Design Mechanism Model of Wearing Comfort for Ear-Related Wearables and Its Application Examples

Wearing comfort of ear-related wearable devices is influenced not only by anatomical fit but also by usage motivation, scenario context, and exposure time. Existing ergonomic approaches often emphasize static structural matching and overlook the dynamic evolution of comfort perception during real-world use. To address this gap, a mechanism-based framework is developed to model wearing comfort loss as a time-dependent and context-sensitive process. Self-reported experience data were collected through semi-structured interviews and structured questionnaires under low physical-demand scenarios, including household activities, exercise, and sedentary work. The results demonstrate that comfort loss accumulates nonlinearly with continuous duration of use and varies across usage scenarios and device types. A Logistic exposure-response function is applied to quantify the relationship between usage motivation and wearing comfort loss, showing high fitting accuracy. In addition, a hierarchical static mechanism model is established by integrating auricular shape, external acoustic meatus structure, and auricle-meatus transitional features through weighted ergonomic variables. By coupling static exposure feedback with scenario-specific comfort loss models, a dynamic mechanism model for comfort perception is formed. Design rules, threshold references, and application guidelines are provided to support ergonomic evaluation and comfort-oriented design of ear-related wearables. Validation through application examples confirms strong consistency between model predictions and user-reported comfort perception.