Intervention Study Synthesis: Team Ant

Stretching is one of those habits that people know is good for them—but often struggle to maintain. For college students, the challenge isn’t just remembering to stretch, but overcoming procrastination, social dynamics, and packed schedules. Our goal was to design an app that not only reminds users to stretch but actually makes them want to.

Assumption Map and Tests

Key Insights

• Users fail to currently create a stretching habit because they rely on person prompts, which are inconsistent, weak, and unsustainable. Their current solutions are very reactive as opposed to proactive, meaning they need a more structured solution that pulls on both intrinsic and extrinsic motivation.
• School and work are very demanding and users will prioritize it over stretching even though they understand the benefits. They always frame stretching as a gain, but rarely do they frame their lack of stretching as a loss. They do not consider the consequences of not stretching, diminishing its priority over other things.
• Users are more likely to stretch when cues in their environment and existing routines share the same theme (well-being, physical wellness, mindfulness, etc.).
• Users fail to integrate stretching into their schedule. This is because scheduling it in becomes predictable, especially for such a mundane habit. This reveals that a solution is needed that is enjoyable and fun.

Overview of Assumption Tests

Assumption Test 1

Assumption Test 2

Assumption Test 3

If you’d like to learn more about who we recruited and why, alongside our artifacts, we invite you to read more here.

Key Insights

• People are equally motivated by the benefits and consequences of stretching. Thus, we will employ both in our solution. This variety will also help decrease mundaneness and increase the fun!
• People feel like they don’t have time, so a quick stretching session goes a long way. Therefore, we will refrain from promoting greater stretching durations, and instead encourage consistency, reminding people that even just 1 minute of stretching can be beneficial.
• In the text messages, you can see that people engaged in playful banter even though they were solely asked to stretch. This means that engaging in habits with community can make otherwise mundane habits fun! Hence, we will incorporate social aspects to increase motivation and make building habits enjoyable.

 

Intervention Study

Motivated by assumption test 3, our study placed participants on a leaderboard, where they moved up the leaderboard so long as they stretched (no matter how long, as informed by assumption test 2). 

We recruited participants that already stretch and care to stretch, but want greater consistency. We felt it was important that they already cared so that we can test the effectiveness of the leaderboard in increasing their motivation. 

In essence, our key question being addressed was: is external social pressure enough to help kick start a stretching habit?

 

Amazingly, everyone stretched! 

• Participant J actually stretched everyday, but simply forgot to log that they stretched on the second day. They reacted to this, stating “I’m really competitive, and I love a good challenge… [so] I’m going to make sure I don’t forget [to log my stretch again].” This reveals that the visualization of behaviors can help people identify behaviors they do/don’t want. When participants recognize gaps in their tracking, they may become more intentional about maintaining consistency.
• Participants W and G frequently cited the leaderboard as their motivation to stretch, with G stating “[I stretched to] keep the routine, even if it’s not perfect, it’s something.” This reveals that the leaderboard serves as a strong external motivator by visually reinforcing consistency. Without the leaderboard, people fail to recognize that even a small effort contributes to progress. Progress-based motivation reinforces the idea that maintaining the habit is more important than achieving perfection.

Finally, we mapped participants responses against how much more motivated they stated they were by the leaderboard to stretch, revealing the following key insights:

• There is tension between why competition can be interesting to some and not to others. For participant G, it was interesting because everyone was stretching—“it was harder to make excuses to not stretch.” In contrast, for participant W, it was uninteresting also because everyone was stretching—”we all did it…” This demonstrates that people’s self-perceptions of their individualization is motivating in different ways. For one, people don’t want to be the “odd one out,” and two, people want to feel like they are unique in their accomplishments, which helps them feel special and proud. We will leverage this insight in our solution by balancing external motivators with internal motivators, such as recognizing users’ efforts not only in the leaderboard but also in a sort of personal dashboard with personal achievements and milestones, further motivating them by making them feel special.
• Participant W’s motivation started high and decreased significantly over time. Therefore, competition isn’t always enough. We cannot rely on our leaderboard as the sole motivator within our solution, and we must incorporate a variety of nudges to maintain motivation.
• Finally, participant D notes that they may have been more motivated if they personally knew the other competitors. This re-affirms our insight from assumption test 3— competition isn’t just about accountability, shame, and external pressures, but also about community building and social bonding. Thus, we will create ways that friends can interact with one another in the app throughout their habit building journeys. This will improve engagement as it will be fun and sociable to work on their habits with their friends.

