Clients-

LOCI

Platform for Increasing spatial awareness to reduce risk in public spaces

Exploratory research to identify beneficial directions for user studies

Outcome Overview

We identified two research approaches that will benefit LOCI to set a strong foot in public safety domain while providing a competetive market edge.

• Catering to the needs of under-represented population

Pet Owners

People with disabilities

• Studying building clusters instead of individual buildings and studying their relationship to occupants

V/S

IT block in office campus

Office campus

Contributing factors

Unique occupancy requirements in each building type.

Building foot fall during day vs night time

Increasing affection and population of pet owners

Ratio of varied demographics based on building occupancy.

Potential benefit

Methodology Overview

Our approach to research to meet our project goals

To understand activities, environment, interactions, objects and users involved in the fire drills for creating a digital twin of the process

To discover proven hypothesis that could help us back out findings

Learn from different market players and apply it in LOCI's context

To empathize with our users and their needs and derive new hypothesis for next phase of research

Pilot test with the user studies designed to be implemented on larger scale

Environmental breakdown

To create a digital twin that mimics the process of conducting fire drills closest to the real life scenario , it is crucial to breakdown the environmental factors. AEIOU method is a valuable tool for UX researchers because it provides a structured approach to observing and analyzing the user experience.

Environmental breakdown board

Key learnings

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Structure of the process of conducting fire drills and activities that could be translated digitally to ease the process

Opportunities for various additional materials like scenarios construction, info modules, quizzes etc in digital twin

Significance of psychological environment which is challenging but crucial to stimulated

Literature review

We explored 8 research papers and focused on 3 for this project.

Key learnings

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2

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Competitive Analysis

We explored competitors in 4 areas

Competitors explored

We saw 4 major themes across all platforms we studies

Personalization

Gamification

Feedback and assessment

Accessibility

Key Insights

• Third-party indoor positioning system determines precise location
  
• Produces heat maps based on user's movements
  
• Helps to understand user behavior in actual setup
  
• Traces actions to determine correctness
  

• LOCI's comprehension quiz not fully effective
  
• Quiz answers don't correspond to physical reactions in emergency
  
• Heat-map function helps learners receive feedback on practice
  
• Determines effectiveness of instruction in real-world setting
  

Heatmaps or attractive places

Various map viewing styles

• Tablet Command is a mobile incident command and response solution
  
• Increases situational awareness and speeds incident response
  
• Streamlines incident management and improves firefighter accountability
  
• Offers flexibility to modify map view with different features
  
• Features include "overview of the map" and "turn-by-turn" view for first responders.
  

• Concept can be used for LOC'sI training module maps
  
• Different views of the map can be provided to users
  
• Evaluation can be done to determine which view is better
  
• Examples of views include "full heads-up view" or "turn-by-turn" view.
  

personalized content

• Khan Academy provides personalized learning paths and assessments
  
• Adapt to user's skill level and learning pace
  
• Offers recommendations based on user's activity and progress
  
• The app helps to customize learning experiences for users.
  

• The skill assessments can be used to determine the user's current skill level.
  
• The assessment results can then be used to personalize the content of the training drills according to the user's skill level.
  
• This personalization of content can help users learn at their own pace and level, increasing engagement and retention.
  

design of training module

• Training module designed to address three factors: The Forgetting Curve, The Spacing Effect, and The Testing Effect.
  
• The Forgetting Curve refers to how memory fades over time without regular reinforcement.
  
• The Spacing Effect suggests that learning is more effective when spaced out over time rather than all at once.
  
• The Testing Effect demonstrates that testing oneself on learned material can improve retention and recall.
  

• Regular reminders and prompts can help users remember material and counteract the forgetting curve.
  
• Breaking down learning material into smaller modules and spacing them out can improve user engagement and retention.
  
• Quizzes and assessments can help users test their knowledge and improve retention through the testing effect.
  
• Providing feedback and progress tracking can keep users motivated and engaged.
  

Interviews

Semi-structured interview officials from the university dormitory: Assistant Director of Facility Operations, and Associate Director, Housing Operations

Themes identified

Need for the online platform

Challenges with the current practices

Ways in which students do not comply with standard practices

Impact of the social environment while practicing safety

Possible improvement areas that authorities are currently discussing

Challenges of pet owners and people with disabilities

Key insights into opportunities and challenges

Opportunity to solve for underrepresented population by providing features catering to demographics

Motivating students to participate regularly through the platform design is important.

Asynchronous drills cannot be a replacement for in person drills. Need to work hand in hand.

Students tend to follow each other mindlessly leading to wrong exits sometimes.

No updated information to students about route blockages which impact the participation in drill

Fire safety officers walk-through the building to prep for the drill and open all doors.

Students need to carry their ID cards with them to get back in their rooms after the drill.

Each dormitory floor has a head RA to guide other students on that floor

Authorities want to include different fire based scenarios in the drill practice

Contextual study

A think aloud test in student dormitories followed by interview and survey

Demographic

4 participants

2 residents +

2 non residents

Time

120 minutes

Location

Student dormitory

We conducted some pilot studies to check the response type around our survey and interview questionnaire design. We derived some hypothesis from these contextual studies and handed the Qualtrics survey form over to the client to implement it on a larger scale.

Study Plan

Recorded an exit route

Showed it to participants

Asked them to follow the same route

And think aloud while navigating

Observed what they remembered from the video

Hypothesis derived

Survey design board

The goal of the survey was to determine the 'likelyhood' of students attending the fire drills and how the insights gathered could be used to generate incentives for students to participate in online platform like LOCI.

for e.g.- Making it a part of pet policy in the dorms to practice the lessons and submit a badge for discounts on pet fees.

Journey mapping

Based on all the collected data , I created a journey map to help clients understand our user's challenges and need.

User actions

He proceeds to evacuate from his room and follow the signs in corridor

John sees a 'do not proceed' sign on the landing of the staircase. It confuses him whether he should proceed or not.

John sees multiple exit signs but cannot distinguish between fire exit and regular exit

Fire officers educate all the students on the standard fire and safety practices

Touchpoints

mass movement

Guidance

social impact

general understanding

signages

Objects / personal belongings

Interruption

Emotions

Pain points

lack of clear communication about factors playing key role in navigation

Could lead to spread of miss information by rellying on other's words in emergency

• Visual overload
• Unnecessary information available during emergency
  

Our findings from this research will pave the road for the future teams working on the project and provide foundational direction to them

Future explorations

We identified areas of research that could benifit LOCI in future to increase their user base and actually make an impact in public safety field

We provided a user study plan that we designed to study and compare what signage users think are important while navigating vs what signage do they actually notice and use.

Provide floor plans with tangible tokens in place of signages and ask participants to sort them in order of priority

Ask another set of participants to walk through the same layout and recall what signages they observed

Draw parallels and similarities between the outcomes of these two to analyze which information could be marked crucial vs less important

Each building has a unique occupancy need and is a part of bigger campus which affects the foot fall during day vs night. So instead of focusing on one building layout at a time, a user centric approach would be to study building clusters and relationships to occupants.

People with additional requirements like the demographics highlighted in the start could potentially be benefited the most through an asynchronous platform. Further user research in this direction is needed.

Limitations of Research

Does not account for factors like rural vs urban campuses, metropolitian areas and traffic etc.

Limited to IUPUI dormitories and students.

Doesnot account for psychological impact of fire drills.

Learnings from the project

Team management

Communication with clients

Developing research plan

Extensive research process before jumping to design ideation since the outcome affects public safety

Resonate with my research approach?

Kindly reach out to me for any opportunities that seem fit for my work