overview
This project tackles the nation-wide epidemic of unhealthy relationships with food. People's relationships with food directly influence their mental and physical health and unhealthy relationships can lead to high levels of depression and anxiety as we have seen with the rise in eating disorders.
My team and I created a mobile application that would allow those struggling to track their emotions with their food to guide them in their treatment process. We hoped that by making individuals conscious of their mood changes with food by showing them a visualization and creating daily tracking practice, people would be encouraged to make healthier decisions around their meal choices. I was designated to be the main UX designer on the project and my main job on this project was synthesizing user research and designing the user interface.
my role
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Designed wireframes
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Created user interface
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human coding in user research
context
11-week project for my Designing for Health and Wellness Class (INFO 468)
Team size: 5
tools
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InVision
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Figma
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iMovie
the design process
01. the problem
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30 Million Americans of all ages and gender struggle with an eating disorder
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1 in 5 women struggle with an eating disorder
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Over 70% of people will not receive necessary treatments due to stigma, misperceptions, lack of education, and lack of access to resources
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Stress from food projects onto other areas of life leading to depression/anxiety
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Physical toll on body from poor eating can result in heart, liver, or kidney disease.
"For so many of us... food is feeling. And as much as we love and gain comfort from eating our favorite foods...our relationship with this basic human function remains complex, nuanced and often irrational."
-Alix Walker, Stylist
02. research
After recognizing the severity of this problem, my team and I delved into research for better data points to go off of for our solution. We wanted to understand what causes people to develop these unhealthy relationships and the types of struggles they face when dealing with them.
Two primary methods of user research were performed to understand our population:
1. competitive analysis of current technologies in this field
2. human coding analysis of personal stories (my main task)
human coding of personal stories
Human coding is the process of analyzing text or videos of an individual's personal story by searching for codes to understand common themes and problems across the target population. I coded two interviews and two videos and below are some example codes I used.
treatment/recovery
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"These days I eat nutritional, well-balanced meals and incorporate healthy exercise into my day
symptoms
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"I didn’t eat, I didn’t sleep and I spent my time either crying or listing reasons why I shouldn’t exist"
causes
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"I didn’t know how to properly control my emotions...I hid them deep down inside"
feelings
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"I didn’t know how to properly control my emotions...I hid them deep down inside"
support
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"My family, close friends, and fiancee were by my side through each phase of the journey..."
competitive analysis
A competitive analysis analyzes the strengths and weaknesses of current competitors on the market to better understand flaws. I analyzed pros and cons of existing application solutions to the eating disorder epidemic.
Stregnths
Weaknesses
Why our solution works better
Eating Disorder Management App
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share progress to collaborate with treatment team
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daily logs of meals
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check-ins for how user is feeling
Rise Up
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extremely intuitive
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positive reinforcement
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set reminders and track progress
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check-ins
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extra resources
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falls short in providing community for user
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does not provide a way to connect with others undergoing similar experiences
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lacks sense of security with sensitive user data
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targets younger audience
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will provide a blog post forum where users can share experiences and advice and receive advice from medical professionals
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Build sense of community for user to provide added benefit and support
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We will implement effective security strategies, ensuring user data is respected with privacy and only be shared if given permission to do so
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We will also make the app feel more welcoming to people of all ages.
Jourvie
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focuses more on how the user feels about their food
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discrete food diary
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analyzes cause of eating disorder
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clean interface
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does not create sense of community for users
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only effective when paired with therapy
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our solution can cater to audiences who lack the means to get help from therapists and dietitians
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We address that most people do not seek treatment while also ensuring it is a companion for therapy
research insights
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Current technologies did not have an effective method of creating a community for the user
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Problems with user privacy in technologies; must be more transparent about the security of this sensitive data.
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Lack of effective platforms for those who are unable to seek professional treatment (many current ones go with therapy)
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Many are overwhelmed with the information about nutrition and feel pressured to eat certain ways, further deteriorating their relationship with food.
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Lost the ability to listen to hunger cues and eat intuitively.
the bottom line: more people are struggling to have a healthy relationship with food today due to increasing external pressure and many are unable to heal the relationship and seek help because of the stigma around the issue.
03. framing the solution
project scoping
From the research conducted, there were two types of users:
1. those undergoing professional treatment
2. those not undergoing treatment, but still struggling with unhealthy eating habits
This solution would be designed for both these groups of people as we noticed that many people outside those diagnosed with an eating disorder are struggling.
user needs
accessible + inclusive
individuals of all ages, genders, and backgrounds are able to use this program (including those who do not receive professional treatment).
personal
must be designed to meet all needs of patients since there are a variety of eating disorders.
secure
data entered and provided by the user must be very secure and users must be feel comfortable sharing with the platform.
design challenge
How might we help people struggling with eating disorders manage their relationship with food, even if they do not receive professional treatment, and simultaneously reduce the stigma?
