UX Case Study:
InnerSpace
Digital Concept for university students who suffer from symptoms of impostor syndrome.
- Team Project
- Agile Development, SCRUM
- 4 weeks
InnerSpace - Overview
Impostor Syndrome(IS) is a psychological pattern in which an individual goes through an internal experience that affects a sense of self-worth. IS reduces self-confidence, causes stress and anxiety, and makes a person suffer from a lack of professional progression at some time in life. All of which, if it’s unaddressed, has a negative impact on one’s wellbeing and that is why we came up with InnerSpace.
The Client (fictional)
What would happen if you could have a partner in crime who would help to overcome your struggles? InnerSpace is for people suffering from impostor syndrome. It focuses on helping them with personalized activities and guidelines based on their needs and accompanies them in their journey of becoming their true self.
The Audience
College students suffering from impostor syndrome and its symptoms.
The Challenge
How can we use AI and machine learning to create a digital solution that helps students to overcome the symptoms of impostor syndrome?
My Contribution
This is a summary of my contribution to the InnerSpace project. Even though I was actively involved in the whole process, these are the hats that were the most enjoyable for me to put on.
Project Management
As a Project Manager I prepared a visual representation suitable for our process. Subsequently, I supervised the proper implementation of all steps and the execution of our strategy. This approach helped my team and me keep up with the tasks, focus on the right things at the right time, and mostly focus on delivering outputs.
UX Researcher
As a UX Researcher I put my hands on collecting insights regarding the target audience. Predominantly, I got involved as an interviewer asking questions about imposter syndrome. These questions have helped us discover the extent to which people’s lives are affected by this mental-health struggle. I was also the main facilitator of user testing during our design process.
UI Designer
As a UI Designer, I took care of the design process. I made sure that the conceptual goal was achieved through visual design when creating mock-ups and prototypes.
InnerSpace - The Development Process
Firstly, given a four-week time span, our team decided to follow agile development methodology which refers to rapidly building a desirable solution with constant interaction with the end-users. Therefore, by following this method we split our process into three individual sprints. The result of each sprint is to deliver a testable prototype in order to go through an iterative design process.
You can choose which part of the process you want to look into. Have fun!
The Concept Development
Secondary Data Collection
Firstly, the process began with online desk research that focused on understanding the obstacles impostor syndrome creates in one’s life. That way, we framed a playground for our project and got to understand the seriousness of the topic.
As a result, the research uncovered the following information:
Impostor syndrome affects more women than men up to 70% of the world population students as a result of an academic life
Universally, the symptoms of impostor syndrome group into 5 types:
Expert
Perfectionist
Soloist
Natural Genius
Superman
Primary Data Collection
Then, we set hypotheses. To clarify, we based these hypotheses on general statistics. Therefore, they only scratched the surface of information about the target audience – college students.
After that, we challenged the assumptions with our primary data collection. At first, an online survey was carried out, collecting data from 68 students out of which:
The survey pointed at the areas which needed further exploration:
- the impostor type
- the emotional level
- the areas of awareness, and resources for coping with IS.
In order to get a better insight into the needs of students, five unstructured interviews were conducted. Before that, we screening the interviewees based on their previous experiences with impostor syndrome.
The key insights from the interviews showed that the respondents feel: insecure, sensitive, angry, sad, and unproductive. The students also doubt themselves and they feel stuck. In addition, they often isolate themselves and close up in their worlds. Furthermore, they do not know how to ask for help or help themselves and they lack progress in their life.
User Stories
To summarise the insights, user stories were formed as an actionable plan for further process. The individual user stories pointed at specific features/functionalities for the concept that were desired by the students.
Additionaly, the stories focused on the end goal, and therefore these elements would bring value to their lives.
As who I want what so I can why.
To sum up, all the user stories were considered valuable insights. Nevertheless, the most relevant ones are those highlighted in a salmon colour.
Sketches
To define the concept and illustrate how it should look like, we drew sketches. Each of the features on the sketches was created to fulfill the user’s needs.
The sketches consisted of an onboarding process with a test that will collect the data for the ML to learn about the user. Then, there will be a “Reflection/ Journal” section so the ML can generate content according to the progress of the user.
Lastly, there will be an “Activities” section where the user will have recommended activities.
The “Profile” section will include the settings and the progress of the user in a form of an art board.
Paper Prototype
In conclusion, the key suggestions for the concept were:
- The onboarding should explain the concept idea + value it can bring to users
- Include a checkbox at the beginning to ask the user how much time they want to spend on the app and how much learning they want to do per day
- Show appreciation in the middle of the test/reflection/journal to keep the user motivated
- Send motivational tips to keep the user motivates using AI/ML statistics
- In the profile section, the artboard should be visible. It would be more encouraging to see the progress and have it personalized. Moreover, as the user improves the art changes, this explanation should be included in that section
Empathy Map,
Value Proposition Canvas
To conclude sprint 1, we used an empathy map to unify the insights into the users. That way, we were able to map as-is and to-be scenarios. The main goals for the users are:
- have a sense of belonging
- develop self-confidence in specific situations
- take care of themselves.
Most importantly, the challenges they are facing: intrusive thoughts, comparison, and feeling stuck. When tackling these problems the users will be able to reach their goals and learn how to gear with different situations impacted by IS.
Later on, we used VPC to turn these needs into conceptual features.
The concept “InnerSpace” helps users to deal with the symptoms of IS offering services such as digital guidance and personalized content. Similarly, it creates gain by giving a 24/7/365 service and enhancing the importance of mental health. It relieves some pains the user has by giving relevant activities to work on and giving away self-understanding when doing check-ins in the app.
