Design challenge:
Design a product that will help a 15 year old boy with autism to be more independent.
Context:
Users:
For this project we worked together with our main user Kevin, a 15 year old boy with classical autism.
Daily life situation:
Kevin lives together with his parents and older sister. He goes to a special needs school, plays korfball and likes to work with computers.
During his daily life a structured routine helps Kevin to avoid stress, so he and his parents make sure that every day is as structured as possible. However, Kevin often forgets about the routine he is supposed to follow even if all the tasks he needs to do are written down in words or pictures and hung around the house. His parents often need to remind him about his schedule and the tasks that need to be done before he will start doing them.
This issue becomes worse under time pressure. If Kevin has to perform certain tasks within a limited timespan, he can easily become stressed or frustrated. Kevin also finds it hard to see the consequences of his actions or lack of actions, which adds to his lack of motivation to perform tasks he is not interested in.
All the issues mentioned above make the morning routine an especially hard part of the day for Kevin. He has to perform a lot of tasks within a small period of time, without feeling much motivation or realizing he can miss the bus to school. This is why we have worked on a product that can guide him through his morning routine.
The Product:
To be able to help Kevin through his morning routine, we co-designed the On-timer. This product functions as an alarm and a portable task list.
Pictures of every task Kevin needs to do in the morning will be stuck to the buttons on top of the device using a magnet. The width of the button shows how long the task is supposed to take; A wider button means more time. The user can change the buttons and the magnets to adjust the device to their current needs. Only one task will be visible at the time. After this task is completed the user can press the button down, after which the next task will immediately pop up. After a task is pressed down, positive feedback in the form of audio will be used to encourage the user.
At the front of the device, a showcase with a 3D bus in it can be seen. This bus depicts the total time available to complete every task. As soon as the alarm rings, the bus will start moving forward, and it will reach the end as soon as the school bus arrives. This will help Kevin to see how much time has passed and where in his morning routine he is supposed to be at the moment.
The digital clock underneath the bus shows the amount of time left for the current task and counts down the seconds, so it is clear how much time is left for each separate task.
The device will have two docking stations, one on the bedroom and one in the kitchen, so it is clear where to place it and to make sure the device stays charged. The leather strap will make the On-timer easy to carry.
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The support app can be used to change to settings of the product. For instance: the time given for each task, the time of the alarm and the duration of the whole routine.
How is the product used?:
The product is used from the moment the user Kevin wakes up, up until the moment he leaves the house to catch the bus to school. The following steps will take place during this time
- The alarm will ring
- The user wakes up and turns of the alarm
- All the tasks will be visible so the user can have a quick overview
- The user will get out of bed and press down the first button, after which all buttons, except the second one, will go down with it.
- The user will go through their morning routine, pressing down each button after the task is completed.
- The user will finish their morning routine in time.
The On-timer will help the user by guiding them through their morning routine and by motivating them with positive feedback. It gives them structure and is a constant reminder of what needs to be done, which can avoid stress caused by having to think of too many things at once.
The final design:
Visual design:
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For the visual design we asked Kevin to color a drawing of an earlier design in the colors he would like for this product.
Interaction design:
The buttons on the device are made slanted so that the tasks can be seen from above even when the button is down. The buttons are big enough to be able to see the pictograms of the tasks on them and to make it easy to press them down. The stop button for the alarm is almost as long as the entire device, which makes it easy to find and press down. The strap makes it easy to carry the device from one location to another.
Materials:
Evaluation:
Usertest:
During the usertest our clients told us they really like the idea behind the On-timer and they think it will be a valuable addition to Kevin’s life.
They did mention that the product was quite large, but added that this would make it hard to forget or lose.
During the testing of the app a few aspects were mentioned which they would like to see added or changed, for example: The option to different alarms for different days of the week, the ability to type the time instead of dragging and so on. These details were adjusted in the final version of the app.
The future:
The first thing to continue with if this project would be extended would be to build a prototype with which the usability and Kevin’s engagement with the product can be tested. The results of this test should be used to adjust the design. After the adjustments another usability test should determine the effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction of the user in his morning routine context.
It would be good to look at alternative ideas for the design as well. For example: using screens on the buttons instead of magnets or designing a different charging station.
During the project we focussed on Kevin as the user of the product, but it has added value to research how to make the product usable for a larger target group and to adjust the design accordingly.
After this we would work on the finalization of the design and make a plan on how to bring the product on to the market.
Contact
This website is created as part of project Design for specific users edition 2020 by the following students:
Marjolein Dekker, S1973460
Wout Huitink, S1852361
Renate Overdijk, S1931857
Sabine Peters, S2109220
Floor van Ruiten, S2096633
Joris van den Biggelaar, S2191822
of group 9.
for further questions or information our project coordinator Jelle van Dijk can be reached at:
jelle.vandijk@utwente.nl
