Inspiration
Given the trend of Singaporeans becoming more open-minded and willing to talk about mental illnesses, more Singaporeans can now expect to seek treatment more readily. However, improvements in infrastructures and treatment plans require time. This is where ChatBuddy would come in by providing a stop-gap measure in the interim.
What it does
As mentioned in the description, ChatBuddy provides a listening ear to anyone, particularly people who are facing strong feelings of isolation and combating mental illnesses. ChatBuddy aims to provide a more humane conversation with users by physically talking to them through our speech features.
How we built it
Using React and Tailwind CSS, we developed a responsive web page for Users to interact with our chatbot. Using React's Audio Voice Recorder, we are able to provide a real audio conversation with users.
Challenges we ran into
We found it difficult to set ChatBuddy apart from the variety of chatbots available in the market initially. However, we managed to discover the weaknesses of the available chatbots through a focused group discussion within the team and realized that current bots do not provide a human touch necessary to comfort people.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
Hence, we sought to use voice features to simulate a more authentic conversation.
What's next for ChatBuddy
We hope to further improve ChatBuddy by allowing users to customize the persona of ChatBuddy so as to allow users to feel more comfortable sharing things to personas they are familiar with. Additionally, we hope to make ChatBuddy more humane sounding over time.
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