2021
UX Challenge Project
5-day independent sprint
Duration: 5 days
Team
Elizabeth Matkiewicz
This is a short 5-day sprint UX project based on a brief from UXchallenge to create an environment for strangers to go through the darkness together. In this project, I concentrated on people who suspect a mental illness or were diagnosed with one. Mental health is important, however, often stigmatized and quite limited in terms of coverage. This is my humble way to chip in the discussion and fighting stigma as well as an opportunity to show what I can achieve working independently for 5 days.
“How can you design an environment where people who are seeking help feel safe to connect and support each other?”
Figma, Unsplash, Word, Notes
UXchallenge suggested that sometimes strangers who have gone through a similar situation can give an advice for those who are going through a similar experience. Additionally from my research turned out that often such a places want to earn rather than help.
Early exploration consisted of literature research, quick online interviews, and a quick overlook of current apps. The data was analyzed and used during prototyping.
After the analysis, sketches were done on first paper, translated to wireframes, and then prototyped in Figma to prepare for quick usability tests.
First, I began with reading about peer support, its importance as well as what is already in place to understand the bigger picture and current state of things. I also looked into the existing apps, read reviews about each, and narrowed down good and bad points in each.
Additionally, I came up with 5 short questions for the participants to get more personalized data and explore preferences. I opted for just 5 questions in order to both get necessary data for my research as well as not to make it too demanding for the participants.
From all the research I gathered, quite often existing apps give an impression of trying only to earn rather than help, therefore seem to be less trustworthy for the users. Another negative aspect was that forums and mentors were not moderated in most cases, which led to cases of cyber-bullying or verbal abuse.
It was clear that people wanted helpful content that could aid them in the navigation of self-help and self-discovery as well as a place that would not feel artificial or "special" but just a place that would look like any other app. That inspired me to concentrate on making the place less like a health app.
After gathering all the research data, first I ideated on a paper. A lot of inspiration came from existing platforms in terms of understanding what possibly could be included and what could be excluded from such an app layout and content-wise. From paper sketching, I quickly switched to wireframing in Figma and then building the content and looks on wireframes. I used a style guide for iPhone and chose the SE model as being the smallest one, to see how much can fit in the smallest screen.
Unfortunately, I was not familiar with UI kits at the time, so I had to build the content from scratch, which took me more time than planned. While I managed to conduct unsupervised usability testing and get feedback, I did not manage to address any.
Moreover, many things were left out of the prototype due to time constraints, so will be described verbally.
This is the version I presented to participants for user testing. As prototyping took more time than I originally planned and I wanted to fit in 5 days' merit, the feedback gained during usability testing was not addressed. In this prototype I wanted to create all the main screens of the app, to give a feeling of how such an app could be as well as what things it could include, rather than concentrating on a concrete user journey or scenario.
Understanding the business side of the app and the inability to have it fully free I opted for some of the content is free. The amount of free content should be covering the basic needs of the user and provide enough recourses for them to navigate their mental health journey. The paid content is viewed as an additional extra the user may want to explore but does not necessarily need.
The first step in future work would be to address the feedback received during the usability testing. It was brought to my attention that some of the screens could have been combined and some of the things should be rephrased because of confusion, which I fully agree with, looking at the prototype with fresh eyes.
Moreover, next time I will evaluate whether it is better to concentrate on general app feeling or should the prototype be created for a concrete scenario or user journey.
Original cover picture: Alexa Suter on Unsplash
Images used in the app: Unsplash
