Headspace Challenge
encouraging youth mindfulness through social media
Overview
My capstone team worked with the Headspace for Educators Team to promote mindfulness among youth.
Through a participatory design process, we researched what motivates youth to start healthy habits. We then developed and executed a week-long social media challenge encouraging youth to practice small mindfulness activities daily. We evaluated the effectiveness of our challenge and provided insights that the Headspace team can use for their future campaigns.
TOOLS
Figma, Mural, Instagram
Skills
participatory design, user research, visual design, social media marketing
time
20 weeks, winter & spring 2021
Solution
A week-long Instagram challenge to educate youth on mindfulness practices, encourage small behavior changes, and foster community.
Problem
Headspace wants to encourage mindfulness practices among youth (ages 14-22) outside of their app.
2-minute video describing the entire project
project poster
Research
Secondary research
My team started by reviewing research and literature regarding youth and mental health, including findings from past Headspace campaigns. We wanted to build a foundational understanding of youth's daily routines, stressors, and perceptions of mental health, as well as what other digital solutions exist in this area.
exploratory interviews
Based on feedback from Headspace, we narrowed our research to youth's daily routines, their existing mindfulness practices, and how they approach conversations about mental health. We developed an interview protocol with 15 primary interview questions and conducted 16 virtual semi-structured interviews over two weeks. I participated in 7 of the interviews as an interviewer or notetaker. We then created an affinity diagram to identify themes.
"Talking with others isn’t so much to have them help you, but to use them as support to help you think through things."
"Positive mental health is about being able to handle your issues and problems."
"Going on YouTube or Netflix to watch videos...is like running away from my problems. But it helps to manage situations."
interview affinity diagram
Surveys
To see if our interview findings represented a larger population, we collected survey responses from diverse youth across the country. We spread our survey through personal networks, Reddit, and local survey-sharing Slack channels. We received 95 responses, 45 of which met our youth demographic criteria.
Data analysis
We used quantitative and qualitative data analysis to review the surveys and interviews. The findings are listed below.
The Headspace team requested we further research what motivates youth to engage in healthy habits. Once we understand this underlying motivation, we can determine how they can incorporate mindfulness into their lives.
Motivation barrier
85% of survey respondents expressed a desire to improve their mental health, but many can't find the motivation to take the first step.
Social Support
10/14 interviewees mentioned valuing social support when navigating issues, but 64.4% of survey respondents fear judgement.
88.9% of survey respondents agree that they like having a sense of control over their daily routines, and 93.4% agree that uncertainty of the future creates stress.
Sense of Control
Although few consider it a mindful activity, nearly every interviewee uses technology and social media to escape stressors.
Escapsism
Participatory Design
We developed a participatory design session that included 8 former interview participants to further learn what motivates their healthy habits.
Our session took place over Zoom, and participants completed white boarding activities on Mural. I facilitated the entire session.
participatory design Mural board
Warm-up
We started with three brainstorming activities that asked participants to think about how they started new habits and share them with their friends. These were intended to be general (not focused on mental health) to help users think about their existing habits.
Main Activities
Working off the warm-up brainstorming, we had participants complete four additional activities that would directly result in potential solutions.
Come up with the worst and best idea you can think of to tackle/improve on the habits you selected.
[determine ends of the scale]Generate 8 ideas for how you might encourage yourself and others to engage in mindful activities.
[create several actionable ideas]Work in pairs to build off one of your ideas.
[sharing of perspectives to validate ideas]Share your idea with the group. Everyone votes on the three ideas that are most promising
[identify which ideas we should move forward with]
examples of participants' ideas for building new habits
Results
We analyzed our participatory design session and found 6 interesting findings, which are listed. One of the most important observations I made was that the majority of the motivators that youth brainstormed already exist in the Headspace app, like daily reminders, progress tracking, and social connection.
Even though we gave all of our interview participants a code for free access to Headspace, only 1 of the 8 people in our participatory design session redeemed it. This shows that Headspace as a standalone app is not a desirable solution for youth, and we need to figure out how we can motivate them to participate in mindfulness in other ways.
