UX Case Study for Travel Acclimation
Timeline
Three Months
Role
Mobile Product Design
Deliverable
Mobile Application
Tools
Sketch and Principle
Context
Traveling should be fun, exciting, and create long lasting memories that forever is shared for a limitless time. For most areas with higher altitude and climate, people will find a way to adapt to different environments. What happens when you can’t adapt simply because you don’t frequently travel? Or when you’re unsure of how to properly prepare for the elevation change and altitude level?
Goal
It is quite a challenge to be prepared for the temperature and altitude change in the location you’re going as opposed to being prepared for the weather. My main goal is to propose and design a solution that helps prepare users on staying acclimated and prevent jet lag to their selected travel destination.
Primary Goal
Secondary Goal
Create and propose a probable solution that fights jet lag and helps users acclimate to their travel destination better and efficiently.
Take full control initiatives of mobile product user experience planning and designing.
Analyzing how users manage and work through different complex navigation systems within a quick timespan.
Dive further into user research and experience processes to grasp more comprehension levels.
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User Research
I sat down with five of my frequent travel friends - age 21 through 28 - and conducted an hour-long discussion on what they think is the biggest problem with travelers dealing with sudden climate change. To my surprise, the whole group agreed that there isn’t a proper app available to teach travelers to help get rid of the unwanted certainty of harsh climate change.
3 out of 5
friends said that it is sometimes quite overwhelming having to read as much about staying acclimated.
3 out of 5
talk about having to travel with their pets and often time runs into trouble with maintaining their needs.
2 out of 5
friends admit that they have experienced severe jet lag that causes them to miss a few days of their trip.
2 out of 5
mentioned that their experience with altitude sickness was horrible because they failed to notice their elevation level.
In addition to our discussion, we also participated in an icebreaker challenge and brainstormed an affinity diagram that correlates to staying acclimated and fighting jet lag. At one point we were quite stuck, so we decided to come up with whatever that comes to mind when a person travels for a long distance. I then organized them into groups and this is what we came up with.
Jessica Dober
Age: 22
Location: Chicago, IL
Education: Bachelor Degree in Journalism
Hometown: Evantson, IL
Meet Jess!
Jessica recently graduated from her Bachelor Degree in Journalism from Northwestern University in the local hometown of Evanston, Jess relies heavily on traveling for her career.
A dog mom, Jess also owns two small dogs she occasionally takes with her for her work. Not used to traveling, Jess gets jet lagged often quickly during her overseas adventure the most - she also sacrifices not seeing her furry children for several days because she is unsure on how to properly take care of them.
Frustrations
Recently back from her flight to Mexico, Jess was assigned to travel to Japan.
Jess would love to go to Japan, as she’s never been there and has always wanted to. However, she might contemplate withdrawing the trip and let her boss know she feels sick and unsure of how to properly keep up with the timezone and weather in Japan.
Goal
Jess would love to have an app tailored towards her needs for both her jet lag problems and how to travel with her two dogs so she doesn’t leave them behind as often when doing international flights.
Michael Tepilla
Age: 26
Location: Atlanta, GA
Occupation: Flight Attendance
Hometown: Houston, TX
Meet Michael!
Michael recently got hired as a flight attendant with one of the most successful airlines in the nation. Michael loves adventure and traveling outdoors so he took the job immediately on the spot.
Methodical and wise, Michael knew that he’d have to face the difficulties of adjusting to a different climate and timezone very fast. Though he has traveled overseas on multiple occasions, Michael spent most of his days reading acclimation tips and travel hacks to prevent jet lag but has yet learned anything important at all.
Frustrations
Michael had his first successful flight overseas, however, he ran to the restroom afterwards and vomited because he felt ill. Michael assumed it was because of the elevation shift and shift in time zone that causes him to feel dizzy.
Michael thought he did everything right, and is worried that this might happen again. The next day, he calls management to let them know about his sickness and they confirm it was everything Michael had expected.
Goal
Michael worries that this might happen to other new flight attendants. So he asks kindly about having a proper jet lag and acclimation app that informs him and his coworkers on how to prevent such an unpleasant experience from occuring again.
I created an MVP matrix to help with prioritizing my main features and functionality of the app. Creating this matrix allows me to further view what is viable and important and help organize the features into the mobile application.