04. ideation
primary features
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data visualization
to visually depict how the type of food they eat is correlated with the way they are feeling and encourage the user to make choices that make them feel good.
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daily entry & reminders
increase accountability for the user to ensure the user is retrieving accurate information from the platform and will encourage the user to take a more active approach to their health.
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journal entry
create a safe, personal space for the user to share their thoughts and feelings and reflect.
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community forum
create a supportive community for the user to learn from others receive advice. This would also be designed to cater to a wide audience by including advice for various eating patterns.
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privacy settings
add a feature to increase transparency and help them understand how their data is being used and how the application is securing their information
ethical implications
To ensure these features would be used ethically, I was in charge of analyzing potential flaws in our design that could negatively affect the community of users and beyond.
influencing vs. manipulating
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Make sure the design is encouraging and influencing them instead of manipulating them.
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The goal is to empower the user and help them feel more in control of their health --> the user is given full freedom to enter their food data without suggesting food choices for them.
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This will allow the user to reflect and learn what patterns are the best for them -->This solution will not directly fix user's relationship with food, but instead help the user heal themselves.
social norms
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Users of this app are likely to be sensitive to forms of social media.
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Decided to eliminate user profile photos to reduce social pressure and limit the forum content specifically to advice.
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Show advice from medical professionals at the top for more credibility.
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People struggle with their relationship with food in very different ways--> the forum would allow the user to find information relevant to them by filtering by topic or keyword search.
storyboarding
In the process of ideating, I created this user journey to understand how each of the features will affect the user as they use our app. Below is an example of a target user's journey through the solution and how their relationship with food is projected to improve overtime.
Meet Emily, college student who struggles with her relationship with food.
Emily tends to rely on food to help her manage her emotions.
After some time, she improves and feels happier and healthier.
Meet Emily, college student who struggles with her relationship with food.
information architecture
05. iteration
low-fidelity wireframes
After ideating, I translated my team's sketches to low-fidelity wireframes in InVision to better manage the real estate of each screen and make sure we were not overloading the users with information. These wireframes also helped me decide how users would be able to navigate through each screen in the app.
visual language decisions
Avenir Bold
Avenir Light
As the sole designer for this interface, I was in charge of choosing the fonts, color schemes, and icons.
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Chose Avenir as the main font for its clean simple aesthetic and varying widths to create information hierarchy to
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Green has been proven to evoke a sense of calm and healing and I accented it with a baby blue to maintain the relaxed feel of the app.
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Used color only in places where the user's attention was to be drawn to and neutralized the rest of the app with grey. This decision was made to reduce information overload on the user.
09.
06. final solution
daily entry
The first screen shows the different fields the user would enter every day. The app would send three reminders a day for the user to enter in their, what they had eaten, and if they wanted to attach any notes or record any incidents.
trend analysis
Through these screens, the user is able to understand what types of foods have had a positive effect on their emotion or a negative effect. They are able to filter by type of food which will become personalized to them or to see the visualization with all their food.
community forum
This feature was designed to help users connect with others to break the stigma. Users are able to receive and ask for advice from other users and medical professionals. This platform will contain topics related to a variety of eating patterns to be able to cater to our large population's needs as each user will be able to learn more about their specific patterns and behaviors.
journal entries
From this feature, the user is given the privacy and freedom to express their thoughts and emotions to reflect on to understand themselves better. From our research, journaling as been proven to be an effective strategy in changing unhealthy behavior patterns and is thus a strong addition to personalizing the solution.
reflection
This was a really personal project for me and it was really amazing to create a solution for something I have seen so many people in our society today struggle with.
Over the course of this project, the biggest challenge I found was developing features that could really users of all backgrounds without creating too much of an information overload. We decided to include the journaling feature to encourage the user to take part in this daily habit as numerous articles and studies have shown how journaling can help people recognize negative behavior and thought patterns which is largely associated with poor relationships with food. Another large challenge was deciding on a color scheme that would evoke a professional sense and feeling of calmness and healing for the user. I settled with the dark green as green is associated with healing and we picked the light blue to create a sense of peace and calm as entering this personal information can be difficult for some.
In the future, I would like to perform more user testing with this platform to find any areas of improvement or any features that should be added or removed. I would also want to connect this platform with doctors and hospitals to help patients receive professional, medical nutrition advice to help them find comforting and healthy foods to improve their lives.