Forget surveys and focus groups. Verbalized opinions are confounded by cognitive biases that may hide how consumers might "really" feel about a product. At least this is what the emerging field of neuromarketing wants you to think. The potential for exploitation has even generated a Commercial Alert.
Is neuroimaging an effective tool for designing popular consumer products? The basic idea is simple: show participants a bunch of stimuli and record brain activity indicative of positive affect or feelings of reward. Those that generate the best responsiveness can become prototypes for future products. But there can be complications depending on the type of product being created and the stimuli being presented, especially when dealing with a daunting combinational space (see Goebel, 2008 for more).
But putting experimental design aside, isn't there something wrong with assuming that positive affect is the best indicator of a "good" product? Eliciting other emotions, such as sadness, can be just as "good" if not better.
References
Goebel, R. (2008). Response to Karaszewski: Creating significant art products requries the brains of artists. Trends in Cognitive Science, 12, 172-173.
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