Thoughtspace

Inspiration

Our inspiration behind this project was to explore the cognitive sense beyond the traditional 5 physical senses. We wanted to tap into how cognition plays a central role in how we percieve and interpret information which can range from person to person. We thought of accessibility as a pinnacle for our design principles, and wanted to consider the many different ways people understand the world.

What it does

Our app, ThoughtSpace, allows for the user to connect neurally (their brain) to our app in which our app processes their memories and their approaches to thinking. We have 3 use cases: learn, visualize, and explore. Users are able to pool in their thoughts (with consent) and have the option to map out, edit, and connect their thoughts depending on how they want to organize their thoughts. We also have the option which they can share and export their thought mind-maps to help articulate their ideas better to others.

How we built it

We conducted primary and secondary research via online research, user surveys, and user interviews. We used Figma to build our entire project alongside its feature Figma Make to explore how fast iteration works. We used blue and yellow as our main color palettes to reflect introspection and creativity, respectively. We wanted to immerse the user in an initial abstract experience but as their thoughts become more concrete, shapes become much more solidified and clear.

Challenges we ran into

Challenges we ran into were defining what a sense really is, in which we conducted user research and surveys to gauge opinions and thoughts. Ideating what sense we'd like to focus on proved a bit challenging as well because of how cognitive sense is quite ambiguous, where we navigated this ambiguity by connecting it to real-life challenges. Lastly, building out our actual project took time, dedication, and much iteration, but also a lot of fun! It was also a struggle balancing our members' busy schedules and other deadlines while designing an app from scratch within a few days.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

This is our first Design-a-Thon for all of us, so this experience was a large learning curve working as a group to create a full product in a short amount of time. For experienced Figma users, it was our first time using Figma Make in an elaborate way as well. We're designers who learned how to integrate a new tool into our workflow!

What we learned

We learned how to work more efficiently in a short amount of time through being guided by the formal design process from user research to prototyping. Learning how to ideate quickly and make quick decisions whilst prioritizing the user in mind proved difficult, but a great learning lesson. We also learned how to use helpful tools like Figma Make to speed up the process.

What's next for ThoughtSpace

The future for ThoughtSpace is fleshing out features further, conducting more user testing, and creating more user-friendly features while developing the technology as a real product.