BraveCircle: Crowdsourced community Mental Health in 72 hours
My Role: UX Designer, Lead UX Writer | Sprint: 72 hours
Project Status: Complete. Submitted to IxD21.
It’s a lonely time. A global pandemic has distanced us more than ever and our spirits are strained. With that in mind, we made BraveCircle to build communities and improve mental health. BraveCircle helps people empathize, have needs met, and be less alone.
BraveCircle also breaks new ground by relying on published clinical research to drive design and functionality. Why invest time and resources in bitesize research when better data already exists? Read the published study here.
Our prompt :
From the GA x CC Creative Jam:
Design a third-party mobile app to help underrepresented creatives access hiring opportunities, showcases, communities, and/or other resources that ultimately empower them and allow them to thrive.
Empathy circle screen: give, receive, come together.
Problem space
How might we improve the mental health of people who are isolated and can’t access mental health care?
(And do clinical-level research in less than 72 hours?)
Our Solution
BraveCircle is not a self-care app, it’s a community care app. It exists to fight two silent epidemics that predate the pandemic: isolation and depression.
Design Goals
To build community.
To empower people to empower others.
To foster empathy, not sympathy.
To empower neurodiverse individuals with mental health concerns to find support, come together, and thrive.
We made:
A support need/request matching system.
A gender and race-blind UX (bias is a silent killer.)
Streamlined connections with the people around you.
Mental health education that’s approachable + science-based.
An intuitive chat system.
Profiles to inform helping and prevent hurting.
Support, Matches, and Learn tabs.
Research
We started by putting users at the core of our design.
Problem space defined, we had 56 hours to spare. We devoted 3 hours to research, relying on established, empirical data rather than user interviews. This allowed us to move quickly and stand on the shoulders of giants- an example of how my background in clinical psychology can bolster a UX team.
We established that:
Minorities are more likely to accept contract work that doesn’t provide mental health insurance.
Creatives are more likely to accept contract work that doesn’t provide mental health insurance, making minority creatives an intersectional group.
Bipolar and schizophrenia are more common among creative professions. Vincent Van Gogh and Mariah Carey are famous examples.
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Design
Low Detail to MVP
With limited time, we brainstormed how we’d address each feature and iterated before developing our MVP.
Home Screen Version 2
Home Screen Revised
Chat and Profile Designs
Revised Profile Design
Takeaways
Focus is key. Developing proto-personas and focusing on core features allowed us to build a polished experience in less than 72 hours.
Great project management = great UX- by ensuring that each of us was allocated and using components, we spent less time on coordination and more on components and animation.
Animation that does not guide distracts. Keep it simple.
UX means authentic inclusion. Authentic inclusion means going beyond convention and never assuming. That meant devoting our limited design time to a walkthrough so that BraveCircle was enjoyed by all users.
