This book presents emotive design as a new way of connecting design, neuroscience, and machine intelligence to understand and respond to human experience. It explains how human experience is sensed, interpreted, and translated into emotive design. Architecture and the built environment provide the principal context, while the framework has broader relevance to design fields concerned with engagement with physical and digital systems.

The book is organised into three parts. Part I, Brain, establishes foundations through electroencephalography (EEG) and brain–computer interfaces, moving from brainwave-controlled vehicles to neuro-parametric feedback and responses to virtual environments. Part II, Space, examines human responses across spatial conditions, from compact housing to urban environments, before reconnecting measurement with physical adaptation in an EEG-informed shelter. Part III, Machine Intelligence, explores affective EEG datasets, cross-domain inference, and multimodal spatial mapping, linking computational interpretation to design conditions.

Richly illustrated case studies, diagrams, and accessible explanations make developments in EEG and artificial intelligence accessible without requiring advanced technical knowledge. The book appeals to designers, architects, engineers, planners, researchers, educators, and students examining the affective and cognitive dimensions of design in the era of intelligent systems.

Emotive design seeks not smarter environments, but more empathic and intelligible relationships among brain, space, and machine intelligence.

Dr Seung Yeul Ji is Research Professor at the School of Architecture at Hanyang University and Visiting Senior Fellow at UNSW Sydney. His research integrates EEG and AI to investigate human perception, affective responses, and interactions with the built environment. For more than a decade, he has led National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF)-supported research in neuroarchitecture, spanning smart shelters, adaptive systems, heritage environments, and disaster-response design. His publications include contributions to Smart Shelter Space: Where Art Meets Engineering (Mijinsa 2018) and Smart Shelter Space 2: How Digital Technology Contributes (Mijinsa 2020). He has also extended this research into public engagement through documentaries and media programmes with broadcasters including KBS, SBS, and Arirang TV, with project outcomes featured in exhibitions, media coverage, and policy discussions.

Dr Ju Hyun Lee is Associate Professor of Architecture and Computational Design and a Scientia Academic at UNSW Sydney, whose research contributes to architectural design computing and design cognition. He has authored more than 100 research publications, with projects supported by the ARC, OLT, and AKF-DFAT. He is Co-Director of the Advanced Architectural Analytics Lab (A3LAB) and Chair of AKA.Network, and has held academic and research positions in Australia and South Korea. Before joining UNSW, he completed a five-year postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Newcastle and held a Senior Research Fellowship at the University of South Australia. He is first author of Grammatical and Syntactical Approaches in Architecture: Emerging Research and Opportunities (IGI Global 2020), Design Thinking: Creativity, Collaboration and Culture (Springer 2020; 2nd ed. 2025), and Mathematical Thinking and Properties in Architecture: Palladio, Le Corbusier, and Eisenman (Birkhäuser 2025).