The Design Development
Content Inventory
As the first step to the interface development, the content inventory was made. Here, the ideas from the sketching + insights from the testing came back to life. The navigation across the platform consisted of four sections:
Firstly, the landing page contains a motivational quote that welcomes the users to the InnerSpace app. There is a list of recommended activities, customized to each user based on his impostor type and progress. In addition to that, a list of recently done activities signifies the latest progress of the user.
- list of activities
- motivational quote
Secondly, the explore page works as an activity library with content that helps a user with overcoming his mental struggles. The content can be sorted by name of a mental struggle, category, or activity. The activities are presented in a form of UI cards.
- filters
- search button
- UI cards
- mental struggle categories
Thirdly, the journal page helps a user to map his feelings through checkups which can be taken on a daily basis. The checkups help machine learning to track the user’s progress of how he copes with impostor syndrome. Additionally, this progress is displayed in the form of an artboard on the home page and profile page.
- check-up button
- timelines
- check- up form
Lastly, the profile page has two sections – account information of the
user and progress tracking with artboard. The profile section also includes settings where the user can de/select if he wants to get notifications or not.
- art board
- account info (name, avatar, email)
- setting icon
Data Structure for Machine Learning
As seen in the inventory, the ML collects information from:
- the onboarding test
- the check-ups
- the activity of the user.
Then, based on the collected information the user’s impostor type, level and progress is detected.
The algorithm uses the information for “Recommended activities”. The progress is showcased in the profile section in a form of an artboard.
Lastly, for machine learning the modeler was set up to fit the criteria of detecting impostor type and level.
User Journey
Moving on, we created a user journey to map the interaction between the user and the solution. Above all, the potential pain points were spotted so we turned them into opportunities.
Wireframes
To showcase the user flow wireframes were built.
Most importantly, wireframes also served as a tool to determine the layout and composition of the interface. We achieved that by following the industry standards in order to ensure a user-friendly design that is easy to understand.
Furthermore, wireframes also helped us with maintaining consistency across the whole interface in terms of spacing.
Mood boards & Style Tile
After the wireframes, it was time to dress our concept into fancy clothes. We started building mood boards to unite our vision for the “look & feel” the interface should obtain.
Then, we focused on individual-style tiles. The idea was to combine two concepts; privacy/ safe space, and willingness of working on yourself and improving your lack of self-esteem. These aspects also reflected in the design of the app.
The name selected for the app was InnerSpace, representing the same initials as impostor syndrome – IS. The InnerSpace logo represents how one should take care of his/her inner self.
Mockups
Later on, we designed the mockups according to the style tile that is displayed above.
We built the consistency of the colors and elements, as well as bringing the calmness, safety, comfortable space that we wanted to transmit for the users.
In addition, we established a prototype by interconnecting the mockups.
Usability Testing
Firstly, you have been having mental struggles for a while now. You found this app called “InnerSpace” in the store, downloaded it and now you want to know what it is about.
Now, try to adjust the app setting based on your preferences.
After that, you want to find out which type of impostor syndrome you suffer from/have the strongest symptoms of.
Now, that you know your type try to complete an activity.
As you have made some progress with the activity, maybe it’s a good idea to fill out how you feel after that.
Lastly, your feelings and thoughts have changed. That means there’s a progress in, check it out.
The Digital Solution
Problem Prioritization
As a result, the problems that were found during the testing were listed and prioritized by following the Usability Severity System Tree, according to a grade of severity influenced by three factors: impact of the issue, the number of users affected by it and the repetition of the issue.
Firstly, issues 2 and 6 are classified as critical. 2 has a high impact on the understanding of the concept. 6 needs to be addressed since the naming of the categories might play a crucial role in terms of user understanding. In other words, it’s important for the users to understand what to expect.
Secondly, issues 1,5, and 7 are serious problems that happened repeatedly for many participants. However, these issues didn’t have high impact.
Thirdly, the medium problems are 3 and 8. They had a low impact but the problem was persistent.
Design Iterations
Heuristic Evaluation
To have the prototype validated on a professional level, 5 experts were asked to evaluate the interface based on rules of thumb.
Above all, the results of the evaluation pointed at contents within the interface and opened space for future improvements and potential iterations:
“ add help button to the interface to help users turn to somebody in case they are confused.”
“ improve the hierarchy in filters to avoid misunderstanding.”
“ reduce the noise a bit that is happening in the background.”
Conclusion
Results
Overall, the solution helps students to overcome the symptoms by guiding them through a journey of development and self-growth.
Since the ML predicts the type and level of the user it will showcase suggested activities and resources. To clarify, it’s a tool that functions as an interdisciplinary platform of self-help resources. The goal is that the user will reach their desired outcomes in situations when they are dealing with symptoms of IS (eg: presentation, exam, interview).
Finally, the digital solution has the potential to allow students to gain more self-confidence and overcome the syndromes while providing the possibility to reflect on their progress.
Now, let’s dive into the interactive Figma prototype that will guide through the onboarding experience to the app interface. Enjoy!
Learned Lessons
I must admit that InnerSpace it is one of my favorite projects to this day. I loved how my team and I managed the planning and preparations of the process. The execution of the three sprints ran smoothly. Also, we managed to engage our end-users in the process by constantly asking/observing them. That way, I believe I gained confidence in my project management skills and I am looking forward to seeing how I will use them for the upcoming projects.
Nevertheless, given more time, I would have worked more on the interface design, exploring the wonders of interaction design. Also, I would have put bigger importance on the specific activities taking place in the progress. These would be the next points I would pay attention to.
Lastly, I would like to give a shoutout to my amazing team:
- Andrea Gavira Hernandez
- Silvia Artero Alcaraz
- Virág Sákovitsh
Working with a bunch of motivated people always brings me joy and with these talented ladies, we got along as team colleagues and friends who always have fun no matter the case.
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