We created an application for young people after refining our research and brainstorming as a team. The application will be kid-friendly, with bright colours, bubbly fonts, and interactive elements to keep the child interested while using it. The application includes a landing screen that allows the child to ‘journal’ about how they are feeling on that particular day. This includes childish concepts such as “what colour do you feel?” We thought this might be a good way to help children who can’t explain or understand certain emotions. Similar to Facebook or Twitter, the user can add a describing word, a colour, and a face to sum up their feelings and cast it onto the app as their ‘update/status’.
Users complete daily challenges that are designed to keep their minds distracted and active. The daily challenges will be mundane activities that will help to build healthy habits and mental health wellbeing in the long run. Daily challenges will be tracked and logged into the app, and other users in their network will be able to see how their friends are doing and how far they have progressed. Completing challenges will not only encourage users to compete with their peers, but they will also receive rewards for their efforts. The app will work with sponsors to provide goods or services that children would be interested in, such as games, toys, and other items.
The app will also include a chat function that will allow the user to communicate with their friends as well as a member of the uplift team who will be available to offer advice and support. We also considered some of the security concerns associated with having children use an app like this. We would need to put measures in place such as parental guidance and user rules to ensure that the app remained a safe space for children to talk about mental health, complete daily challenges, build connections, and feel more positive/ uplifted.