System Paths

System Path 1: Shame Shawn

• Motivation: Driven by loss aversion and social pressure. Shawn acts when friends complete stretches, so social proof offers a short-term push.
• Habit Formation: Loading screen facts about stretching help shift his focus toward intrinsic rewards.
• Key Flow: Notification → App Launch → Loading Screen with quick stretching benefits → Selects a desk-friendly stretch → Option to send a “bump” to friends for extra validation.

System Path 2: Booked & Busy Beetrice

• Motivation: Prioritizes speed and minimal distractions. Beetrice values a streamlined onboarding process.
• Efficiency Focus: Fewer steps, minimal information (only essential fields like Name, Email, DOB), and smart defaults to auto-fill details.
• Key Flow: App Launch → Immediate, distraction-free login/sign-up → Quick, simple info collection → Instant confirmation, ready for use.

System Path 3: Procrastinating Pam

• Motivation: Tends to delay tasks; initial prompts are often ignored.
• Strategic Nudges: A gentle follow-up later in the day (e.g., via Apple Health Sync) and simple, manageable exercises (e.g., a 10-second toe touch) improve engagement.
• Key Flow: Initial notification → Possible inaction → Second, pre-bed nudge → Simple stretch with a countdown for urgency.

System Paths Overview and Insights:

Across the personas—Shame Shawn, Booked & Busy Beetrice, and Procrastinating Pam—common themes emerge in motivation, engagement strategies, and behavior patterns. While their entry points and decision-making processes vary, their core needs align in requiring a balance of motivation triggers, ease of engagement, and adaptive interventions.

Universal Insights (Shared Across Personas)

Motivation Comes from Loss, Social Influence, or Habitual Learning

• Shawn is driven by social proof (friends stretching) and loss aversion.
• Pam responds to adaptive nudging and habit streak reinforcement.
• Beetrice prioritizes efficiency over motivation but benefits from frictionless engagement.

Universal Takeaway: Motivation varies, so a multifaceted approach using streaks, social accountability, and habit-building insights is key.

Adaptive Reminders & Nudging Enhance Engagement

• Shawn & Pam need well-timed nudges: social proof for Shawn, bedtime reminders for Pam.
• Beetrice prefers no interruptions, so onboarding should be fast and unobtrusive.

Universal Takeaway: Smart, adaptive reminders should adjust to each user’s response history.

Low-Effort, Quick Actions Improve Retention

• Shawn prefers desk-friendly stretches with fast execution.
• Pam benefits from bite-sized, quick-win exercises that remove the barrier to starting.
• Beetrice expects minimal friction, so streamlined actions are essential.

Universal Takeaway: The simpler the engagement, the higher the retention.

Intrinsic vs. Extrinsic Motivation Must Be Balanced

• Shawn starts with extrinsic motivation (friends stretching) but needs habit reinforcement (stretching facts).
• Pam requires structured external nudges until small wins create a habit.
• Beetrice is efficiency-driven and expects immediate results—engagement must be instant.

Universal Takeaway: Extrinsic motivators (streaks, social influence) can start the habit, but internal motivators (habit-building insights) must sustain it.

Story Maps

 

About Our Process…

Our process started with identifying the key moments in a college student’s daily routine that would benefit most from incorporating a stretching habit. We structured our user journey map into three segments, each representing a critical opportunity:

• Morning Routine – when users can stretch to wake up their body and improve mood.
• Between Classes – when long sitting periods lead to stiffness, requiring quick stretch breaks to re-energize.
• Evening Wind-down – when users can stretch to relax and improve sleep consistency and quality.

From there, we mapped out common challenges students face at these moments—forgetting to stretch, lacking motivation, or struggling with consistency. We then determined the ideal outcomes using techniques from habit formation research. A key insight from this process was recognizing that making stretching a habit requires consistent engagement. Features like notification reminders, progress tracking, and social motivation (e.g., leaderboards and group challenges) stood out as crucial in reinforcing stretching as a daily behavior. Another major insight was the need for customization—integrating with existing digital habits (e.g., calendars, Apple Health, screen-time monitoring) would help create, low-friction reminders and encourage habit building.

