Objective: This study investigates the relationship between ear anthropometry and design specifications of open-type wireless earbuds for optimum fit.
Background: Recently, wireless open-type earbuds have been provided in a single size, unlike in the past were provided the size variations of earbuds. However, since the ear is a part of the human body with significant individual differences, issues regarding pain and fixation occur, especially when walking and running while wearing wireless earbuds. It is essential to understand the relationship between the cavum concha of the ear and the corresponding design specifications of the earbuds to relieve the user's pain and provide an optimal fit. The existing studies about earbuds focus on kernel-type and hook-type, which considered only the width and height, the design specifications of earbuds. They did not consider the influence of the depth of the earbuds. This study included the width, height, and depth and investigated the effect of design specifications on the cavum concha of the ear.
Method: Thirty-six participants' cavum concha dimensions were measured and asked to evaluate discomfort and overall preference on a 101-point scale by wearing 20 mock-ups of open-type wireless earbuds.
Results: There are four clusters of cavum concha dimensions using hierarchical clustering and k-means clustering, and silhouette score was used to evaluate the quality of the clusters. Also, response surface methodology was used to find out the reasonable design specifications of the earbuds.
Conclusion: Through an experiment, the study reviewed the interaction between the type of concha and the product's design specifications when wearing an opentype wireless earbud. As a result, the research discovered the effect of main factor and interaction on wearing open-type wireless earbuds.
Application: The result of the study can be applied when determining design specifications of open-type wireless earbuds for a comfortable fit and for ear-related products as well.