Figma link: https://www.figma.com/file/e68kbmODy0BpzzchsorfO8/Clickable-Prototype?t=jAKgbYudXhQEfnam-1
Introduction:
Our prototype simulates our app, TimeIt, which aims to limit screen time on TikTok by enforcing users’ self-imposed time limits. Once a user reaches their limit, they are locked out of TikTok, at which point they have the option to 1) ask their friend (who is alerted of their TikTok usage) for more time, or 2) close out of TikTok. Once the request is made to their friend, the friend either accepts or denies the extension request. The number of extension requests that the user makes is tracked as a weekly metric to monitor progress.
Our goal is to have users go through the process of 1) setting their own limits, 2) using TikTok, and 3) receiving notifications of a reached screentime with overall low pressure. Embedded in this goal is the desire for a straightforward onboarding process to get users started with the TimeIt experience. Throughout use of the prototype, we hope that the significance of notifications will be clearly conveyed to users. Lastly, we expect for users to find value in additional UX elements, found on screens like our homepage.
On the homepage of our app, users are able to see the status of their TikTok usage request, daily usage patterns, and the number of times they have requested an extension for TikTok throughout the week. The goal is for this to be the center of everything TimeIt-related, so that users can easily keep track of how well they’re minimizing their TikTok usage.
The target users for TimeIt are college TikTok users who use TikTok during multiple sessions throughout the day and have a desire to cut down on their short form media consumption. While looking for students to participate in our usability study, we decided to focus on Stanford students struggling with TikTok addiction. Since you fit this user profile, we have asked you to test our clickable prototype today. We have considered some ethical concerns related to our study such as data collection and privacy implications for students, uncompensated participation, and how Stanford students may not be a plausible representation of all college students that might fit our target audience description. We will be aware of these considerations as we carry out building our app. Thank you for your participation!
Instructions:
Hi, _______. My name is _______, and I’m going to be leading you through this usability session today! You probably already have a good idea of why we asked you here, but let me go over it again briefly. We’re asking people to try using an app that we’re working on so we can see whether the UI and other components are working correctly. The session should take about an hour. The first thing I want to make clear right away is that we’re testing the app, not you. You can’t do anything wrong here. In fact, this is probably the one place today where you don’t have to worry about making mistakes. As you use the site, I’m going to ask you as much as possible to try to think out loud: to say what you’re looking at, what you’re trying to do, and what you’re thinking. This will be a big help to us. Also, please don’t worry that you’re going to hurt our feelings. We’re doing this to improve the app, so we need to hear your honest reactions. If you have any questions as we go along, just ask them. I may not be able to answer them right away, since we’re interested in how people do when they don’t have someone sitting next to them to help. But if you still have any questions when we’re done I’ll try to answer them then. And if you need to take a break at any point, just let me know. You may have noticed the microphone. With your permission, we’re going to record what happens on the screen and our conversation. The recording will only be used to help us figure out how to improve the site, and it won’t be seen by anyone except the people working on this project. And it helps me, because I don’t have to take as many notes.
(Start the voice recorder.)
Do you have any questions so far?
Pre-Screen Questions:
OK. Before we look at the site, I’d like to ask you just a few quick questions.
- First of all, how do you typically spend your day?
- How much time do you approximately spend on your phone every day? On TikTok specifically?
- What kind of things do you mainly do on your phone? Do you have any favorite apps?
- How do you currently feel about the time you spend on Tiktok?
- Have you ever tried to curb your screen time? If so, how? Was this method effective? Why/why not?
First Screen Tour:
OK, great. We’re done with the questions, and we can start looking at things. First, I’m going to ask you to imagine that you just opened up the app labeled TimeIt. Now, before you start doing anything, just look at the first screen and tell me what you make of it: what strikes you about it, what you think you can do with it, and what it’s for. Just look around and do a little narrative. Please don’t tap on anything yet.
Tasks:
Thanks. Now I’m going to ask you to try doing some specific tasks. I’m going to read each task out loud and have you demonstrate your understanding of how to carry it out. And again, as much as possible, it will help us if you can try to think out loud as you go along.
- Our app has our users add a friend to approve their requests for using tiktok for longer periods of time. As such, our first task for you is to add a friend to your app.
- Our app allows you to set your own screen time limit. As such, our second task for you is to set your screen time limit.
- Next, imagine that you are on TikTok and have been scrolling longer than your configured screen time limit. Our third task for you is to request a screentime extension from your friend.
- Finally, imagine you want to check in on how your screen-time usage on TikTok has increased/decreased throughout the week. Our final task for you is to use our app to check your TikTok usage statistics.
Probing:
Thank you! If you’ll excuse me for a minute, I’m just going to see if the people on the team have any follow-up questions they’d like me to ask you.
Follow-up questions:
- For each task: ask about mental demand, temporal demand, effort, performance, frustration level (1-10 scale, where 1 is least and 10 is most)
- Task 1:
- How intuitive was the design to add a friend on the app?
- If you could go back to the screen that allows you to request your friend for more time once you’ve reached the time limit, what features might have made this task easier?
- Task 2:
- How did you interpret the phrase “Input Daily Time Limits”?
- How intuitive was the design to set screen limits?
- Task 3:
- How intuitive was the process to request a screen time extension request from your friend?
- Was the imagined scenario for your friends’ response to your request easy to follow?
- Task 4:
- How easy was the graph of your screen-time spent on TikTok throughout the week to interpret?
- Was it easy to differentiate between the two graphs?
- Were the identified metrics ones that you would take interest in?
Wrapping up:
Do you have any questions for me now that we’ve walked through this study? Thank you so much for your valuable time!
(Stop screen recording, thank them and end the meeting.)
