The problem
As an advent gym-goer, I noticed numerous people on treadmills trying to lose weight on a daily basis. However, chatting with many of them has led me to realize the difficulty in achieving this goal. After a bit of research, I found that while half of the adult population in the United States have attempted weight loss in the past 12 months,
“97 percent of dieters regain everything they lost and then some within three years.”
This made me question — why do so many give up, and how do we get them to stay?
The Solution
Secondary research
I started the case study by researching methods used to build lasting habits. In the process, I found two ways proven to work through science:
Let people lead their diets.
You shouldn’t follow a diet — you should lead it. Research suggests that humans are motivated by autonomy, mastery, and purpose. People want to control their actions, receive recognition for what they have done, learn new things, and feel that what they are doing matters. All of this comes from making your own decisions instead of doing what an app tells you to do.
Psychology also suggests negative impacts of following a diet: according to The Personal MBA by Josh Kaufman, persuasion reactance occurs when “a prospect senses that someone is trying to compel them to do something; they automatically resist and attempt to move away from the conversation.”
Take small steps that build on top of another.
Taking on small habits at a time allows people to be more consistent than taking on bigger habits when motivation starts to runs low. Therefore, breaking down goals into smaller pieces allows people a greater chance to persevere through their diets in the long run.
*https://jamesclear.com/habit-guideCompetitive Analysis
Having an understanding of what makes diets successful in the long run, I examined popular apps on the market to see what features they had in common. I found that many of my competitors approached dieting through meticulous calorie tracking instead of the methods shown above. This gap allowed me to focus my app design on setting & altering goals based on user needs instead.
User interviews
To understand users’ pain points in detail, I conducted 8 interviews with those that previously used diet apps to alter their bodies. some of the questions that I asked included but are not limited to:
Tell me about your experience with dieting and your relationship with food.
What was your approach to dieting & why?
What motivated you to start dieting?
What do you usually do to set goals/habits for yourself?
In your experience, what is the most difficult part about persevering through a goal?
To gain insight into their perspectives, I organized their responses on an affinity map.
Main insight
Keeping all of these information in mind, I thought,
How might we…
keep the users’ motivations high during diets, even when they face obstacles?
With all of this information in mind, I organized 3 main goals for this app to meet. If I wanted users to persevere through challenges, I would have to cater to these features:
Proper guidance for users to set their own healthy, actionable goals
An effective method to track their activity without causing stress
A system to adjust their goals based on their needs and experiences
Ideation:
I experimented with 2 different ideas for a couple of weeks before landing on the concept of self-reflection.
Iterations and revisions
Through multiple rounds of usability tests, I revised my original design based on feedback from 8 users and an external source. After weeks of iteration, I made 4 major improvements:
The Final Design
Reflections & Conclusion
This was my first ever UX project! 🎉🎉 While there were many unexpected challenges along the way, it was quite satisfying and enjoyable to solve a problem that users faced through my efforts. I’m so glad to have completed the design process from start to finish, as it served as a valuable experience to implement in my future designs. Here are some of the things that I learned along the way:
Think big picture
Because this was a project spanning two months with multiple parts, it was extremely easy to become side-tracked on smaller details during each design process. At one point, I had to ditch an idea for a solution that I had worked on for over a week (solution #1 — gamify) because I realized that it did not relate back to the original problem statement. Therefore, I will remember to tie my design back to the problem statement and look at the big picture at every step of the design process next time.
Breaks, feedback, & revision
Editing a single Figma frame for multiple days has made me realize that a design can look differently not only from someone else’s perspective but even from your own after a certain time. Because of this, I found taking breaks and getting peer feedback to be invaluable. And although I received some harsh criticism at first, I’ll try to keep a positive mindset — after all, their comments will only help with my design.
Interviewing & bias
Although I was aware of the implicit bias going into this project, I found it extremely difficult to not be subject to it. Maybe this was because I’m very passionate about the topic at hand or the fact that I have once been a user of diet apps myself, but I was tempted to add my opinion during the interviews. And although interacting with the users and getting to know more about them was my favorite part of the project, I will try to stick strictly to the script next time for a more accurate, reliable solution.
Patience is key
Throughout this project, I learned that designing, especially ideating, is not a linear process: there were many times when I couldn’t think of a solution after sitting down for hours but have an idea randomly pop into my head while I was walking my dog. Because of this unpredictability, the ideation stage took much longer to complete than I expected. Although I am satisfied with the solution that I proposed in the end, I’m confident that I can present an even better solution the next time around with more patience and a more realistic expectation of the timeline. For all it’s worth, at least I’ll be less frustrated when I run into an idea block.
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