Co-Designer
The MoodBabble was designed not just for, but also with the envisioned user. Instead of us making the design choices for her, we have collaborated throughout the whole design phase as co-designers to develop a product that perfectly matches the wishes, expectations and preferences of our co-designer. Continue reading if you want to get to know our co-designer Wendy in more detail.
Co-Designer
For the project "Designing for Specific Users" we were matched to Wendy*. In the first few weeks of the project, we tried to get to Wendy as good as was possible in an online setting. We did not just get to know her struggles but also her hobbies, preferences, motivations, dislikings and so on. We did not just focus on Wendy herself, but, additionally, tried to get to know the people close to her: her family, friends and caregivers. This was done so we could get a good idea of what problems Wendy and her environment encounter and what possible solutions would suit the best. The information was divided into three sections: person, context and activities. The collected information was combined in a persona as well as a storyboard.
NB: Personal information of our co-design participant, like her name, has been manipulated in such a way that it is not possible to trace it back to her. The information shown in the persona and storyboard is, however, still an accurate representation of her.
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Persona
Person
Wendy Smit is a 35-year-old woman. She is diagnosed with a mild intellectual impairment. She lives in Almelo in a 24-hour residential facility in her own apartment, where a caretaker can help her, if needed. On Thursdays, she has daytime activities at team JOY and another company on Tuesdays and Fridays. She likes diamond painting, walking and cycling. Her boyfriend is Kevin de Jong, he is 33 years old and lives in Oldenzaal. Wendy hopes that one day she can live together with her boyfriend. In her daily life, Wendy experiences difficulties with expressing her feelings, stress, anxiety and thoughts. She is able to do basic tasks and chores, like doing laundry and grocery shopping. Currently, Wendy fills in a mood tracker about how she feels at a certain moment. But with this system, she does not always feel heard.
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Activity
Wendy currently uses a mood tracker on paper to fill in how she feels at a certain moment. Her stress occurs due to a variety of different circumstances. She uses the colour green, orange and red to explain her mood. Green, for when she feels quite good, orange when she is not feeling very well, and red if she is feeling very bad. Every mood has a different solution to make her feel better. A disadvantage of the current mood tracker is that when Wendy fills in the mood tracker with the colour red, her caretakers don’t get a notification right away. This results in situations in which Wendy does not feel heard at a time when she needs it the most. It would be convenient for Wendy to use a product where she can track her mood and a notification gets sent to her caretakers, so they can be there for her, when she needs them.
Context
Wendy lives in a small, modern apartment in a 24-hour residential facility. This means that there is always someone present in case something happens. The caregivers, who work in the facility, come by at least once a day to talk with Wendy and, if necessary, to discuss the mood tracker. Her apartment consists of a bedroom, a bathroom, a living room with a kitchen around the corner and a hallway. Whenever Wendy is at home, she has day time activities every Tuesday and Friday. In addition to the general caregivers, Wendy has a personal caregiver to help her with her struggles and assists her with the goals she wishes to achieve.
Storyboard
Introduction to the Impairment
Our co-designer is diagnosed with a mild intellectual impairment. This impairment can vary strongly in severity and occurrence. A person who is diagnosed with a mild intellectual impairment lags behind in conceptual development and social and daily living skills compared to people of the same age. However, they can learn practical life skills, which allows them to function in everyday life with minimal levels of support (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine et al., 2015, pp. 1–3).
This is also the case for our co-designer. She is able to function independently in practical situations like, for instance, cooking, cleaning her apartment, doing the laundry and the groceries. She only needs help with the finances and expressing her mood.
The main issue for our co-designer is expressing her mood, stress, anxiety and thoughts, which are typical symptoms of her impairment. Coping with the mood, stress and anxiety is difficult, as well as finding a solution to feel better. She does not always know how to deal with her feeling, lets feelings build up for too long or does not know how to share them with her care-givers. Something that is more unique for our co-designer, is that she has no issues identifying her own mood: this is not the case for all people with a mild intellectual impairment.