PSY.cl and Rice Design For America
PSY.cl and Rice Design For America
Role
UX Designer and Researcher
Team
5 UX designers
2 design leads
engineering
Tools
Timeline
Figma
Figjam
Pen and paper
6 weeks
1. Identify problem space
The founder of PSY.cl noticed that existing period-tracking apps rarely cited medical literature, provided free menstrual education, or used gender-inclusive language and imagery.
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Our role as part of Design for America was to conduct a 6 week sprint to ensure that PSY.cl would be founded on human-centered design, starting off with in-depth user research.
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PSY.cl sought to answer: How can we empower menstruators through providing accessible, curated menstrual health information and customizable features?
2. User research
a. Stakeholder Interview
Users
Menstruators in late teens to early twenties.
Primary goals
What makes PSY.cl unique?
PSY.cl focuses on inclusivity of menstruators of all genders, provides accessible and reliable period education, and focuses on health data privacy.
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Existing period-tracking apps fail to address these user needs, creating a key opportunity for PSY.cl in the market.
Emphasize data privacy and security
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Create an inclusive space for all menstruators
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Promote reliable period education
b. User Interviews
After conducting 26 interviews with users of current period tracker apps, we identified user delights and pain points of current apps.
Delights
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Variety of logging options
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Used as a record
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Reminders helpful for regular cycles
Pain points
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Inaccurate predictions
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Unsatisfied with frequency and type of notifcations
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Too lazy to input data
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Not useful for those with irregular cycles
c. Research Insights
Synthesizing our research, we identified 3 core problem spaces.
Credibility
Users are curious about menstrual health and want reliable menstrual education.
Users are overwhelmed by app features and have specific information logging and notification preferences
Users feel comforted by empowering community, seek a similar anonymous, online community.
Customizability
Inclusivity
3. Ideation
a. Competitive Analysis
Each team member downloaded a popular period tracker app. We then compared key features of each app.
Features that stood out to us
Credibility
Clue
Articles with cited medical literature encourage users to trust information.
Inclusivity
Flo
Users enthusiastically engaged in anonymous community forums.
Customizability
Life
Customizable reminders give users autonomy to use the app according to personal preferences.
4. Design
Our team completed 15-minute design sprints to brainstorm ideas for these features. We then created wireframes using Figma based off these initial sketches. These were then used for usability testing.
5. Usability Testing
a. Potential Users Interviews
We interviewed 20 potential users, asking them to walk through the lo-fidelity prototype and answering open-ended questions about their experience. Based on their responses, our team re-iterated on our lo-fidelity prototype, implementing user feedback.
Testing
Testing
b. System Usability Score (SUS)
We measured the usability of our prototypes using the industry standard System Usability Score (SUS) as we asked the standardized set of 10 questions to survey our users. By incorporating user feedback from test 1, the score improved when tested on separate users in test 2.
Iteration 2: 88. 2
Our SUS score of 88.2 indicated very high usability!
Iteration 1: 83. 6
​​​Our prototype received an excellent score during the second and final round of testing, above the 95th percentile. Backed by decades of research, this SUS score identified our product as a promoter of user engagement with excellent usability.
6. Product
Notable features include:
Credibility
​PSY.cl Article provides free educational resources, sorted by topic and backed by academic citations so users can trust what they're learning.
Customizability
Onboarding introduces the user to the customizability options.
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Settings allows for flexibility, so users can change their mind anytime.
Inclusivity
PSY.cl Community Forum allows users to anonymously get questions answered and learn from others in their community.
Click the video below to see a walkthrough of PSY.cl.
7. Reflection
This project highlighted the importance of user research, as our research insights highly informed the features we implemented which ended up contributing to our prototype's high usability score. Subtle changes can often make the biggest impact on users, and this was especially highlighted through this project.