Cultural Understanding of Rice Cooker Design in Turkey

In this paper, we examined the experience process of the rice cookers in Turkey to understand culture’s effect on the acceptance of the rice cooker design. The purpose of this research is to highlight how people experienced the rice cookers, what problems they came across with, and how they solved the problems. First time rice cookers were sold in Turkey was in 2001. With the development of multifunctional cookers, rice cookers are removed from the market. In our research, we used a case study approach; gathered materials that are published about rice cookers, blog posts, newspaper and online magazine articles, user comments and product reviews from the time they were first published in 1999 until 2016; and we conducted interviews with Turkish people. Rice cookers in Turkey initially failed as a design product, but after a while, people discovered new ways to use them. The study shows the importance of meaning for the product’s acceptance by people. How the language is used, what people associate the rice cookers with, and how they conceptualize them affected the way people perceive and use the product. The analysis shows that the perceived context of the rice cooker is the reason for its success and failure in Turkey.