When prioritizing our Minimum Viable Product (MVP), we had to balance technical feasibility, user impact, and time constraints. The core features were chosen based on their necessity for habit-building while meeting our proto personas needs.

• Tracking Progress: To provide meaningful feedback and motivation, we need a way to store user progress. This requires an onboarding process (login/account creation).
• Personalized Reminders: Since engagement is highly dependent on timing, we need access to scheduling data (calendar integration, Apple Health, etc.) to tailor reminders. However, this comes with privacy considerations, so permissions must be clear and user-controlled.
• Social Accountability: Because some users are more likely to follow through when external pressure is applied, we prioritized a social component—allowing users to invite friends and engage in group challenges. This requires access to contacts, but we considered an opt-in approach to balance privacy concerns.

Given time constraints, we focused on features that offer immediate value without being overwhelming for the user. We decided to deprioritize more complex elements (such as AI-driven recommendations or real-time feedback on stretching form).

Moreover, our proto-personas Shame Shawn, Procrastinating Pam, and Booked + Busy Beetrice—helped guide our decisions by emphasizing how different user needs shape feature priorities:

• Shame Shawn thrives on social accountability. Group-based stretching sessions or challenges within friend groups provide the external push needed to stay consistent.
• Procrastinating Pam avoids tasks that feel like effort. Subtle, friendly reminders instead of pressure-based nudges ensure stretching feels easy to start rather than another chore.
• Booked and Busy Beetrice values efficiency. Calendar-integrated reminders and ultra-low-effort stretches fit into their packed schedule without feeling disruptive.

By incorporating these insights, we shaped our MVP to address real constraints while still maximizing impact. In the future, we could refine these features or even expand features based on user engagement and feedback. Finally, our storyboard and journey map helped identify the MVP features needed for an engaging stretching app, incorporating habit-forming techniques. Recognizing students’ busy schedules, we prioritized key features to ensure functionality while identifying opportunities to encourage stretching and habit formation.

MVP Features

Onboarding & Registration

• Sign-up/registration (collect personal info: name, email, etc.).
• Request permission for notifications.
• Request permission for contacts.
• Invite/add friends during onboarding.

Core Stretching Features

• Stretch in App (users can follow guided stretches).
• Log Stretch Feature (users can track their stretch activity).

Social & Motivation Features

• Leaderboard to track progress and encourage competition.
• Stretch Reminders (e.g., “Did you stretch today?” notification).

Bubble Map

Bubble Map Insights

Our bubble map organizes the relationships between different elements of our solution. The sizes of the bubbles represent the importance/centrality of core features (e.g., guided stretches, the leaderboard, the dashboard) in the app’s structure, while smaller ones represent supporting or secondary elements (e.g., settings, notifications).

The sizes of the bubbles are not representative of anticipated time spent in-app. While the user will likely spend the bulk of their time in the app in some of the sections indicated by large bubbles, this is not applicable for every large bubble (e.g. leaderboard or sign up/registration). Furthermore, we may find that they spend extended time exploring public stretch routines posted by the community, or parsing their own stretch history, even if these are not features that we intended to be the highlight of our app. In summary, our bubble map:

• Reveals how features interact and which features are central to user experience
• Different user motivations require tailored intervention strategies
• Simple, quick actions enhance usability and reduce barriers to participation

Process

Using our MVP features as a foundation, we built an ecosystem of features. The user personas outlined in our System Paths influenced how these elements in the bubble map were weighted and connected:

For Procrastinating Pam:

• The map shows a direct path from the Home Page to “Begin Stretch” and “Choose from Existing Stretch Routines,” making it quick and easy to start without overthinking
• Motivational elements like “You’ve been on your screen for too long. Let’s stretch!” reduce friction for reluctant users
• Timer and visualizer features appear as supportive features rather than separate pages, keeping procrastinators engaged without extra clicks

For Shame Shawn:

• “Stretch with Friends” is a major section with multiple social features (Friend Streaks, Friend Activity)
• “See Who’s Available” and “Invite Friends” are included as features within the same context, not requiring additional navigation
• Leaderboard is prominently connected to the Home Page, satisfying the need for social proof and comparison

For Booked & Busy Beetrice:

• The central “Home Page + Dashboard” design allows quick access to everything, keeping frequently used functions accessible
• “Choose from Existing Stretch Routines” saves time for busy users
• “Timer” feature helps fit stretches into tight schedules

Inspired by our personas, we also designed a system of personalized stretch coaches, each catering to different motivation styles, lifestyles, and preferences. Recognizing that users have diverse needs—whether they seek structure, fun, efficiency, or social motivation—we wanted to offer a customized user experience with the right encouragement and approach to guided stretches and nudges.

