Knowledge portal for evaluating product attractiveness and risk

• US 20050159966A1
• Filed: 01/15/2004
• Published: 07/21/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 01/15/2004
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Ram consulting
• Original Assignee: Ram consulting
• Inventors: Rider, Eugene, Huang, Erh-An, Chen, Xiao, Milkovich, Scott, Brown, Tina
• Granted Patent: US 7,778,898 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/10
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/00 Administration; Management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/00 Finance; Insurance; Tax strategies; Processing of corporate or income taxes

Abstract

A method and system is provided to uniformly evaluate product characteristics and identifying risk factors associated with the products so that a comprehensive scoring system provides an attractiveness score by age brackets and also provides for a consistent quantification process so that an overall characterization may be viewed by a color coded scoring scheme. The scoring system is based on predetermined scores created for age brackets and pre-identified product attributes. Through user feedback a new product may be evaluated using a series of questions that are associated with the predetermined scores producing an overall attractiveness score. Through another set of questions and predetermined mitigation scores, a mitigations score may be developed for the product so that by combining the attractiveness score with the mitigation score and comprehensive product score may be produced indicative of risk. The invention also provides for exploring various categories of characteristics that may lead to particular behavioral responses to the product by age group.

Claims

1. A method of assessing a product, comprising the steps of:

assessing one or more characteristics associated with a product, each of the one or more characteristics having an associated predetermined score based on age; and

generating a risk product score for the product based on each of the one or more assessed characteristics and associated predetermined scores.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the risk product score includes:

one or more attractiveness characteristic score associated with the product; and

one or more mitigation characteristic score associated with the product.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the generating step comprises generating one or more attractiveness product scores for the product based on each of the one or more characteristics.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the generating step comprises generating one or more mitigation scores for the product based on each of the one or more characteristics.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the one or more mitigation scores includes at least one of a caregiver perception, a user perception, a value, and a labeling effectiveness.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the generating step generates the risk product scores based on one or more age brackets.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the risk product score is provided by one or more age brackets.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the generating step generates one or more attractiveness scores and one or more mitigation scores for the product.

9. The method of claim 8, wherein the risk product score is a combination of the one or more attractiveness scores and the one or more mitigation scores.

10. The method of claim 9, wherein the one or more mitigation scores offset the one or more attractiveness scores.

11. The method of claim 1, wherein in the generating step further includes generating the one or more overall risk product score based on one or more age brackets.

12. The method of claim 1, further comprising the steps of:

assessing one or more exploration characteristics associated with the product; and

generating one or more exploration scores based upon the assessed one or more exploration characteristics.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein the one or more exploration scores are provided by one or more age brackets.

14. The method of claim 13, wherein the one or more exploration scores are color coded.

15. The method of claim 12, wherein the one or more exploration characteristics include at least one of a mouthing object, an alternating mouthing and looking object, a rotating object, a insertion (body into object) attribute, a insertion (object into body) attribute, a transferring hand to hand attribute, a banging objects attribute, a dropping objects attribute, a throwing objects attribute, a combining objects, a using appropriately attribute, a representational play attribute, a using imaginatively object attribute, and a testing the limits attribute.

16. The method of claim 1, wherein the one or more characteristics include at least one of a sensory attribute, a physical attribute, and a cognitive attribute.

17. A method for assessing product risk comprising the steps of:

providing predetermined attractiveness scores associated with one or more product attributes and one or more age brackets;

prompting for feedback relating to each of the one or more product attributes; and

computing at least one product score for the one or more product attributes based on the predetermined attribute scores and the feedback.

18. The method of claim 17, further comprising the steps of:

prompting for mitigation feedback; and

generating at least one mitigation score based on the mitigation feedback, wherein the mitigation score provides a mitigation to the product score.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein the mitigation feedback relates to at least one of a caregiver perception, a user perception, a value, and a labeling effectiveness.

20. The method of claim 18, further comprising the steps of:

generating a composite mitigation score associated with one or more age brackets and based on the at least one mitigation score;

generating a composite attractiveness score based on the one or more age brackets and based on the at least one attractiveness score; and

generating a composite product score based on the composite attractiveness score and the composite mitigation score, wherein the composite mitigation score offsets the composite attractiveness score.

21. The method of claim 20, wherein the composite product score is indicative of risk level for a certain age group using a certain product.

22. The method of claim 18, wherein the mitigation score is color coded.

23. The method of claim 17, wherein the one or more product attributes include at least one of a sensory attribute, a physical attribute, and a cognitive attribute.

24. The method of claim 23, wherein the sensory attribute includes at least one of a image attribute, a color attribute, a texture attribute, a movement attribute, a light attribute, a sound attribute, a smell attribute, and a taste attribute, and wherein the cognitive attribute includes at least one of a challenge attribute and an influential attribute.

