Taking the App idea to the next level

A few requirements in the past week (a scholarship application and a Management class assignment) have asked me to clarify ideas about my thesis project. While I was feeling torn between two concepts, I decided to let one of them—the idea for a mobile app to assist in redefining food habits—emerge for the purposes of completing these assignments. This proved to be a most helpful exercise in allowing me to think through the implications of focusing on this design concept and carved a path for further design explorations in this space.

A revised project description:

“FOOD FOR THOUGHT”—A MOBILE APP to help make better choices about food

Jamie Oliver points out in his popular TED Talk that this generation of American
children are the first in history to have a shorter life expectancy than their parents. That’s a tough pill to swallow. In the midst of the national debate over healthcare reform lies a fundamental problem that has caused a rapid decline in the health of Americans in recent decades: we have a dysfunctional relationship with our food. We’re faced with a broken food system, an insufficient understanding of food production, and confusion about how our bodies process food as energy. We’ve forgotten how to eat!

For my thesis I am designing a mobile application that addresses the widespread misunderstanding of food consumption by providing healthy recommendations and a system for tracking nutrition changes that can be made to consciously effect improvements in personal diet regimens. It’s about reengineering the food environment so that eating becomes both mindful and enjoyable. The application will incorporate a database of small, reasonable changes that users can try which will have an overall positive effect on their diet and wellness if incorporated into their lifestyles over the long term. A daily reminder system and checklist will help the user focus on one small change at a time, for 28 days, the span in which experts in behavioral modification say is sufficient to replace a bad habit with a better one. A support component for friends and family will help participants reach their goals, and the social aspect will contribute to the viral concept of “spreading” healthy living.

This application will address ways to encourage people to make food choices consciously, and to prepare food for themselves. A focus on health rather than weight loss, prevention rather than treatment and teaching moments that delight is crucial and fundamental to the education necessary to reverse the effects of the food crisis at hand.

We are at an interesting crossroads in which there is the real possibility to make
history by working to modify behavior with technology available to us. I will use the resources of interaction design process and communication to foster the understanding that eating need not be so complicated. With a partner in technological development, this concept can be presented to the world as a working product for positive change.

Some preliminary wireframes:

Next Steps:

I am in the process of running a paper prototype test of this idea with some users. I’ve presented the behavior change component in 2 ways, as a 7-day challenge and also a full 28-day commitment. I’m looking forward to seeing the results of this as my testers document their thoughts on this format.