• Nimble Nina: Light-hearted with humor, using peer pressure and group dynamics to motivate, i.e. “Your friends are stretching, don’t let them beat you!” Highlights how many others completed similar stretches today. Creates shareable milestone challenges and positions flexibility as a social currency (looking at you, Shame Shawn).
• Contorting Christina: Efficient and practical. Offers micro-stretches that integrate into work transitions. Uses calendar-friendly language and focuses on productivity benefits like mental clarity and stress reduction. Aimed at those with a packed schedule (Booked & Busy Beetrice will appreciate this).
• Stretchy Snuffles: Playfully persistent with gentle humor and zero judgment. Uses tiny wins and “just 30 seconds” approaches to overcome resistance. Celebrates even minimal effort with genuine enthusiasm (Procrastinating Pam needs this).
• Malleable Melody: Calm, grounding, and mindfulness-focused. Encourages users to connect with their bodies and take their time. Soft, soothing, and inspirational, with phrases like “Breathe deeply,” “Feel the flow,” and “You are one with your body.” Designed for our spiritual queens seeking stress relief, relaxation, and mindfulness.
• Agile Amy: Tough-love, high-energy, and performance-oriented. Uses strength-training language and emphasizes the athletic advantages of flexibility. No-nonsense approach with concrete metrics and competitive elements. For the gym bros.

We debated whether users should pick a coach before every guided stretch or select a coach during onboarding and adjust it later in settings. While allowing users to choose a coach each time could provide flexibility, we ultimately decided that this would introduce unnecessary friction to the stretching process.

By integrating coach selection into the initial setup, we assume that users will resonate with the coach designed for their motivation style—whether they prefer playful encouragement, structured guidance, or social accountability. This approach streamlines the stretching experience, ensuring that users can jump into a session without an extra decision point each time.

While this choice does make switching coaches slightly less accessible (tucked into settings rather than surfaced before every stretch), we believe this trade-off aligns with user preferences for low-friction, predictable experiences.

This may seem like a lot of detail for a small part of our bubble map, but the decision-making process behind it offers valuable insight into our values and approach. It highlights how we thoughtfully considered our proto-personas and system paths, ensuring that every design choice aligns with user needs and behaviors.

*Note: We did not expand on the “Choose from Existing Stretch Routines” section of the bubble map, since the contents of this section will vary from user to user. However, our discussions on accessibility led us to consider offering a starter set of stretch routines that can be performed seated, standing, or lying down, as well as routines targeting specific muscle groups. This ensures that users with limited mobility can find an option that works for them. From this, we developed the “Build My Own Stretch Routine” feature, allowing users to customize routines to fit their unique needs and abilities. This is a pretty neat example of universal design—a solution created for accessibility that ultimately enhances the experience for all users.

TLDR

Our stretching app addresses why college students struggle to maintain stretching habits by targeting three key user personas:

1. Procrastinating Pam – Needs gentle nudges and bite-sized stretches that feel achievable
2. Shame Shawn – Motivated by social accountability and competition via leaderboards
3. Booked & Busy Beetrice – Requires efficiency-focused stretches that integrate with existing routines

Key research insights:

• Short, consistent stretching is more effective than infrequent longer sessions
• Social features significantly increase engagement (confirmed in our intervention study)
• Users need both intrinsic and extrinsic motivation to form lasting habits

Our solution offers:

• Personalized stretch coaches with distinct personalities
• Smart notifications that adapt to user behavior
• Social features including leaderboards and friend activities
• Quick-access home dashboard prioritizing low-friction engagement

The app’s navigation design intentionally minimizes page transitions for procrastinators while providing rich social features for competition-motivated users, all while keeping the experience streamlined for busy students.