SORMI - Helping students manage their well-being
SORMI is an anonymous chat forum for students to receive and give support to other students. It has journalling features to manage the student's well-being and creates a safe space for students to find communities and support systems.
👋 CONTEXT ABOUT THE PROJECT
Introduction
About the project
SORMI is an app created for students by students with the mission to make mental health a proactive process. SORMI promotes motivation, support and accessibility in the management of mental health among students.
My role & team
My role: Lead UI/UX Designer
Our team: Cross-functional team with 2 engineers, 2 PMs and 1 UX Researcher.
My contributions
As the only UI/UX Designer, I delivered 2 end-to-end designs.
Created two clickable prototypes for concept and usability testing.
Conducted screening surveys and user interviews.
Used research methods such as personas, affinity mapping, storyboards and jobs to be done.
Impact/Outcome
Won second place at Rotman Commerce’s “Launch Your Big Idea” and received funding.
By introducing the JTBD framework, it enabled our team to deeply understand our users' needs, goals, and pain points, leading to a more effective and user-centered solution. It also allowed us to pivot and iterate quickly, improving the overall success of the project.
With the personas I created, it allowed our team to better understand our target users and increased team alignment, resulting in a more user-centered and cohesive design process.
🤔 DESIGN QUESTION
How might we help UofT students who are struggling with mental health issues so they can improve their well-being?
RESEARCH - INSIGHT INTO THE PROBLEM
User Problem
I conducted research with UofT students to understand mental health management issues and identified three main pain points using research methodologies.
TOP 5 Insights from research
Students are encountering challenges such as feelings of being overwhelmed and difficulty in maintaining motivation.
Students often go through their issues alone rather than seeking professional help.
Having a support system is beneficial, but not all students have one.
Many students are not always aware of the early signs of deteriorating mental health.
Journaling and engaging in exercises were effective ways to cope with the challenges students face.
Methods
Survey with 46 students (Link to Survey)
Affinity mapping (Link to Affinity map)
Personas (Link to Personas)
Day-in-the-Life/Storyboard (Link to Storyboard)
Define user's problems
I identified 3 main issues in mental health management for students using research data: motivation, healthy coping mechanisms, and accessibility, which I aim to address in this study.
Social Isolation
Students feel lonely and usually persevere alone.
Lack of Motivation
Students find it difficult to maintain motivation for school due to negative thoughts taking up their minds.
Unapproachable
Due to isolation and the lack of motivation, students struggled to talk to people.
Setting Design Principles
After identifying the key problems faced by users, I established design principles and requirements for the design solution to adhere to.
Safe Space
The design solution should provide a safe environment for students so that they feel comfortable and allows them to be vulnerable. It should help them to share their feelings without being fearful.
Coping Mechanisms
The design solution should promote the student to have positive distractions with supportive communities and healthy discussion. This would decrease the feeling of isolation and loneliness while also increasing motivation and positive thoughts.
Accessible and Personal
The design solution should be easy to use so that they don’t use a lot of their mental capacity to complete features in the solution. It will also be personal so that the solution is enjoyable and fun!
Jobs to be done
After looking at user unmet needs, I created JTBD statements with the team using research insights and JTBD canvas.
As a college student, I want to
be able to improve my mental health through effective self-care and management
so that
I can stay motivated and maintain a strong work ethic and stay focused on my studies.
KEY OUTCOMES
Reduce stress
Increase motivation and work ethic at school
Find effective and healthy coping mechanisms
✨ THE END-TO-END EXPERIENCE ✨
Prototype
✏️ CONCEPT TESTING FINDINGS & ITERATIONS
Design Iterations
ITERATIONS FROM MVP
Home
Our MVP version of the app only had a mood-tracking and journalling feature
What landed:
Most participants liked that they could track their mood and see what they felt each day.
All participants understood that there will be a progress chart for each time they log/track their mood.
What didn’t:
Many participants expressed that they don’t understand how tracking their mood will help with their well-being.
“I’m confused about the benefit of this app.”
Participants said that they don’t think they would take the time of their day to track their moods or even download a mood-tracking app.
From research and feedback, we learned that the social aspect is important, so we transformed the app's main feature into a Q&A/anonymous chatting forum to enhance social connections and support.
Sense of belonging and support can help reduce feelings of loneliness and isolation.
Option to share feelings and gain emotional support from other fellow students.
Motivation to download and use the app.
ITERATIONS FROM MVP
Crafting your Journal
Our MVP version of the journal had a note-taking feature
What landed:
Participants liked that they could journal within the app
All participants liked that you can change the colour of the note
What didn’t:
Many participants wished that the journals were more personalizable.
“I like the feeling of scrapbooking, not writing a document.”
From research and feedback, we added features such as adding stickers, pictures and weather. We also combined the mood-tracking feature into a sticker where they could choose what mood they felt.
Journalling became more fun!
Could add their mood while expressing their thoughts.
ITERATION
Composing Posts
Original concept for creating post (V1):
What landed:
Clear framework on title and text
Tag and images options
What didn’t:
Too general - the forum could become a toxic environment instead.
Design decision:
Make the options more specific to avoid random posts.
Add examples to let users know what kind of content should be posted on the app.
Risks & Mitigations
Since we added a social aspect and we are in a sensitive topic, there are some risks we considered.
Negativity
Risk: The forum can become a cancel/exposing culture and is vulnerable to being a toxic environment.
Mitigation: For instance, students may want to complain about a professor and “name-drop”. This is not healthy so a bot will identify this and flag it.
Sensitivity
Risk: What happens if a post is too personal and traumatic and ends up affecting other students’ mental health?
Mitigation: Students can add a trigger warning to their posts. However, if the student posting is unaware or does not do it, a bot will identify the content of the post and automatically flag it with a trigger warning.
Vulnerability
Risk: SORMI is a place where students are vulnerable and try to find support groups, what if someone takes advantage of this and harms the users?
Mitigation: There will be a reporting system and the user would have to change their username every month or so to remain anonymous.
🎁 PROJECT WRAP-UP
Key Takeaways and Reflections
Importance of Design Principles
Using design principles throughout the process ensures a systematic, organized, and goal-oriented approach. The research methods used also provide a point of reference for future comparisons and evaluations of data.
Triangulating Data
Having a solution in mind before user research can lead to bias and limit the scope of possible solutions, thus it's important to gather user feedback and research data before finalizing any solution.
Timing and Efficiency
Timing is crucial when it comes to prototyping and testing in order to design effective solutions. By prototyping early in the process, it allows for quicker user feedback on proposed solutions.