Mind Games
💡 The Idea
This project came about through participation in the RSA Design Awards. We had to create a product from a selection of briefs.
📝 Our Brief:
Redistributing Health
How might we design systems that provide seamless and cost-effective access to quality health services for underserved communities?
🎯 Our Focusing Themes:
👦 Youth 💻 Technology 🦠 COVID-19 🧠 Mental Health❓ The Research Question
How does COVID-19 impact the mental health of youth and how can technology-based services improve the mental healthcare experience in 2020?
🧠 My Roles
🔍 UX Research 📝 Wireframing 🧪 Usability Testing 📱 Prototyping📱 About the App
The main idea of the application was to create a service that gave users access to a library of games focused on mental wellness.
🔍 User Research
Based on our research, it was clear that COVID-19 created significant barriers that hinder people from getting the care they need.
The scarcity of mental health resources made it harder to help these groups of people, resulting in:
- Bottling up emotions
- Spontaneous outbursts
- Worsening unhealthy coping mechanisms
📊 Main Trends
- Rise in screen time and gaming practices
- Video games were found to be stress-relieving
- Scientific research showed games were effective in managing mental health
👤 User Personas
17 y/o student and avid gamer struggling with online schooling and maintaining focus during COVID-19.
Bio: Johm lives in the suburbs with his family. He is the youngest in his family. He spends his days going to school, working on homework, going to basketball practice and spending his free time with his friends and family. When COVID-19 hit, it stopped him from having a social life as he was unable to hang out with his friends, while the lack of basketball opportunities stopped him from having the healthy life balance of physical activity.
Frustrations:
- Finds it hard to pass time,
- He finds it hard to maintain concentration and easily get distracted.
- It's very stressful going to online school nowadays and it's been affecting his education, social life
- Trying out new genres of games might be a boring transition.
Goals:
- He wants a way to pass time
- He wants to learn ways to handle his mental wellbeing
- He is an avid gamer so he is willing to try a new service.
21 y/o university student managing stress, work-study balance, and limited gaming access during the pandemic.
Bio: Allison lives in a small dorm with her friends at the University of Waterloo. She spends most of her days going to class, studying, and working her part-time job at the school's front desk. She has no free time as most of her life revolves around her education. With the fear of COVID-19 virus, her inability to see her family and friends outside of her school life and the schoolwork that is becoming increasingly difficult to keep up with, she is more stressed than ever. This is leading her to have a very unhealthy lifestyle.
Frustrations:
- She doesn't have access to high-end gaming PCs or consoles
- Being a student providing for oneself also means she needs to have cost compromises
- She has used mental wellness apps in the past and wants to try something new.
Goals:
- Wants to have a healthy work-study life balance.
- Wants to have access to a service which has a nominal cost and is effective
- She doesn't play games often but is willing to try something new.
✍️ Initial Ideas
We started prototyping for both mobile and big screens. However, based on user surveys showing preference for personal computers for gaming, we shifted focus to big screens for the final prototype.
🧭 The Prototype
🖌️ Design Language
🎮 Final Prototype