1
Youth prioritize other healthy habits over meditation.
Participants aren't drawn to the Headspace app.
Activities are attractive when they're fun, involve self-improvement, and/or can be completed with friends.
2
3
4
Participants are motivated to stick to habits when they can track their progress and receive rewards.
Participants want new habits to fit with their existing lifestyles.
50% mentioned that they would like to see mindfulness social media challenges.
5
6
Ideation
Based on the participatory design session findings and ideas, we storyboarded 10 potential design directions.
my storyboards of both digital and physical design solutions
Final Direction
The two most promising themes were social media and a school campaign. After weighing the options, the Headspace team was most excited about increasing their social media presence.
The Instagram Challenge
We developed a 5-day social media challenge that incentivizes youth to incorporate mindfulness activities into their everyday routines. This solution aligns with Headspace's goals, my team's capabilities, and youth motivators.
Logistics
Creating a social media challenge to address mental health was tricky. Youth made it clear that social media was the best way to reach them and raise awareness, but they also recognized it can be addicting and toxic. Further, they feel incentivized to make change through prizes and competition, but mindfulness requires a clear intention to be effective. Our challenge had to find the balance between these competing factors to best serve the goals of our stakeholders.
5 Days
Five days align with the length of a school week and allow time to start building a habit without losing interest.
3 prize incentives
Multiple prizes incentivize people to participate.
The Headspace app has 3 primary categories: move, sleep, and focus. The challenges aligned with these categories.
3 daily challenges
participation
We had participants comment on their completion to create a low barrier to participation and encourage interaction among participants.
Recruitment
We recruited participants through school and personal networks. We aimed for ~20 participants to test the challenge on a small scale.
We gave participants surveys before and after the challenge to measure how their attitudes about mindfulness changed.
Surveys
Our challenge format was informed by our goals, our research, and other social media challenges we've seen. The exact rules can be found on our Instagram page.
Content Design
My team designed our challenge content and graphics. The challenges were inspired by past Headspace campaigns and participatory design suggestions. The copy conveys a friendly and supportive voice, and the graphics for each challenge were based on Headspace's brand elements.
Instagram content
Execution
We successfully conducted our challenge from May 17-21, 2021. Every day we posted one challenge post and one repost of existing Headspace content. I gained valuable experience running a challenge, interacting with followers, and creating unique content.
Some stats
43 Instagram followers
21 Instagram participants
14 participants met challenge completion criteria
117 total entries
"Left my phone in another room for two hours, and I’ll definitely be trying it again - the most productive I’ve been in a looong time"
"I took 5 deep breath before switching tasks and I think y'all should too since yall r such busy bees
[tagged 3 friends]"
examples of how our users engaged with the challenges and recruited friends in the comments section
Results
Overall our challenge had positive results. Our followers reported learning new mindfulness techniques that they want to practice regularly. Not all participants loved the social media aspect, so it prompted ideas for how we could implement a similar educational and competitive campaign on another platform if we had more time.
We reported our findings to the Headspace for Education team and gave them a framework for how they can implement a similar challenge on a larger scale.
87.5% of Participants reported being more likely to practice mindfulness on a regular basis after the challenge
Reflection
This project was invaluable for practicing research, marketing, and stakeholder communication. We started with the generalized goal of encouraging youth to practice mindfulness, and with several research methods and participatory design, my team uncovered the deeper, unspoken motivators. We would not have been able to come to this conclusion without co-designing with youth, which exemplifies the importance of involving users in every step of the design process.
It was refreshing to work on a solution outside of an app. As much as I wanted to practice interface design, that's not what this project called for. It was an interesting challenge to use social media as a solution to one of the biggest problems it creates.
Unlike most school projects, we worked with clients. I enjoyed determining how to balance business goals with design practices. I'm excited that our findings will be used by the Headspace team and that our social media challenge created a positive impact for our followers. This project was rewarding from both a design and social impact standpoint, and I'm proud of the work that was accomplished.
