participate

Interaction Design Project

Background

At large universities researchers employ a variety of methods to recruit participants for their studies. These methods often include posting recruitment materials on billboards, creating posts on websites like Craigslist, and pulling from University subject pools. Though it can be helpful for researchers to have multiple channels through which they can find participants, it creates an information gap for potential participants. The decentralized nature of the recruitment process makes it difficult for potential participants to find and compare opportunities, and further, difficult for them to benchmark what may typically required and what compensation level may be considered fair. 

Design PHILOSOPHY 

Borrowing from Critical Design, I tried to reimagine the current participant recruitment process with a different set of values. My design values the time and experiences of participants and aims to empower them to make informed decisions when volunteering for a study. Further, I took an iterative approach to the design process stopping for user feedback as often as possible.

Design Process

Brainstorming & Sketching

After initial brainstorming I had a set of ideas that included web or app based solutions, digital signage and a mailing service. To better communicate my ideas sketched 8 ideas in parallel and presented them to 4 potential users for feedback. The users expressed interest in features from multiple sketches, but thought it possible to combine them into a single solution.

StoryBoarding

I incorporated the initial user feedback into my storyboards by combining a few of the ideas found on the sketches into a single story.  I found this was especially relevant to the web based ideas presented previously. When I presented these storyboards to a second set of users  it was clear they preferred mobile solutions. In particular, users gravitated towards a mobile app designed to match users with studies in a way reminiscent of dating apps like Tinder. 

Interviews & Personas

To better understand my users I conducted 3 interviews with potential participants and researchers.  I then used the findings from these interviews to inform the creation of 3 personas and 1 anti-persona. The personas described participants and researchers who had varying degrees of familiarity with the research participation process. The anti-persona described a researcher who's research process was not dependent on participant recruitment. These personas helped me to identify key needs for my user population and influenced some design changes.

QOC & Design Defense

Having generated a number of possible ideas, it was time to assess them to determine which design I would continue developing. I conducted my Design Space Analysis using the QOC framework.  Each design option was scored based on its ability to meet the criteria of the question it was meant to answer.  A key finding from this analysis led me to reconsider the way in which studies were displayed to users; ultimately, presenting studies in a list form performed better than presenting them sequentially as cards.

Paper Prototype

Using index cards and sticky notes I created a lo-fidelity paper prototype and tested it with 3 users. Users expressed that some of the interactions, which were currently designed as pop-out windows, could have been their own screens instead. Additionally, the feedback revealed users had difficulty with the navigation of the app. I gathered the feedback and took it into consideration when designing the digital prototype.

Digital Prototype

Using AdobeXD I created a higher fidelity digital prototype for my solution.  I incorporated the feedback from the paper prototype and then tested the digital prototype with a few more users. During this round of user testing I found that I needed to modify my on-boarding and scheduling processes. Originally account creation had been optional, but when users expressed that they had an expectation to create an account when downloading an app I realized I could make it a requirement and make scheduling easier further down the road.