Fruitful Mind
We feel you. We hear you. We support you.
The Problem
Mental health in children from Asian immigrant families is often neglected due to cultural beliefs, lack of time, and financial constraints. This neglect can lead to emotional damage and generational trauma. Unfortunately, there is a stigma attached to mental health within many Asian communities, making it even harder for immigrant kids to access counseling services. Our group hopes to bring change to immigrant Asian families by creating a platform for young adults to share their concerns, embrace new perspectives, and find support from each other.
I collaborated with classmates in my UX class to design for social impact.
Empathizing with Immigrant Asian Families
Digging into Cultural Roots
User Interviews
Empathy Maps
Market Research
How can we facilitate a safe-space public discussion?
Coping, Connection, and Reflection
Brainstorming
Low Fidelity Prototype Sketches
High Fidelity Mockups
User Flow Diagrams
Challenge #1: We understand that it's challenging to discuss mental health. Users expressed concern that they don't know how to approach this topic and often associate discussion with guilt or shame because they fear burdening other people with their issues.
Solution: We implemented various activities for people to explore the different areas of mental well-being. For example, we have daily prompts, art, sports, and reflection exercises as a medium for them to express themselves.
Challenge #2: We want to ensure that Fruitful Mind stands out from other social media platforms by focusing on improving mental well-being. How can we achieve this while maintaining our features?
Solution: Users have the option to keep their posts private. All their activities and entries are kept in "My Fruits." My Fruits is like viewing a journal. Users can select past entries, reflect and react to them, and leave comments and notes.
Challenge #3: Fruitful Mind is a community-centered platform. We encourage the users to give and receive feedback and reactions from other users. But we have to consider how we're going to maintain a supportive environment without users feeling limited or threatened. Too much monitoring can hinder fruitful discussion. However, too little monitoring can harm the user's well-being. It also doesn't help the user recognize their negative behavior patterns.
Solution: Our solution was to create a learning module that provides guidance on how users can reflect and change their negative behavior patterns. The learning module includes educational clips and reflection activities to help them understand their actions and thoughts. Depending on the severity of the issue, public discussion may be limited for the user until the user completes the learning module. Given the time limit for this project, this idea is still in its early stages and needs to be further evaluated whether it is feasible.
What I Learned
There's always room for improvement.
"Daily Streak" achievements work due to loss aversion! This can encourage users to complete the Mood Check or answer the Daily Prompt.
Empathizing with the users is powerful. It's to feel what they feel, hear what they hear, and see what they see. It changes how we approach the problem.