Yibi is a mental health and wellbeing app that connects college students with mental health resources on their campus, helps them navigate mental health crises, and offers coping strategy management and tracking. With Yibi, users can more easily navigate the complex mental health systems on their campuses and find care that's personalized to their needs.
Team: Rachel Safir, Erin Walski, Jessie Houghton
Duration: October - December 2021
Role: Primary Research (interviews & survey), Concept Generation, Storyboarding, Video Sketch, Final Design
Problems
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Mental health resources at the University of Michigan are difficult to find.
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Students don't know where to go when they need help with their mental health.
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College students struggle to make time to care for their mental health
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Many don't seek help until they are already in crisis
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It's difficult to find immediate help during a crisis
Goals
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Connect students with effective mental health resources at the University of Michigan
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Help students find and manage coping strategies so they can develop a regular routine to take care of their mental health
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Help students manage crisis situations
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Provide a personalized experience by recommending resources that correlate with each user's unique needs
Research
Our research consisted of interviews, a survey, literature analysis, and competitive analysis.
Interviews and Survey
We conducted 7 interviews with students at the University of Michigan (UofM). Participants came from a variety of backgrounds, had varying levels of experience with UofM mental health resources, and were all between 19-21 years old.
I also designed a survey and distributed it to UofM students. It received 38 responses.
Both the interviews and survey focused on the following questions:
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What on-campus mental health resources do people use? How do they find them?
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How satisfied are they with the experience of finding those resources?
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How could the experience of finding those resources be improved?
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How do they go about dealing with their mental health?
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General thoughts and reservations about chatbots.
Competitive Analysis
We conducted a competitive analysis of wellness and mental health apps, AI therapists, live therapists, Psychology Today, and crisis text lines.
We wanted to know what these services typically offer, and what gaps Yibi might be able to fill. We found 2 main pain points: most of these services are not customizable and the different types of services are not well-integrated.
Literature Analysis
We read several articles about mental health on college campuses. We wanted to know what American colleges are doing well, what needs improvement, and what students on campus need to care for their mental health.
Key Findings
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On-campus mental health resources are hard to find and most students don't know what help is available to them.
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Even when students do find a list of campus resources, they don't know how to decide which are the best fit for them.
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Students find it difficult to manage multiple facets of their mental health care.
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1/3 of survey respondents say they don't seek help until they're already in crisis.
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Students have trouble finding immediate care during a crisis.
Concept Generation
We knew that we wanted to design an application and chatbot that addressed the mental health needs of college students. So, my group mates and I used our research findings to generate ideas for potential features. We wrote each of our ideas on a post-it note, and then organized the post-it notes into categories.
We then narrowed down our ideas into 6 major categories of needs:
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Direct students to resources
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Personalize/customize care
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Provide consistent and long-term benefit
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Aid in finding and managing coping skills
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Confidentiality
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Other
Needs Validation
To decide which features to include, we ran a needs validation with 5 participants.
We made a storyboard that illustrated each feature on our list, then presented them to the participants. We asked them to tell us whether or not they found each feature useful.
This feature, which informs users which resources are confidential, was well-liked among potential users.
"I definitely want to know whether it's confidential or not"
“It just makes things more comfortable if you know things are secure”
Others, like this feature where the chatbot drafts and sends an email for users, was not well-liked. Users wanted more control and less generalization, so this feature was not included in the final design.
“A template would be too general”
“I feel like if I don’t write it myself it’ll stress me out”
Chatbot Flows
User Testing: Think Aloud Sessions
We ran think aloud sessions with 5 participants. We asked them to interact with a paper prototype of the Yibi app and select a coping strategy to work on. We took notes as the participants thought aloud about the experience.
Think Aloud Testing Results
+ App design is simple and easy to understand
+ Yibi is encouraging
- Participants would like more reminders to practice coping strategies and more instructions during exercises
- Differentiate more between everyday mental health check-ins and crisis needs
Final Design
We created a Mental Health and Wellbeing app called Yibi that helps college students manage their mental health.
Yibi helps students:
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Learn and manage coping strategies
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Find effective mental health resources at the University of Michigan
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Manage crisis situations
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Have a personalized mental healthcare experience
Video Sketch
Watch the video sketch below to see how Yibi can be used in everyday life:
Final Screens
Main Pages
Settings & Customization
"Personal Filters" allows users to select the identities that they want Yibi to consider in its recommendations
Daily Tracking: Breathing Exercises
Daily Tracking: Yoga & Stretching
Guidance and Support With Coping Strategies
Error Scenario