25. The method of claim 24, wherein the image attribute includes at least one of a no face, a simple outline of a face, a representation of a human face, a representation of a recognizable character, a representation of a generic character, a recognizable object, and an abstract recognizable image.

26. The method of claim 24, wherein, the color attribute includes at least one of a non-primary/neutral color, a primary/bright color, a black and white color, multiple contrasting colors, and a shiny/reflective color.

27. The method of claim 24, wherein, the challenge attribute includes at least one of opportunity for intellectual challenge and no opportunity for intellectual challenge.

28. The method of claim 23, wherein the physical attribute includes at least one of no physical opportunity, encouraging gross motor skills, encouraging individual fine motor skills, and interactive physical activity attribute.

29. The method of claim 17, further comprising the steps of:

providing one or more predetermined exploration scores having one or more exploration attributes and one or more age brackets;

prompting for feedback relating to one or more exploration questions, each of the one or more exploration questions having an associated one of the one or more predetermined exploration scores; and

generating an exploration summary score based on affirmatively answered questions of the feedback and corresponding associated one or more predetermined exploration scores associated with the affirmatively answered questions, the exploration summary having the one or more exploration attributes and the one or more age brackets,

wherein the exploration summary is indicative of behavior preferences by the one or more age brackets and the one or more exploration attributes.

30. The method of claim 29, wherein the one or more exploration attributes include at least one of a mouthing object, an alternating mouthing and looking object, a rotating object, a first insertion attribute, a second insertion attribute, a transferring hand to hand attribute, a banging objects attribute, a dropping objects attribute, a throwing objects attribute, a combining objects, a using appropriately attribute, a representational play attribute, a using imaginatively object attribute, and a testing the limits attribute.

31. A method for assessing product risk comprising the steps of:

providing predetermined attractiveness scores associated with one or more product attributes and one or more age bracket;

providing predetermined mitigation scores associated with one or more mitigation categories and the one or more age bracket;

generating a composite attractiveness score and a composite mitigation score based on feedback; and

generating a composite product score based on a difference between the composite attractiveness score and the composite mitigation score for an age group.

32. The method of claim 31, wherein the composite product score is indicative of at least one of behavioral attractiveness and risk.

33. The method of claim 31, further comprising the steps of:

providing one or more predetermined exploration scores having one or more exploration attributes and one or more age brackets;

prompting for feedback relating to one or more exploration questions, each of the one or more exploration questions having an associated one of the one or more predetermined exploration scores; and

generating an exploration summary score based on affirmatively answered exploration questions using the one or more predetermined exploration scores associated with the affirmatively answered questions,

wherein the exploration summary is indicative of behavior preferences by the one or more age brackets and the one or more exploration attributes.

34. The method of claim 31, wherein the one or more product attributes include at least one of a sensory attribute, a physical attribute, and a cognitive attribute and the one or more mitigation categories includes at least one of a caregiver perception, a user perception, a value, and a labeling effectiveness.

35. A system for assessing product attractiveness and risk, comprising:

a means for providing predetermined attractiveness scores associated with one or more product attributes and one or more age brackets;

a means for prompting for feedback relating to each the one or more product attributes; and

a means for computing a product attractiveness score for the one or more product attributes based on the predetermined attribute scores and the feedback.

36. The system of claim 35, further comprising:

a means for prompting for mitigation feedback; and

a means for generating a mitigation score based on the mitigation feedback.

37. The system of claim 35, further comprising a means for generating a composite product score based on a difference between the attractiveness score and the mitigation score.

38. The system of claim 35, wherein the composite product score is indicative of risk level.

39. The system of claim 35, wherein the mitigation score and attractiveness score are color coded.

40. The system of claim 35, further comprising:

a means for providing one or more predetermined exploration scores having one or more exploration attributes and one or more age brackets;

a means for prompting for feedback relating to one or more exploration questions, each of the one or more exploration questions having an associated one of the one or more predetermined exploration scores;

a means for generating an exploration summary score based on affirmatively answered questions of the feedback and corresponding associated one or more predetermined exploration scores associated with the positively answered questions, the exploration summary having the one or more exploration attributes and the one or more age brackets, wherein the exploration summary is indicative of behavior preferences by the one or more age brackets and the one or more exploration attributes.

41. The system of claim 40, wherein the one or more exploration attributes include at least one of a mouthing object, an alternating mouthing and looking object, a rotating object, a insertion (body into object) attribute, a insertion (object into body) attribute, a transferring hand to hand attribute, a banging objects attribute, a dropping objects attribute, a throwing objects attribute, a combining objects, a using appropriately attribute, a representational play attribute, a using imaginatively object attribute, and a testing the limits attribute.

42. A computer program product comprising a computer usable medium having readable program code embodied in the medium, the computer program product includes at least one component to:

assess one or more characteristics associated with a product, each of the one or more characteristics having an associated predetermined score based on age; and

generate a risk product score for the product based on each of the one or more assessed characteristics and associated predetermined scores.