for general need fulfilment, positive affect and hedonic quality.
M. Hassenzahl et al. / Interacting with Computers 22 (2010) 353–362 359
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(e.g., ‘‘I had a stimulating experience” – ‘‘the product is novel, cre-
ative”). Note that all subsequent analyses are correlational in nat-
ure. The suggested flow from need fulfilment and affect to product
attributes, and the thereby implied causality, is solely based on
theoretical considerations. In general, however, we refrain from
any strong notions of causality and assume a rather flexible, even
bi-directional configuration (see Hassenzahl and Monk, in press),
where experience (needs fulfilment, affect), for example, form
product attributes, which in turn impact future experience.
A mediation analysis with a regression of general needs and po-
sitive affect on hedonic quality (Fig. 1a) revealed a partial media-
tion, with a significant direct effect of general needs on hedonic
quality (b= .35, b= .85, SE = .12, t= 7.25, p< .001) and a significant
indirect effect via positive affect (indirect effect = .12, Sobel’s
Z= 4.73, p< .001; positive affect: b= .25, b= .31, SE = .06, t= 4.93,
p< .001). A further analysis of the direct effect with attribution
as moderator (controlling for positive affect, see Fig. 1b) showed
a significant moderation effect (general needs attribution:
b= .24, b= .16, SE = .07, t= 2.23, p< .05), a significant effect of attri-
bution (b= .19, b= .17, SE = .04, t= 4.84, p< .001) but not of general
needs on hedonic quality (b= .09, b= .23, SE = .28, t= 0.82, p> .05).
In other words, the relation between fulfilment of needs and hedo-
nic quality perceptions is direct but depends on whether the par-
ticipants attributed the experience to the product. This is a first
glimpse on the processes linking product experience to product
perception and evaluation.
A similar analysis was performed for the indirect effect (Fig. 1c),
which is a case of a so-called moderated mediation (Preacher et al.,
2007). We used the MODMED-Macro for SPSS (Preacher et al.,
2007) to determine whether a conditional indirect effect of general
needs on hedonic quality via positive affect exists. Indeed, control-
ling for general needs, positive affect attribution was the sole
remaining significant predictor for hedonic quality (b= .65,
b= .13, SE = .04, t= 3.64, p< .001; positive affect: b=.14,
b=.17, SE = .14, t=1.36, p> .05; attribution: b=.25,
b=.22, SE = .12, t=1.90, p> .05). In other words, the more peo-
ple believe the product to be important for their experience, the
more they let their experienced positive affect impact their judg-
ment of hedonic quality. In sum, whether people perceived a prod-
uct as hedonic depended on the extent of need fulfilment and
positive affect during the experience and the belief that the prod-
uct accounts for this experience.
General salience of needs was related to pragmatic quality
(r= .23, p< .001) and positive affect (r= .62, p< .001). Positive af-
fect was related to pragmatic quality (r= .28, p< .001) (see
Fig. 2a, coefficients in brackets). As expected, a mediation analysis
(Fig. 2a) showed that the direct link between general needs and
pragmatic quality was spurious (b= .10, b= .24, SE = .13, t= 1.83,
p> .05), whereas the indirect effect via positive affect remained
significant (indirect effect = .14, Sobel’s Z= 3.89, p< .001; positive
affect: b= .22, b= .28, SE = .04, t= 4.00, p< .001). A further moder-
ation analysis of the direct effect is unnecessary because of its
insignificance. The link between positive affect and pragmatic
quality was not moderated by attribution (controlled for general
needs, see Fig. 2b) (positive affect attribution: b=.24,
b=.05, SE = .04, t=1.16, p> .05; positive affect: b= .31, b= .41,
SE = .16, t= 2.59, p< .05; attribution: b= .38, b= .34, SE = .14,
t= 2.54, p< .05).
All in all, these results lent support to Hassenzahl’s model (see
Hassenzahl, 2003, 2008). First, as expected, a direct relation be-
Notes: In brackets are bivariate correlations, all remaining coefficients are β-weights.
Need fulfilment
Positive affect
Pragmatic quality
.10 (.23***)
(.62***).22*** (.28***)
Indirect effect= .14***
(a) Pragmatic quality – Mediation
Positive affect
Pragmatic quality
.31*
Attribution x Positive affect
-.24
(b) Pragmatic quality – Moderated mediation (Need fulfilment controlled)
Attribution
.38*
Fig. 2. (a) Mediation and (b) moderated mediation analyses for general need fulfilment, positive affect and pragmatic quality.
