Regrow
A mobile application rooted in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) techniques that gives people agency, guidance, and resources to better their mental health.
Role: UX Researcher, UX Designer and UI Designer
Platform: Mobile, iOS
Project Overview
The mental health care system is broken in many parts of the world. There are pain points at many stages of the process and innumerable limiting factors that lead to people not getting the care they need.
ReGrow is designed to address the current problems surrounding mental health care: cost, accessibility, provider shortages, among others.
With these limitations in mind, the app enables people to have agency in their mental health journey by tracking their habits, goals, moods, and personal reflections so they can see the impact these actions have on their long-term mental health.
BackGround
This project was conceived with a team of five during a two day hackathon. I continued to iterate and develop the product independently for two months until I was confident it helped solve real problems people are facing in a usable, accessible, and beautiful way.
Research
Competitor Analysis
During the hackathon my peers and I conducted a competitive analysis of some apps that are currently available and address similar problems: MyChart by Epic, ZocDoc, Teledoc, Talkspace, and Betterhelp.
Our analysis focused on key features and functionalities, business models, and care options.
Insights
As most of the competitors offered one-on-one therapy options, my team decided to emulate that buisness model with some slight adjustments. We included an SOS hotline, a community chat, and therapy resources.
Hackathon Final Designs
Due to the rapid nature of the hackathon, my team and I quickly brainstormed, mocked-up, polished, and prototyped a mobile solution.
I was pleased with my team and how much we were able to accomplish in such a short time. However, I did not feel like the visual designs were up to par, so I decided to continue working on the designs independently. As I did so, I realized other problems with the app that we did not have the proper time to address during the hackathon.
This led me to go back in the design thinking process and get more in depth-knowledge about the problems we were trying to address and the best solutions to help the most people.
Although our app would increase the mental health care options available for patients, it’s solution focused on giving people virtual one-on-one therapy sessions, which means the cost per one hour session could be between $80-130, and in spite of sometimes accepting insurance, that would still be financially inaccessible for many people.
White Paper Research
I continued research independently with an academic literature review of the problem. This led me to the understanding that it is often the people who are most in need of mental healthcare who are the least likely to have the resources needed to help them, including insurance to cover expensive therapy bills.
This led me to research how to best help people without a direct one-on-one mental health care provider.
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy
Through my research I landed upon Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) as the most likely form of therapy to work in an app-guided setting, as it is designed to be short term, goal based, and often has exercises integrated into the treatment.
Additionally, it has developed a framework that a patient can use to try to understand what negative thinking pattern their brain is jumping to that is affecting their emotions and behaviours.
CBT provides structure for the patient to examine their thinking patterns by:
Learning to recognize their distortions in thinking that are creating problems, and then to reevaluate them in light of reality.
Gaining a better understanding of the behaviour and motivation of others.
Using problem-solving skills to cope with difficult situations.
Learning to develop a greater sense of confidence in one’s own abilities. [1]
User Interviews
To get an empathetic perspective for people who would use the app, I conducted several user interviews.
I focusing on users with existent mental health care illnesses, and people who have experience with tracking apps.
Based on my interviews, I created a user persona.
Research Insights
The design insights I gained from the interviews and creation of the persona helped me to understand what would best work for people engaging with the app to better their mental health.
People want to be positively reinforced for their progress
People want to learn techniques and tools for self-discovery and betterment
People want to feel empathized with
Ideation
To quickly brainstorm solutions, I wireframed screens and flows to get an idea of how the app would function as a whole and how the users would interact with each individual function.
Information Architecture
I then created an Information Architecture web to visualize the main functionalities of the app.
These included a main Track CTA that allows users to track their habits, moods, goals, and CBT exercises.
User Flows
I created several user flows of the steps a user would have to take to complete an action. This user flow demonstrates the steps a user goes through to complete a CBT journal prompt.
Note: In creating this app, the inclusion of ample feedback was important to me as it gives the user positive reinforcement after completing an activity, making them more likely to keep engaging with the app.
As I continued designing the app, the question of how best to help people was a constant presence. I landed on focusing on people’s progress, as my user research indicates, by allowing users to track their actions.
Data Visualisation
As tracking was one of the fundamental functions of the app, I wanted to get both the call to action flow and the data visualization right. I consulted serval books and articles concerned with accurately portraying data through visual aids.
The main benefit to the user of the tracking functions are to:
Get a sense of their progress and growth
Give users incentive to do exercises and good habits
Give positive reinforcement to users
Iteration
Here is an example of how my designs evolved from wireframes to high fidelity mock-ups. I experimented with different forms of data visualization, but the circle as a form of reaching goals always stood out as a full circle is a satisfying visual for completion.
UX Writing
As this app aims to emulate a therapist, expressing empathy to the people using it was a important consideration.
That is why there is constant feedback through the app reinforcing positive behaviours that the patient is tracking.
Furthermore, the app speaks with a distinctly personal tone, trying to connect with the person so that they are comfortable engaging fully with the exercises the app provides.
Illustrations
The use of illustrations in the app was also an important consideration, as I wanted to be selective about them, to use them in a way that the person feels represented by, and that goes along with the calm aesthetic of the app.
Final Designs
Final Thoughts
I learned a lot during this project, and it was a joy to work on something that I believe could have a positive impact on many people’s lives.
The key takeaways from this project are:
Wait to perfect the visual designs until you are sure of everything else, as it will just lead to wasted time
Be realistic about the scope of the project and do not do more than you have time for, less is more, especially if more just means less well done
Always plan for user testing, even if you don’t think there is proper time
