Meuni
fostering conversations
HUMAN-COMPUTER INTERACTION | Winter 2017
Tools used: Sketch, Principle, Adobe Creative Suite
Meuni is an app concept that fosters new connections between strangers with shared interests, desired conversation style, location, and mood. The companion wearable senses the user's heart rate in order to give guidance and tracking to help with social anxiety or depression.
The rise of social isolation is becoming an increasing threat to Americans.
The effects of social “cocooning” have been correlated increased depression, anxiety, stress, and loneliness levels. Many people do not realize that loneliness is not just a feeling, but quite similar to a biological mechanism similar to hunger and thirst; when a person feels lonely, their brain is telling them to seek out social connection with other humans.
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Most apps currently in the market geared towards making new friends place a lot of emphasis on matching people based off of shared interests and activities alone. While similar interests can act as a strong catalyst for new friendships, there are still many additional layers of one's personality that can be taken into consideration while meeting someone new.
We asked a variety of people ranging from the ages of 14 to 50 about their feelings on loneliness and meeting new people. The questions we asked pertained to comfortability, comfort zones, perspectives, shared interests, and their idea of a genuine conversation.
The affinity diagram we created helped solidify Meuni’s goal to forge emotional relationships through technological means in order to enforce virtual, global, and physical connections.
“It's fun and challenging to experience something new, because otherwise you don’t go through new perspectives since you’re so used to everything being the same. Going outside your comfort zone is good.”
Alejandro Siegert | 23 years old
“I love new conversations and I love getting to know people… I always ask questions to learn more about them, and [the] connection
between people is more important than anything else.”
Nicholas Oji | 45 years old
Based on some cultural probes we created and distributed to various college students, we found that people are most comfortable having conversations with new people more so when they knew about the topic and found themselves in a comfortable environment.
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We also looked into other apps that tried to foster new friendships and relationships. As expected, most of them focused on matching people together based on their shared interests and activities, but did not provide much emphasis on the user's feelings, conversation styles, and other factors.
At this point after conducting some field research, interviews, and cultural probe readings, we came up with a few key insights:
People are constantly looking to stimulate their brains in some way, often times through social media on their phones. While this may satisfy the need for stimulation, it does not necessarily fulfill the loneliness factor.
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Similar interests can act as a strong catalyst for new friendships, especially for those who are more anxious around new people.
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Generally, people are open to talking to strangers provided the connection and compatibility are strong.
At this point, we came up with various different concepts that attempted to target our problem statement. Here are some examples of what we considered:
NOT CHOSEN
Online Conversation Pairing
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This idea featured a system that would match two people together based on inputted conversation styles and interests. Omegle is a site
that has already taken a similar approach to this idea
and the connection of a single shared interest alone is rarely strong enough to brew real compatibility.
NOT CHOSEN
Listening Conversation Table
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This concept featured a physical table located at various establishments (coffee shops, restaurants, etc) that would record and encourage conversations between those sitting at the tables. We scrapped this idea because it felt too imposing and there was not much way for people to configure personal conversation preferences.
CHOSEN
Location/Interest/Mood Based App
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We decided to go with the idea of an app where users could input their location, interests, and mood. Other users of the app would be able to see this information and send each other conversation requests in order to meet.
We created four personas for our user scenarios, all of them differing in levels of introversion v.s extroversion, motivation, and interests.
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From our user scenarios, we found some ideas and opportunities to improve such as implementing a slider function to indicate whether the user was searching for someone more similar v.s different and having the ability to adjust moods on the main screen.
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We conducted individual user tests and received helpful feedback on the overall interface and concept of Meuni. Along with our individual user tests, my partner and I also had the opportunity to have someone from 10 years worth of mobile UX experience at Samsung give an expert review of our product.
After altering our general branding and visual design for Meuni over the course of the 10 weeks, we decided on an orange color scheme to create an inviting and friendly feeling.
Working on this project over the course of 10 weeks was an incredible experience that immersed me in getting to learn the process of ideation, research and constant design reiteration. I thoroughly enjoyed the process and learned a lot about the development of a successful project. Thank you for taking the time to look through our development of this product concept!
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You can view my partner's work at www.joekndy.com
Three different people, three different personalities and desires.
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The power and impact of a truly genuine, delightful conversation and the joy it can bring to people is often times undervalued in today's world.
For many lonely or socially-anxious people, searching for new friends and connections can be a difficult process. This can exacerbate feelings of low self-esteem and confidence over time.
How might we foster more genuine and spontaneous conversations between strangers?
Profile
Connect
Track
Why?
Everyone needs a friend.
Who?
The idea of Meuni was created to allow young adults and teens to be able to have more spontaneous and meaningful conversations based off of interests, conversation styles, and mood.
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While Meuni is not specifically aimed at people who have social anxiety, one of the goals of this project was to create an easier way for more anxious or shy people to make new friends.
What?
Providing a conversational outlet to empower new connections and combat loneliness.
Meuni is an app that aims to connect users with new conversation partners in a spontaneous manner whether this be on a morning commute or a lonely late night. Rather than only shared interests and activities, Meuni includes the ability to input a mood, how similar v.s different they want their conversation partner to be, and the ability to search for other users on both a local and global level.
Challenges
Process
Primary Research
Meuni was a project created in my Human-Computer Interaction class, where we were challenged to create a product concept that targeted an existing social problem over the course of 10 weeks. My partner and I decided to target the issue of increasing social isolation and its effects.
Interviews
Affinitization
Cultural Probe
Competitive Audit
Key Insights
Concept Direction
Personas and User Scenarios
Visual Process
Usability Testing
Hi-Fi Screens
Navigation
Takeaways
One of the main challenges we ran into during our design process was the allocating the time throughout our 10 weeks most effectively. After our primary and secondary research phase, we ended up with various concepts that were difficult to piece together. One of the mistakes we made was to attempt to combine most of the features from all of the concepts into one product. I personally learned a lot about synthesizing and finalizing what exact directions to move forward with for the most viable product on a shorter timeframe.
If I were to return and add to this project, I would want to add some sort of sorting system for users that want more similar v.s different conversation partners. For example, users who indicate that they want more of a debate would see mostly other users who indicated similar preferences on the map. More personality-based information outside just a current mood such as a Myers-briggs result on the user’s profile would also be a feature that might be interesting to consider implementing. Personality is immensely complex to dissect, and I would love to study more into the most effective way to connect people on a genuine level.
Read further for more details on our design process and the methodologies we utilized.
Jenn Lee
UX Design
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Delivered:
Primary research, secondary research, low-fi wireframes, hi-fi screens, journey maps, user scenarios, prototype, video
Team
Joe Kennedy
UX Design
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Delivered:
Primary research, low-fi wireframes, mid-fi wireframes, personas, journey maps, user scenarios, video
Tools:
Adobe Creative Suite, Invision, Sketch, Principle