360 M. Hassenzahl et al. / Interacting with Computers 22 (2010) 353–362
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tween needs and product perception existed for hedonic quality
only. This link between need fulfilment and hedonic quality was
moderated by the extent to which the product was perceived as
responsible for the need fulfilment (i.e., attribution). Thus, hedonic
quality is need fulfilment attributed to the product. Second, indi-
rect effects of need fulfilment on hedonic and pragmatic quality
via positive affect existed (a type of ‘‘halo-effect”, see Thorndike
(1920) and Hassenzahl and Monk (in press), for a discussion in
the context of HCI). One may view this as a spill-over from positive
affect to the underlying processes governing product perception.
However, for hedonic quality the indirect effect was moderated
by attribution in such a way that the more the product was per-
ceived as responsible, the stronger the indirect effect. Positive af-
fect may be understood as a core outcome of needs fulfilment
and, thus, as a legitimate predictor of hedonic quality.
5. Conclusion
In analogy to Sheldon and colleagues’ (2001) work on satisfying
life events, the present study explored the idea of the fulfilment of
basic needs as a source of positive experience with interactive
products and technologies (e.g., mobile phones, mp3-playes, navi-
gation devices). We selected 7 out of the 10 suggested needs that
we found especially appropriate and promising in the context of
interactive technologies. The present study’s results suggest that
experiences can indeed be categorized by the primary need they
fulfil. Our study further revealed a clear relationship between need
fulfilment and positive affect, with stimulation, relatedness, com-
petence and popularity being the salient and contributing needs.
Moreover, the results hint at qualitative differences at least be-
tween competence and stimulation or relatedness experiences.
The actual need was also reflected in the particularities of the
affective experience, with stimulation and relatedness having been
accompanied by positive excitement and interest, whereas compe-
tence was accompanied by strength, activity and a mixed (positive,
negative) affective experience. Our final analysis of the link be-
tween need fulfilment, affect and product perception provided an
insight into the underlying processes that transform experiences
into product perceptions. As expected, need fulfilment was related
to hedonic and not to pragmatic quality perceptions. Whether
experienced need fulfilment was subsequently reflected in hedonic
quality perceptions depended on the belief that the product was –
at least to a certain extent – responsible for the experience (i.e.,
attribution). The evident, but small correlation between general
need fulfilment and pragmatic quality was entirely mediated by
positive affect – in other words a ‘‘halo”-effect.
5.1. Implications
The present study has a number of implications. First, it pro-
vides a first structural model of positive experiences – based on
sound psychological research – which can be used to describe
and classify experiences with interactive technologies. This model
focuses on the communality, the core, of experiences. Although we
acknowledge the huge variety in individual experiences, we argue
that they can be classified nevertheless by focusing on the primary
basic human need fulfilled through the experience. This approach
unifies existing approaches and replaces them with a tried and
tested, and essential collection of independent experience
categories.
Second, the ability to describe particular categories of experi-
ence is an important step towards experience design. Future work
will relate specific requirements and design resources to each cat-
egory of experience. To give an example: ‘‘flow” (Csikszentmihalyi,
1975) can be understood as a variant of a competence experience,
highlighting the importance of a match between the challenge
afforded by the task and the skills of the individual. In the same
vein, randomness as a design resource or the notion of ‘‘serendip-
ity” (e.g., Leong et al., 2008) might be central to stimulation expe-
riences, whereas emotional expressiveness might be associated
with relatedness experiences (e.g., Vetere et al., 2005). The cate-
gory system we developed bears the opportunity to integrate scat-
tered knowledge about experiences and ways to integrate them
into a coherent model.
Third, the present study showed that experiences can be de-
scribed and evaluated with the employed questionnaires. We be-
lieve this to be a promising strategy for HCI, away from the usual
product-centred evaluation towards an experiential evaluation.
This strategy has a number of potential advantages. First of all, it
might be easier for people to describe their experiences with a
product compared to describing the product itself. The former is
a personal, highly subjective task, whereas product-oriented eval-
uation often raises the question on behalf of the participant,
whether she or he has the competence or right to judge the prod-
uct. In other words, it might be easier to answer the question of
whether ‘‘I experienced something new while interacting with a
product” than the question of whether a product is ‘‘novel.” In
addition, experiences are per se personally meaningful, whereas
product perceptions and evaluations always require a process,
which transforms anticipated or experienced need fulfilment into
product attributes. Moreover, experiential evaluation might enable
us to compare the results of empirical evaluations of different
products or even product genres, due to the universal nature of
experiences. Finally, the finding that experience is only reflected
by relevant product attributes, if an attribution process took place,
that is, if people believe the product to be responsible for their
experience, highlights the necessity to consider both, product-ori-
ented and experiential evaluation. Otherwise, we might miss all
the cases where a product creates an experience, but people never-
theless dismiss is, because of a missing link between experience
and product.
