DateYourself
Discover, do, and reflect on your hobbies and passions with a new wellness app for college students.
Project Duration: 10 weeks
My Role: User Researcher, Creator, Designer
Hi-Fi Prototype Samples
Problem Statement
College students are physically and socially isolated due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Additionally, they use technology more than they want to.
Personas
User Journey Map
Insights:
Happiness peaked at dinnertime with her roommates.
Motivation followed her school schedule.
Loneliness peaked at night but was present all day.
Opportunity Space:
Elevate motivation and happiness in the afternoon, when her time was less structured.
An afternoon activity could raise her spirits and protect against loneliness.
Design Requirements
Time Management
Encourage users to pursue their hobbies and get off technology.
Link with calendar to leverage users’ free time.
Goal Setting
Allow users to set up goals to do in their free time.
Remind users to complete their goals.
Suggest new hobbies for users to try.
Reflection
Provide space for semi-structured journaling.
Record and display statistics about users’ app engagement.
Storyboard
My storyboard shows how:
The user started with no structure to her free time
Used the app as a productivity tool
The app jumpstarted her day.
Usability Test
I conducted usability tests with four college students. This provided many insights that informed the final design, as well as two concrete suggestions to improve usability.
Unclear '+' Button
Solution: Label the plus button and connect it more clearly to daily tasks
Unclear App Flow
Solution: Provide a Tutorial
Annotated Wireframes
End Hi-Fi Prototype
The high-fi prototype is complete with a tutorial, calendar, journal, and passions recorder and browser. I chose a warm color palette to promote a positive environment that the name of the app, DateYourself, and the app itself, brings to users.
Reflection
This project was a large undertaking on a ten-week timeline, but I worked with my teammates, entirely virtually, to design an app with clear functions and clean aesthetics.
If I had more time, I would have done more preliminary research to better understand the routines and problems affecting the user group. Additionally, utilizing other research methods, such as shadowing users, could have better informed the user journey map.
Overall, this project met and exceeded the goals of the User Centered Design class, and showcases my user research, ideation, and UI design skills.