DriveMe
Help Seniors Go Anywhere, Anytime
Duration
3 months (Oct - Dec 2022)
Team
Angela Chan
Luka Liu
Michelle Wu
Paxon Wallace
Role
Research
Usability testing
Prototyping
Video editing
Tools
Adobe Suite
Figma
ProtoPie
OVERVIEW
Background
Senior centers, recognized by the Older Americans Act (OAA) as a community focal point, are one of the most widely used services among America’s older adults. Compared with their peers, older adults who participate in senior center activities have higher health, social interaction, and life satisfaction levels
However, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, approximately one-third of all seniors live by themselves. Seniors do not always have access to private transportation and are not always able to utilize public transportation to get to the senior center. At the same time, many senior centers have reported having fewer resources and manpower to serve seniors due to labor shortages
Problem
How might we meet the transportation needs of seniors so that we may ease the logistics and resource burden on senior center staff?
Solution
With the aim of solving this problem, we came up with DriveMe - a call-based service that allows seniors to independently arrange rides to and from the senior center without having to directly interface with a ride-share app
Product Launch Video
RESEARCH
Before we could arrive at our solution, we first had to get an understanding of our users and who we were designing for.
As part of our research we used three research methods to drive and scope our project:
Secondary Research
Easily accessible and helped us to gain a high-level understanding of seniors, their goals and surrounding environment
Our team was researching studies and articles about seniors
Fly On The Wall Observation
Observed how seniors behaved at senior center and interacted with the staff and organization
Observed seniors' daily activities in Central Area Senior Center
User Interview
Conducted one-on-one semi-structured and unstructured interview to gain an understanding of seniors' preferences, needs, motivations and issues senior center staff are faced with
Conversed with a 98-year old senior
Key Insights -
Seniors
01 The majority of seniors would visit the center to participate in specific
pre-planned activities
02 Some seniors struggle to visit the center when their families are unable
to provide transportation
03 Seniors who rely on public transportation face significant travel times,
especially if they live far from the center
Key Insights -
Senior Center Staff
01 Senior center has an inadequate staffing issue
02 The staff have to arrange carpools in order to provide an alternative for
seniors who have difficulties commuting to the center
03 Senior center staff need more support for transportation to
accommodate seniors with commute assistance
DEFINE
Using the findings from our research, we generated two personas that helped us better orient our design goals and guide our design decision.
User Personas
DESIGN
Firstly, we created a set of design requirements as guidelines for the ideation process. Then we used the Crazy 8's method to come up with multiple ideas. Next, we evaluated the strengths, weaknesses, feasibility and originality of each idea before refining our three most promising ideas.
DriveMe - Automated Phone System
After thorough evaluation, we decided to combine the two ideas of "AI-based Shuttle Service" and "Ride-share Program for Seniors" to create our solution - "DriveMe". This initiative will integrate an AI-powered shuttle service, automating ride scheduling for seniors. It will optimize routes and assign rides to drivers participating in "Ride-share Program for Seniors", with funding sourced from drivers, charities, corporations or governments.
Strengths
01 Minimum technological literacy from seniors
02 Optimal route would shorten ride duration
03 Allow seniors to access the same transportation services as everyone else does
04 Reduce the burden of commute planning on senior center staff
05 Eliminate workload on senior center staff
PROTOTYPE
Firstly, we created a user flow accordingly because it could help us to know what actions a user has to take and also informed us of the interactions that we would need to consider during the prototyping stage.
User Flow Diagram
Information Architecture
We started building out DriveMe into a medium-fidelity prototype to proceed with usability testing. To aid the design process of our prototype, we created the information architecture of DriveMe to get a sense of the scale and structure
There are three levels to our information architecture which support key interactions:
-
Arranging rides to and from the center
-
Ride confirmation calls
-
Ride notification calls
* There are other interactions documented in our
information architecture but we will only be focusing
on the three mentioned above for the scope of this project
Final Prototype
With the information architecture established, we identified key flows for testing during our usability sessions. I then crafted dialogue for these interactions, focusing on simplicity and brevity to avoid overwhelming users. Additionally, I ensured that the system would repeat user responses to confirm accuracy. Then using voice recordings and ProtoPie, I created a clickable prototype to facilitate our usability testing
VUI dialogue between the system and user
Clickable prototype to demonstrate the experience of interacting with DriveMe
USABILITY TESTING
We held our usability testing sessions at the Central Area Senior Center with four participants and the recruitment was through snowball sampling with the help of senior center staff. Testing was aimed at finding out if DriveMe was desirable and if it was easy to use for seniors.
Conducted usability testing with a senior
Key Findings
01 Participants were very receptive to DriveMe and found it easy to use
02 While seniors were receptive to DriveMe and felt it easy enough to
use, they conveyed their apprehension with technology
03 Participants were pleased to have more transportation options
which would give them more flexibility
04 DriveMe can be extended to be accessible to seniors who are
visually impaired with voice command
Limitations
01 Sample size of participants was not sufficient for a qualitative study
02 Participants were not savvy with digital prototypes
03 Required more testings by using devices that seniors are familiar with
OTHER DELIVERABLES
Onboarding Program
In order to reduce seniors’ apprehension with technology, we also developed a preliminary onboarding program which could help reduce cognitive load on seniors when being introduced to new service and help build their trust towards the service
