Preference Analysis of Architectural Façades by Multidimensional Scaling and Unfolding

The methods of paired comparison and ranking play an important role in the analysis of preference data. In this study, first we show how asymmetric multidimensional scaling allows to represent in a diagram the preference order that comes out in a paired-comparison task concerning architectural facades. A ranking task involving the same stimuli and the same subject sample further enriched the preference analysis, because multidimensional unfolding applied to the ranking data matrix allows to detect the relationships between subjects and architectural facades. The results show that high curved facade is the most preferred, followed by the medium curved, angular and rectilinear ones. Rectilinear stimuli were always the least preferred and not angularity as expected.