Fig. 1

Illustration showing how suppository prototypes were presented to study participants. Each participant received her own set of samples to manipulate and examine. Panel a shows the ‘Shape and Size’ tray depicting the four shapes (Long Oval, Sphere, Round Oval, and Teardrop, from Left to Right) in three sizes (Size 1–3; 1 to 5 mL). Panel b shows the ‘Firmness’ tray depicting Round Oval in Size 2 (3 mL) prepared from gels with an increasing firmness level, from Left to Right. (G’ = 250 to G’ = 125,000 Pa at 25 °C). See text for additional details