Having an informational architecture helps me plan and details where my layout, features, and screens will be. This way, I can also structure my product better and guide my users to where they need to go. This doesn’t always work in my favor, however it helped build a structural root of my solution to allow more guidance for everyone.
The process of sketching involves thinking critically about where certain elements will sit. Brainstorming allows me to “quickly throw” whatever content I need onto the paper without having to think too much on their final outcome.
On-Board Screens
Sign in Screen
Home Screen
The main explore page will be the based homepage for all users when they first sign in, this page consists of a search feature, trending locations, articles about acclimation and a travel checklist. Clicking on the following contents will direct users to another screen.
Trending Locations
View trending locations searched by other users .
Recent Searches
Display user’s recent search history.
Stay Informed
List of informative articles and readings that users can read to stay more informed about acclimation and jet lag.
Packing Checklist
Pre-made template of a list of things to pack that allows users to add to their travel list.
Locator Screens
Not a map, but rather a weather location finder.
The locator allows users to drag and drop a pin to find out about the condition of the area. I wanted to highlight the usefulness of this feature because it allows users to quickly scan the local area for names and weather.
Planner Screen
The planner page consists of letting users create an acclimation plan, edit their travel bag, and view their saved locations.
Acclimation Plans
Users can create, edit and share an acclimation plan that guides them on traveling and dealing with high climate or sudden weather change.
Saved Locations
Saved locations made by users are displayed here.
Travel Bag
Travel bags contain saved items made by users either at the Explore page or browsing on the location page.
Account Screen
Profile Edits
Users can edit their profile preferences here such as changing email, password, add a profile picture, and more.
Preferences
This tab consists of editing features that would be useful for the users to understand the app better.
Settings
This menu contains necessary information such as notification and location tracking so users can have full control of their privacy.
Supporting Screens
These are screens that appear after an action is performed by the user - usually within its native page (EX: to get to the article screen, users have to be on the Explore page first).
Into the Night with Dark Mode
I thought having a dark mode option can help cover more with accessibility features and allow my users to have more freedom.
Location Screen
Users land on the location screen when they click to view a location from a search or the Trending Locations tab. Detailed breakdown of the weather of the given location, an essential travel packlist, a live dashboard for COVID-19 cases as well as having an acclimation review system for the selected location from verified travelers or locals of the area to write their acclimation tips.
Create an Acclimation Plan
On the Planner page, users have the option to create a new personalized Acclimation Plan. Users first will have to search up their flight number (or they can skip) and then will be taken through a series of short questionnaires to finalize their setup process to create their plan. After the plan has been created, users can share their plan with friends.
I gathered the same groups of five friends and gave them instructions that relate to the core usability of the app.
Meanwhile, each time they begin a task, I would try and time their actions and see how fast they reach their goals. All subjects finished their tasks in a timely manner.
Feedback Results
All users were able to navigate through the on-board and log-in screens.
All users were able to find where the packing checklist is.
All users successfully turned on Dark Mode and delete a saved location.
All users were able to read the local acclimation tips on Costa Rica.
All users were able to successfully search for Acadia Mountain on the Locator screen.
All users were able to create a new acclimation plan.
All users were able to turn on satellite mode within the locator screen.
3 users were able to find where the share button is located on the acclimation plan page.
Criticism
3 users were a bit confused on what the Locator screen actually does.
2 users said that the timeline feature within the acclimation plan is actually quite confusing.
2 users mentioned that having a bit more contrast within some location screen could help with legibility.
What's Next?
Incorporate and expand Acclim8s into a more suitable and friendlier platform such as smartwatch for easier traveling and time management. I am also interested in turning this app into a desktop site so that users can access it through the internet if they don’t have a mobile device.
What Was Tough?
Iterations within a deep process of a stage of the app was the most difficult because I have to refine and reroute my prototype to fit a certain way for the users, and hoping that it came back positive. Iterations took most of the time - and I’m very much glad it did - because it was a constant back and forth with my subjects and getting good information out of it.
Self Reflection & Lessons
I learned that in order to get the results that you want, sometimes you have to sacrifice what you want. It’s confusing, but after interviewing my subjects I realized that a lot of what I did is actually for me and not them.
It was quite an eye opening experience considering I never planned on taking Acclim8s into this direction as well as going against my motto “putting users first”. It was a successful learning lesson as I put aside my creative thoughts and worked with the users firsthand to solve their problems.
Real Life Interactive Prototype
