Shaelyn Strong, Angela Kim, Delina Yohannes and John Bell
Helping Victimes of
Substance Abuce
During Their
Recovery Process
please click yellow circles to go to each section
AGENDA FOR TODAY
01
01
INTRODUCTION
Meet the team and see who we are
04
VR THERAPY ANIMAL
Including research, case studies and comparative analysis
02
THE PROBLEM
Overview of our main problem
05
DESIGN RESEARCH
Developing personas, user flows, moodboard and wireframes
03
ROBOT SUPPORT ANIMAL
06
Including research, case studies and comparative analysis
CONCLUSIONS
Summary of our project and next steps
A group of four talented user experience designers ready to take on any challenge that comes their way
MEET THE TEAM
01
01
JOHN BAZINET
SHAELYN STRONG
ANALYTIC
Managing the team and ensuring progress is on track
PROJECT MANAGE
Managing the team and ensuring progress is on track
click yellow Titles with circles to see my work
Collaborating through conducting research and sharing findings
Contributing to design research and prototyping
ANGELA KIM
COORDINATOR
Managing and planning team meetings
PROBLEM RESEARCH
Collaborating through conducting research and sharing findings
DESIGN
Contributing to design research and prototyping
COMPARATIVE RESEARCH
Collaborating through conducting research and sharing findings
DESIGN
Contributing to design research and prototyping
DELINA YOHANNES
PROJECT MANAGE
Manages Team & conducts note taking during meetings (With RTI, Professor, Team, etc).
SOLUTION RESEARCHER
Conducts extensive research across topic leading towards solution
VISUAL DESIGNER
Compilles process documents, prototype ideations, and constructs layout/designs
We are planning to connect support animals to victims of substance abuse
“88% of Canadians identified their relationship with animals or pets as an important support in their recovery from addiction”
—CCSA(Canadian Centre on Substance Use and Addiction)
OUR MAIN FOCUS
02
We aim to better the sobriety process in Canadian’s 20-25, by connecting them with serves animals. These animals will help them build strong coping skills and have a permanent support in their lives long after other programs would have ended.
Now, we looked into some solutions
To begin the brainstorming process, we chose the Crazy 8’s method to generate a number of ideas within a short amount of time.
Each group member came up with around 8 possible solutions each and sketched each one.
For each possible solution, we highlighted what works well and what could be difficult. In the end, we came to a solution of choosing one idea to focus on for our final solution.
Potential Solutions
From here we each voted for our three favourite concepts.
Through this we decided on VR Pet Therapy.
However, through our researching process to come we also came across the idea of Robot Pet Therapy, so we are starting to explore this concept as well.
Robot Support
Animal
Case Study- Tombot
Realistic robotic companion animals
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Touch sensors allow dog to react based on where you pet her
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Helps with stress, depression, loneliness and anxiety
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Voice commands work so pup can listen to you
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Real life puppy recording make it feel real
“Millions of people facing health adversities cannot safely or practically care for a live animal companion. That's why we launched Tombot."
-Tombot 2023
Case Study- Sony Aibo
A robotic puppy powered by AI
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Can learn different tricks and commands
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Gets to know each member of the family
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Adjusts temperament based on owner
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Feed aibo with virtual food
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Each aibo has a different personality
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Recognize up to 100 faces
“aibo grows each day and acquires an identity depending on its living environment and relationship with people. See how its tricks, facial expression, and preferences change. Enjoy developing your own unique aibo!”
- Sony 2023
Market Research
Currently Vr is being used to treat addiction but not for support pets. Pet games are being used in VR but do not focus on sobriety.
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“one can vary the number of times per week a virtual dog might need to go for a walk depending on the opinion of its owner with mental health and their therapist.”-Nahal Norouzi
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“The VR therapy works by affecting the way the brain processes information. Addiction alters the brain’s chemistry, gradually rewiring the brain to behave in ways conducive to the addiction.”
- Kyle Melnick
Cost Comparison
VR Eye Contacts will cost between $99-$299 and blend in with your eye colour
Keeping in mind, these contacts could be used for many other things and there is a lot of talk in the tech industry that they could replace smartphones
Based on case study research for robotic support animals we found Tombot would could around $450 to purchase and Aibo costs around $200
Therefore VR would be a cheaper and better product to invest in.
Let’s Make a Decision
Due to such a large source of robotic support animals already in the market, we chose to create an VR Reality Therapy Animal.
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This could also bring the cost down for the user too!
Dog Interactions in Virtual and Augmented Reality
04
The use of this article is to extensify Dog Interactions in a Virtual Reality while helping users with potential phobias.
The dog models used in this review appeared to display generic behaviour.
The use of VR dog models as a form of exposure therapy had positive effects.
1) Explores scope of the field VR/AR dog models have been used in research with the focus directly on human-dog interactions.
2) Representation of virtual dog models (e.g., appearance/breed) and dogs behaviour including evidence-based development and fidelity.
3) Identifies what equipment is used and if/how these differ between studies.
4) Describes the main findings of the research and measures used, both objective and subjective - assessing the human-dog interaction and other measures used in VR.
Augmented Reality Technology
in the Pet Industry
Three Positive Effects AR has in Pet Industry:
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Makes products speak to a customer - tell it’s story to create immersive environment for user. AR can also be used as an additional communication.
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Enable your user to try the product in their own home or environment before buying it. For instance, let them see what the dog bed looks like in their living room or try the new bowl in the kitchen. Let them play with the sizes, colours and complementary products.
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Let your user live their own brand story. Capture 360° videos of your manufacturing process and become shared through AR portal. This can build a strong emotional connection between user and pet, demonstrate core important values, and engage users in their brand’s story.
Animal Pal:
Pet-Walking AR App
For many, having a pet is a dream that may not come true for different reasons, their landlords don’t allow it. However, the brand new Animal Pal pet-walking AR app might be a solution.
You can now have a virtual pet, which you can customize in many ways. Taking your pet out for a walk in your favorite park and train it. Your landlord won’t object, because the pet exists solely inside an AR app.
Users can choose between two animals as their pets (called “partner to walk with” in the app). One is a teddy bear-looking dog, and the other a more different, unique option for a pet – a shark.
As more word cards are collected, users can start communicating with your virtual pet. The words appear randomly users will have to wait to collect several
Animal Pal Encourages Virtual Pet Owners to Interact.
The pet-walking AR app is a great way to socialize with other people. Users can trade word cards with each other. At the same time, they can share special moments with their virtual pets
Moodboard
We created a moodboard with some inspirational products and images for our solution ideas, this prompted more research questions and market research we could conduct.
Persona
User Flow
Take a look at our user flow here and click the link below for a better view of it!
Wireframes
Take a look at our wireframes here and click the link below for a better view!
Next Steps
Our next steps towards our solution is to continue in the design process of creating a Pet-Friendly Virtual Reality System.
This will give victims the chance to experience a Metaverse of living in a world with their desired pet, without having to leave their home - making it accessible to them right at hand.
Examples/Ideas are the following:
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Users able to walk dog in a world virtually - in a world of their choosing (Through a valley, rainforest, mountain, etc).
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Able to pet and/or swim with dolphins through designed avatar.
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User can select their own setting/scenery, landscape, and animal of their choice.