Fourth, the present study lent further support to the idea of he-
donic quality being a ‘‘motivator”, capturing the product’s per-
ceived ability to create positive experiences through need
fulfilment and pragmatic quality being a ‘‘hygiene factor”, enabling
the fulfilment of needs through removing barriers but not being a
source of positive experience in itself. This evidence defies any
model that assigns value to pragmatic quality or usability in itself.
One might argue that security experiences are the true objective of
all attempts making a product pragmatic. Note, however, that
security is only weakly related to positive affect. This is in line with
Sheldon and colleagues’ (2001, Study 3) results, which showed that
the absence of security played an important role when asking peo-
ple explicitly about negative experiences (which was not done in
the present study), but did not contribute largely to positive expe-
riences. In fact, security can be viewed as a ‘‘deficiency need” (Ma-
slow, 1954), that is, a need which creates a negative feeling if not
fulfilled, but does not contribute much to a positive feeling. This
is the essence of a ‘‘hygiene factor” as explained above.
5.2. Limitations and future work
There are at least three limitations of the present study, which
require some discussion. Obviously, the present results strongly
depend on the obtained sample of experiences. Although we used
multiple ways of distributing the study to reach diverse people,
worked with a sufficiently large sample and captured a wide vari-
ety of different experiences (and embedded technologies), it can-
not be ruled out that future studies will produce different results.
Note that this holds true only for the rank order of needs according
to their saliency. All correlational analyses, such as the principal
M. Hassenzahl et al. / Interacting with Computers 22 (2010) 353–362 361
Author's personal copy
components analysis on the needs questionnaire, the general link
of need fulfilment to positive affect and the way need fulfilment
is transformed into product perceptions should be reproducible.
The saliency of needs, however, clearly depends on the sample of
experiences. However, it rather reflects the distribution of experi-
ences provided by currently available technology and should not
be confused with a ranking of importance. Basically, all needs are
important and meaningful to people and it is the task of designers
to create interactive products that provide the full range of possible
experiences.
Admittedly, the selection of needs explored in the present study
was based on our preconceptions. It would be premature to declare
stimulation, relatedness, competence and popularity as the defi-
nite set of possible positive experiences with interactive products.
Physical striving, for example, may become more and more impor-
tant (see ‘‘physio-pleasure”, Jordan, 2000), given the proliferation
of interaction technologies, such as Nintendo’s Wii or Apple’s iPhone.
In addition, other authors provided differing lists of needs, which
may capture experiences not covered by the present study, such
as a competition experiences or the experience of collecting and
preserving meaningful things (see Reiss and Havercamp, 1998).
We are looking for future studies on further needs, leading to a
comprehensive set of experiences meaningful to people.
Similar to Sheldon and colleagues (2001), we found that the
descriptions of experiences provided by the participants were too
heterogeneous in length, style and depth to further classify them.
However, product-, situation- or activity-specific profiles would
have been an interesting outcome. They could be used, for exam-
ple, as a validation of the need questionnaire, to better understand
broad differences in product genres or to reflect upon certain prod-
uct features from an experiential perspective. One step into this
direction was our attempt to distinguish between social and non-
social situations and the reassuring finding that social situations
are especially marked by salient relatedness experiences. Future
studies should employ a more structured way of having partici-
pants describe the experience, for example, by asking explicitly
for a product category or the number of people involved. This will
enable us to understand situations, activities and product features
in terms of the experience they provide.
User experience as a discipline is just in its infancy. Some of its
key assumptions, such as its subjective nature, context-depen-
dency and temporality are already widely accepted (e.g., Law
et al., 2009). It also seems self-evident that people concerned with
the design of interactive products ultimately aim at providing po-
sitive experiences. What is needed now is a better understanding
of the particularities of positive experience, that is, sources for
and types of pleasures and techniques to evoke and to shape those
experiences. We hope the present study to be a step towards this
goal, by providing a framework to organize knowledge about User
experience in a psychologically meaningful way.
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