01. Overview

Problem Space

Background

Computers have become the primary equipment for many people to work, communicate, and entertain, and people spend more time sitting in front of the computer nowadays than in the past. Asa result, it raises the problem of physical position and postural stability while interacting with computers.

Problem Statement

“How to help people maintain good posture when they are working on computers to improve long-term health?”

Solution

We designed a behavioral tracking and intervention app with a ‘desktop pet’ named Work Buddy, and it monitors and optimizes people's posture, reminds users to take a break from working on a computer, and educates them about good posture and stretching techniques.

Set up Work Buddy

Users can turn on and off Work Buddy on the home page and navigate between the home screen and Work Buddy on their devices to optimize user experience.

Initiate break reminders

Users can create break reminders based on their schedule, and the system would activate Work Buddy and remind users to take break in between.

Learn good posture and stretch

The system contains a library of posture and stretch knowledge for users to explore and learn about proper posture and methods to relieve bodily pain.

02. Research

User Research

We came to a realization of common postural problems that we all faced after studying on computers for a long period of time. We began with a vague idea of helping people, especially those working primarily from home, maintain good sitting posture and prevent bodily discomfort.

To explore the problem space and understand user behavior of interest from various perspectives, we determined to conduct 4 user research methods: exploratory research, public observation, interview, and survey.

Key Research Findings

Although we employed 4 different research methods to collect data, we discovered many similarities and common interests in the different sets of research data. We summarized them into 5 high-level key research findings that helped develop our design solutions in the next phase.

01.

People feel bodily pain across categories.

02.

People lack knowledge of good posture.

03.

People prefer to change positions while working.

04.

Focusing hard on work contributes to poorer posture.

05.

People have mixed satisfaction with ergonomic solutions.

03. Ideation

Personas

To understand who we are designing for, we created 3 fictional characters to represent our potential users and generated personas for them based on the research data.

Empathy Maps

Then, we wanted to understand how these 3 potential users feel about our product. We make 3 empathy maps that list their attitudes and behaviors in response to some postural challenges.

Design Requirements

Based on the personas and empathy maps, we defined 5 design requirements that we would frequently look back into when prototyping the product.

01.

Encourage users to stretch to relieve pain.

02.

Educated users about good posture for work.

03.

Help users to adjust their sitting posture.

04.

Remind users to take a break in between work.

05.

Provide advice on how to use furniture.

Design Concepts

We ideated 2 rivalry design solutions that address the 5design requirements from different aspects and invited users to evaluate these two design concepts.

Posture Optimization App (left) is a mobile-based application integrating AR technology to help optimize sitting posture. Users can use phone cameras to scan a chair, and based on their input data, the system provides personalized instructions on how to sit on it.

Posture Reminder (right) is a desktop application with a screen accessory, consisted of both digital and physical forms. The computer camera is activated to track user posture, and the system can read the data and remind users to sit properly and take work breaks.

Concept Testing

We conducted a 60-minutes testing session with 4 potential users to evaluate the 2 design concepts. We presented the design to the users and asked 15 follow-up questions about their thoughts and reactions. Then, we summarized the feedback and turned it into a chart to compare these two design concepts and evaluate whether they meet the listed design solutions.

Overall, users expressed a positive attitude toward both design concepts. However, they found Posture Reminder more useful, because they believe the use cases of Posture Optimization App are limited to acquiring anew chair, which is not a frequent event for them. Further, based on their feedback, Posture Reminder does a better job of fulfilling the 5 design requirements. Therefore, we decided to move on with Posture Reminder and turned the latter design concept into a wireframe.

04. Design

Wireframe

Based on the feedback we received from the users, we turned Design Concept 2 into a wireframe and iterated the initial layout, key features, and user flow maps on Figma.

Wireframe Testing

Before moving further with the wireframe, we wanted to hear what our users thought are on the features and user flows. Therefore, we invited 4target users, of which 3 of them were UX professionals and 2 experienced chronic back pain, to participate in 60-minutes cognitive-walkthrough. We walked them through the flow diagrams and asked them 18 follow-up questions to evaluate whether the design provides viable solutions to their postural problems.

Final Design

Based on the wireframe feedback we received, we iterated the prototype to streamline the user flows, enhance user experience, and redesign the visuals. The hi-fi prototype is the closest representation of the final product, demonstrating how users can interaction with the final product.

Navigate from home screen to desktop reminder

Remind users to take breaks in between work

Track metrics of user postural progress

Educate users about good posture for work

Encourage users to stretch to relieve pain

Help users to adjust sitting posture with camera

05. Testing

Usability Testing

To test the usability of the main features and collect user feedback, we conducted 3 testing methods and invited 9 participants from different fields(2 UX professionals, 1 physical therapist, and 6 target users). Each testing session was an hour long and taken placed both online and on-site, depending ont he availability of the participants.

Work Buddy

Role: UX designerUX researcher

Team: 4 HCI master's students @ Gatech

Methods: ‍Contextual inquiryPrototypingUsability testingData analysis

Tools: FigmaQualtricsTableau Miro