BugMe — Because communicating with teenagers can be harsh.
We raise children for the world, and also, despite the world.
When they are little we feed, love and, just keeping them by our side seems enough to protect them. Little by little, in baby steps, we teach them responsibility and freedom.
But teen age comes and the steps become bigger and farther. It is hard to find the right balance between freedom, responsibility and safety.
And everyday life can become a battle.
Client
The National Wellness Institute
Briefing
Reimagine wellbeing and create a set of digital tools that update the image of the wellness industry and it's immense disruption, embracing wearable technologies and activity-tracking products.
You will be required to conduct user research to understand people’s relationship with mental, physical, and emotional well-being to develop a tool that will drive them to action.
fresh and updated UI
native iOS
have a tracking feature, social networking, login/register, set profile.
the prototype should consist of the main user flow for the main feature of the application.
The Start
For me, well-being are small day-to-day improvements that make the wheel of life a little lighter, relationships a bit smoother and time more enjoyable.
I started this project with a specific user group in mind: parents of teenagers.
How could I contribute to ease the everyday life of these families?
Research
My first step was to interview parents of teenagers to better understand their main pain points. The answers were very loud: COMMUNICATION!
Soon after I started talking to the parents, I felt the need to also listen to the teenagers' points of view.
The complete research phase consisted on written interviews and surveys, each formulated for both groups of users:
teenagers between 13 and 18 years old.
parents of teenagers between 13 and 18 years old.
Curfew, safety and location were the main concerns of the parentes.
Surveillance, controle and privacy were major pain points for the teens.
The great majority of users declared not to use one specific parent control app rather than combining different features from different apps like shared location, text messages and telephone call (only when urgent!).
Some teenagers pointed out their need to also know their parents’ location.
The household chores are also a major source of disagreements.
From the teens came also the insight of having a panic button.
Insights
Teens do understand the need of parents monitoring their safety and are open to cooperation .
However, most of the time they feel overprotected and having their privacy invaded. .
There are many apps that help parents control and secure the interaction of their kids with devices.
As research has shown, most of these features do not apply to older teens.
Parental Control
How could we improve communication and provide security,
taking into account teenager’s need for privacy and freedom to grow.
Hard job!
The most importante insight from research : NEGOTIATION
Flora is 14 years old, she likes watching anime, drawing and of course, KPOP! She lives with her mother and her baby sister.
During the week she goes to school, takes piano lessons and she would love to hang out at the park with her friends every day after school but she has to help her mother with the house chores.
Sometimes she forgets her chores and that can be a fighting point with her mother.
Personas
Luisa is a primary teacher and a single mother of two daughters.
During the week she divides herself between work, taking her younger daughter to kita, holding the house together and keeping her teenage daughter out of trouble.
On the weekends she takes care of the house and tries to recover from the buzzy week’s routine
Luisa just can’t fall asleep not knowing if Flora is safe and spends her whole night checking the phone and waiting for news.
Turning research insights into features
1 — To Do List
To address one of the biggest sources for fights in the family’s daily life: household chores!
We came up with a shared to-do list.
One of the most important features being used by families and it was brought up in 100% of the interviews.
We came up with a tracking feature that would not only show the user’s actual location but also save the most visited locations, drawing a graphic map of the whole area covered and most frequent paths. This would give parents a visual graphic (by day, week and month) of the most usual places of their child, tracing down their territory.
2 — Tracking Location
Following the request of the teens for a “Panic Button” we decided to include an easy access to the app that would instantly create a buzzing alert in the parents main screen. When clicked takes the parent straight to the location of the child with the call button ready to be accessed in an urgent mode
3 — Panic Button
BugMe also counts on a very funcional chat feature and during login/profile the user can configure who they what to Bug
4— Chat and Profile
As this was an individual project and therefore I had to figure out everything on my own, I learned a lot! Sometimes the hard way, of course, but it was a great opportunity!
It was especially satisfying to start out with a real problem that also affects me and “throw it back to reality”. Many of my pain points and assumptions were contradicted by research.
This was harsh at first sight however helped me brighten my vision in the whole teenage freedom issues.
The first version of the profile screen turned out to be a little confusing. The UI and , maybe the whole idea of having bugs as avatars in the app, needs further work on and lots of testing.
Although the inspiration and the first version of this project tries to be playful and fair with both groups or users, putting them on the same side, the actual truth is:
No teenager likes to be controlled!