Emilie Zhang's Portfolio
Aibly
First Place @ Wellesley College 2022 Design Hackathon
Personal fitness app for people with disabilities.
Team & My Role
Emilie Zhang, Rita Lyu, Shellie Hu
UX Researcher and UI/UX Designer
Contributions
All writing components, all market research, designing, prototyping, creating presentation pitch, creating video
Timeline
April 16-17 2022
Tools
Figma
Wellesley In Product’s Annual Design Hackathon, EMPOWER, challenged participants to design a product that empowers people to embrace their authentic selves. We focused on the issue of inclusion and designed a fitness app in 2 days for people with disabilities. Our design won 1st place.
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Our Key Goals:
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Provide personalized fitness and recovery resources for people with reduced mobility.
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Celebrate physical progress and individuals’ unique bodies.
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My Key Contributions:
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did comparative analysis on the efficacy of existing designs for people with disabilities using first-hand accounts of target users
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iteratively designed and prototyped 30% of Aibly's functionalities and screens using Figma
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wrote all marketing materials intentionally, crafting a story of our design for the intended audience (including competition pitch)
Design Process
Market Research
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While we were first brainstorming how we could design an app that focused on the competition's theme, I began to do some basic market research. After investigating our target users and the potential problem statement of the app, I found that one significant pain point was the lack of inclusivity on apps related to mobility. Specifically, I noticed that in many first-person accounts, people found that there were very few disable-friendly gyms and astonishingly limited fitness software that accommodated for their needs. When comparing and researching existing fitness apps, I also found a lack of disabled representation and consideration towards the diversity within disabled populations.
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Upon further research, I discovered that according to the CDC, 1 in 4 people in America have some type of disability. As of 2022, the most common disability in the U.S. was the one related to physical mobility (since then, cognitive disabilities has surpassed the percentage of mobility-related disabilities by 0.7%). Noticing the discrepancy between the large demand and little solution, we decided to make a fitness app for people with physical mobility disabilities.
Preliminary Design Sketches
Figure 1: my preliminary design sketches & ideation
Examples of my Iteration Process
I was in charge of designing and prototyping the default home screen of the app that featured personalized fitness and recovery resources, as well as the social media aspect of the app that allowed people to share their own progress and find community.
High-fidelity Design
Final Design
A survey of empowerment
After logging in, the user is asked to enter some information and go to the initial survey. From the very beginning, we seek to empower people with disabilities by focusing on what they are able to do instead of what they have lost. We do not ask for weight and height like most fitness apps do because of the special circumstances of our users.
Personalized fitness and recovery resources
On the fitness page, users can search for categories of fitness that suit them. Apart from the regular fitness categories, we incorporated filters specific to the needs of this community such as physical therapy, balance training, and prosthetic usage.
Here, Aibly also recommends fitness series based on the user’s initial survey. Their most recent workouts and programs that best fit their needs will be featured.
If the user searches for physical therapy, the certified physicians registered with Aibly and gyms that offer accessible options will be offered to them, tailored specifically for users’ needs.
Personal Tracker
In the weekly summary section, users can see how close they are to completing our goals on any given day. Aibly uses minutes to measure fitness goals instead of calories or other units to be as inclusive as possible. The exercises that are done on that day will be featured, with a place to record your diet, as well as a weekly summary.
Community Building
In order to create an uplifting community, we created a community section where users can post their successes, offer tips specific to our users’ needs, as well as ask questions. Recommended profiles and followed channels will appear at the very top along with their posts. Only certified channels will have the special icon to differentiate between professional medical advice and general tips.
Celebrate Individual Achievement
On the profile page, users can access their moments, a culmination of their exercise hours, and a collection of posted images, where they can see their physical progress and be proud of their own bodies. Direct messages are also accessed here.