Overview
CHALLENGE
Encourage undergraduate students to read for leisure and connect with peers through reading
SOLUTION
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​Campus-wide book of the month program where book excerpts are played on TCAT bus routes through campus
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Large-scale copies of the monthly book placed outside campus libraries allowing students to write public annotations
METHODS
Literature Review, Contextual interviews, Co-Design Sessions, Experience Design Theater
DELIVERABLES
Storyboards, persona, thematic analysis from research findings, program initiave, photoshop mockups, physical prototype
ROLE
UX Researcher/Designer
TIME
One semester
TYPE
Group project
TASK
Facilitate social connections on campus through leisure reading
TOOLS
Figma, Sketch, Ipad, Adobe Creative Suite
RESEARCH AND EMPATHIZE
Research
What do we need to know about leisure reading and our user group to clarify this problem space?
Literature Review Insights
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Leisure reading has many benefits in human development and wellbeing, including improving memory, increasing focus, reducing stress, etc.(Gauder et al., 2009)
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Forming networks driven by desires to share and cultivate passions for literature engages people of different perspectives and levels of reading to meet each other on common ground through discussion (Vlieghe et al., 2009)
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university-aged individuals have become the least-likely, from most, to engage in leisure reading (Weigart, 2008)
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Literary conversations can also provide accountability and motivation to stay engaged with readings (Massimi et al., 2009)
Provisional Personas
To understand how to design for this challenge, I needed to learn who the user group is and how to empathize with them.
THE BOOKWORM
Age 17-25
GOALS
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Reach her yearly reading goal on GoodReads of 40 books​
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Discover new genres of books expand her comfort zone
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Exchange books with friends to talk about likes/dislikes of shared books
PAINS
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Difficult for her to discuss recent reads with friends since they're not as avid readers​
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Hard to discover new books on her own
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Easy to procrastinate and fall behind her yearly goal
THE BUSY-BEE
Age 17-25
GOALS
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Read school required material in between homework assignments
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Listen to audiobooks while he walks from class to class
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Join a book club to encourage himself to accomplish more leisure reading
PAINS
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Too tired to read leisurely after finishing school assignments​
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Difficult to know what kind of books he should try to read
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Hard to discipline himself to read when he has no accountability to do so
Contextual Interviews
Interviewed a total of 10 Cornell undergraduates, half of whom were avid readers, and half who struggle to motivate themselves to read. We conducted interviews in locations where participants felt most comfortable reading and asked questions regarding their individual reading experiences.
Empathy Map
Based on our interviews, I was able to build an affinity diagram and identify four common themes from every interview
SOCIAL PERCEPTION
Users are concerned about being perceived negatively when reading in public
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MOTIVATION
Users who enjoy reading in their free time are motivated by the escapism offered by books
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INTEREST
Users are motivated to read when they feel engaged and interested in the topic of the book/article they are reading
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ENVIRONMENT
Users become distracted more easily when reading in a public setting but also feel accountable to keep reading.
User Persona
Based on my initial research and contextual interviews, I was able to construct a clear user persona to represent who I'd be designing for
Jenny
GOALS
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Make meaningful connections with peers through reading
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Find comforting books to de-stress with
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Discover new book genres
MOTIVATIONS
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Connecting with new friends through books​
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Decompressing from academic pressure
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Discovering new books
NEEDS
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To feel encouraged to read outside the classroom​
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To be able to read books in common with peers
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To know she can find new and interesting books
FRUSTRATIONS
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Difficult to remain motivated to read leisurely​
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Friends don't read the same books as she does
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Hard for her to discover new books
Female. 21 years old. Student. Single
DEFINE & IDEATE
Defining the Problem
Having developed the persona, I now knew who to design for and used the insights from the interviews to define the problem space. I also constructed POV statements from the persona, and "How Might We" (HMW) questions to understand what we need to solve.
Co-Design Sessions
To begin the ideation process, we led five co-design sessions where we tasked our participants of Cornell undergraduates (half who read avidly, half who struggle to do so) to produce moodboards depicting their ideal reading experiences.
Mapping Co-Design Insights
After concluding the co-design sessions, I analyzed our notes and constructed a map of common themes from each interview. This map yielded three main insights.
ENVIRONMENT
People tend to read in environments where they feel most safe and comfortable
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SOCIAL INVOLVEMENT
Involving close friends in an individual's reading habits encourages people to read
Leisure reading can encourage social interaction, but people tend to prefer reading by themselves
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RESPONSIBILITIES
People are more likely to read in situations where they feel no other responsibilities or obligations to fulfill
Design Brainstorming
Based on our insights and research, we proposed 65 potential design solutions. Through combining some of our favorite ideas together, we decided on two solutions.
SOLUTION ONE
Geocaching book excerpts around campus
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SOLUTION TWO
Speakers placed around campus buildings that play book excerpts aloud
Experience Design Theater (EDT)
Although we initially planned on conducting a diary study, we ultimately decided that practicing EDT with our user group would better allow us to test out the practicality of our two solutions and iterate through improved versions.
My teammates and I took the part of actors and we performed pre-written scenes based on how our two solutions would be implemented on campus. We performed these scenes in front of our 10 participants and asked them to re-direct and re-write each scene to more accurately reflect their experiences. We went through this iterative process three times for each scene.
Thematic Analysis of EDT Process
I reviewed the notes of our participants and how our scenes progressed and changed throughout the EDT process and used that knowledge to construct the following chart of reoccurring themes.
INSIGHTS
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Design solution needs to be sponsored by Cornell to establish credibility
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Book excerpts should be read aloud in places where users are unoccupied with classes or studying (e.g elevators, bus stops)
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​Written excerpts of the audiobook recordings should be placed in communal areas like campus libraries
DESIGN PROPOSAL
"Book Club on the Go"
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Cornell chooses a book each month for this initiative
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Excerpts from this book are played aloud on the TCAT routes
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These periods of transportation allow participants to engage with books in a context where they have no other obligations and can relax and be comfortable.
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The excerpts will intrigue bus riders and facilitate conversation with friends as well as interest in reading the book of the month in their free time
We used Adobe photoshop to create a program poster that would be distributed across campus to promote the chosen book of the month. We also created a mockup of how our users would interact with the audio excerpts while on the bus.
"Communal Annotations"
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A large copy of the book of the month will be placed outside of Olin library with markers and post-it notes
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Students passing by will be able to contribute to community discussion on the book via annotations left on the pages
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Students will also be intrigues to learn more about the book, and the overall Book Club on the Go initiative and will be incentivized to read the book on their own time so they too can contribute
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Allows for inclusive design since students will have both an auditory and visual medium for the book of the month available
We used Adobe photoshop again to demonstrate how our large-scale book of the month would be installed outside of libraries. Additionally, we created a physical prototype of the book.
Design in Action
With our proposal complete, our group filmed a video to show how exactly our design would be utilized by students
Reflection and Next Steps
I faced several daunting challenges within this project including implementing research methods I had never previously used such as Experience Design Theater. Additionally, while I am used to working with Figma to develop UIs, this project forced me out of my comfort zone to design a program initiative rather than a digital interface.
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The biggest lessons I learned from this project are that (1) not every problem space requires a digital solution, and (2) design tradeoffs are unavoidable.
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The next steps I would take this project through are:
1. RE-TEST
2. IMPLEMENT
Conduct a usability test using audio excerpts with participants on the TCAT to observe needed changes
Implement book prototype and conduct ethnographic study to observe how students interact with it