Improve The Isolated Conditions of Relocated Grandparents
A report about a depressed old grandma became popular in April 2022. She got depression after only one year of living in Guangzhou to assist with the care of her grandchild. The mental condition and experience of the relocated grandparents quickly sparked discussion. Source Click Here.
HIGHLIGHTS OVERVIEW
PLANTALK is an EdTech product that helps relocated grandparents learn intergenerational communication by providing a service of a plant product and an app with the assistance of parents and children.
The individual work featured a comprehensive service for four distinct types of grandparents, different educational interventions for parents and grandparents (an App and a plant product), and extensive user testing to get real input on my design.
An article about depression among relocated grandparents was presented in 2021. 62% of them reported feeling lonely and isolated, and 54% reported feeling depressed and sad. Source Click Here.
BACKGROUND
"Migratory Birds" for Grandkids' Family
PRIMARY RESEARCH
SECONDARY RESEARCH
PRIMARY RESEARCH
Grandparents Seem To Isolate Themselves, Even Among Their Family
STAKEHOLDER INTERVIEW
The Shanghai municipal government is building a contact point for mental health services, and present solutions are ineffective for grandparents.
DAILY FLOW
By using the fly-on-the-wall method, I can learn that, while there are some events in the community to help the grandparents adjust to life here, their daily routine is filled with three spots: home, school, and farm market due to housework and grandchildren.
RESEARCH QUESTION
Why are relocated grandparents hesitant to connect with others, particularly with family members?
USER RESEARCH
INTERVIEW
To better understand the grandparents' struggles and true needs, I used a story-telling strategy to encourage them to speak up. I also created personas and customer journey maps for each interviewee type.
"We live as if we were a free nanny for our children's families."
"It's only when I do gardening daily that I feel like my life belongs to me."
AFFINITIZATION
Short-term elderly immigrants lack confidence in communicating with others, particularly family members, for a variety of reasons depending on their personality.
ANALYSIS
Grandparents lack the confidence to express themselves among family, especially among parents
INSIGHTS
Grandparents' needs differ based on their persona
HOW MIGHT WE...
How might we make relocated grandparents feel confident in communicating with parents?
IDEATION
Brainstorm with four insights
I categorized my ideas by impact and difficulty after brainstorming based on four findings.
IDEATION
THEORY OF NVC
Nonviolent Communication Model helps me develop solution
The model of NVC includes two parts: honestly expressing ourselves to others, and empathically hearing others. Both are expressed through four components – observations, feelings, needs, and requests
IDEA
QUICK TESTING THE IDEA
A mobile app for families to learn communication skills
TESTS
HOWEVER...
Quick tests with grandparents revealed their unwillingness to learn with mobile apps...
SERVICE DESIGN
STORYBOARD
To attract grandparents and naturally integrate my design into their daily behavior, I decided to teach families communication skills through the common topic of gardening
TOUCHPOINTS
DAILY ROUTINE
After codesign, I found grandparents regarded their plants as companions.
UJM & SERVICE BLUEPRINT
Bridge the reserved grandparents & parents with an app & a plant
STAKEHOLDER MAP
Make Stakeholders Be Willing to Get Involved
FINAL CONCEPT
Use a plant and an app to teach and evaluate all family members' communication skills
PRODUCT DESIGN
Grandparents learn with a speech-detecting plant to practice communicating
MAIN FEATURE
INCENTIVES
Award A Good Conversation Based on Emotional Flows
TECH SUPPORT
Prototype with Natural Language Processing Models
GRADING BASIS
The emotional flow of the family talk determines the quality of the conversation. The shift from positive to negative is emphasized. Sentiment analysis is used to detect sentiment.
1. DIALOGUE FUNCTION
-Convey Unpleasant Message To Parents
The speech module connects to a speaker and a UNO board, speaks with grandparents to obtain vital information, and sends feedback to the parents' mobile devices.
http://www.smartpi.cn/ is used for dialogue.
2. CONVERSATION GRADING
-Rate A Good Conversation by Sentiment Analysis
Based on the communication quality, the pump will transport fertilizer in accordance with the command.
Following text processing, the sentences can be classified as good, neutral, or negative using sentiment analysis, which serves as the foundation for the rating system. For data visualization, a word cloud is also given.
Parents learn skills and track progress with an educational app
APP SITEMAP
LOW FIDELITY
USER TEST
THINK-ALOUD
ITERATION INSIGHTS
Introduction Quiz
1. Fewer words, more pictures 2.Add options for open-ended questions
Lessons
1. Planting should be moved to Lesson 2. 2. Parents can use the App to grow their virtual plants
Mood ---> Score
1. Use 'Score' to describe the conversation assessment 2. Promote their self-confidence in this function 3. Fewer numbers, more visuals
I conducted a think-aloud test with one parent to test the functionality and flow of the educational app
FINAL APP DESIGN
VISUAL ELEMENTS
MAIN FEATURE
INTRODUCTION QUIZ
Use VISUAL and QUIZ to learn more about grandparents' lives here
1. Display data visualization to inform parents about the present situation of the relocated grandparents. 2. Quizzes on their own grandparents' lives help parents learn more about them and recognize their lack of concern.
3. Detailed questions enable parents to start a conversation with grandparents to get answers.
INTRODUCTION QUIZ
Make a commitment by creating a PLAN and VISION
1. Answer questions about the learning plan in order to increase their commitment and willingness.
2. Saving the quiz as a shared memory with grandparents
LESSON
Learn communication strategies in scenarios by ROLE-PLAYING and BADGE
1. Scenarios and role-playing are used to make learning more engaging and enjoyable
2. Users can be rewarded with badges of various clothing to increase their motivation to learn
SCORE
Use REMINDER and DIARY to motivate users to care about grandparents
1. A red dot will appear when the plant gets an unpleasant message from grandparents to inform parents of the situation 2. Parents can talk with grandparents about the strategies they learned
SCORE
Display the data visualization WEEKLY and MONTHLY to evaluate communication learning
1. Interact with the plant for grandparents 2. Score and word cloud are used to describe the conversation of one day 3. A line graph and progress are used to show the conversation quality of a whole week 4. Experts' suggestions and fertilizer amounts are summarized for monthly analysis
TEST & ITERATION
RESEARCH QUESTIONS
What impact does PLANTALK, in their opinion, have on their intergenerational communication learning?
1. Test the app's high-fidelity prototype among parents 2. Test the plant prototype among grandparents 3. Test the collaboration and communication experience among both parents and grandparents.
USER TEST
Test the Smart Plant and the App Together
REACHABLE IMPROVEMENT
1. Add the function to assess their conversation manually 2. Have the right to choose whether to use automatic assessment.
FUTURE IMPROVEMENT
1. GPT is considered for further improvement in the speaking style of the plant. 2. Open for long-term testing to know the real effect of this learning tool
I tested PLANTALK with a family with 1 grandparent, 2 parents, and 1 kid.
ANALYSIS
ITERATION
Understanding and applying user behavior leads to a natural intervention
Users will lose the motivation to learn if the intervention is too stiff. A natural design focuses on gently influencing users' behaviors and changing users' cognition of learning. By understanding users' everyday routines and interests, a design can better blend into a user's life.
Lack long-term impact and testing
Learning is always a long-term business, thus testing and impact are important. However, as a student project, it was very hard to test the long-term outcome. I want to do more design that has a meaningful influence on people, thus I participated in more commercial works with specific clients in my other projects.
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