Co-Designing Technological Mental Health Resources for Unaccompanied Migrant Youths

This UX research study was conducted as part of my PhD research and a four-year Innovation Training Network (ITN) – Technology-Enabled Mental Health for Young People (TEAM) funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions (MSCA) initiative.

Background

Unaccompanied migrant youths are exposed to many mental health risks (Höhne, van der Meer, Kamp-Becker, & Christiansen, 2020; Hodes, Jagdev, Chandra, & Cunni, 2008), and even after arriving in the country of destination, they experience many stresses such as continued unstable educational and living situation (Hodes & Vostanis, 2019) and discrimination (Fazel & Betancourt, 2018). Research increasingly shows that technology can improve access to mental health interventions such as behavioral activation and interventions (Mohr, Burns, Schueller, Clarke, & Klinkman, 2013; Mohr et al., 2017; Rohani et al., 2019, 2020), CBT (G. Doherty et al., 2012), dialectical behavior therapy (Schroeder et al., 2018).

Aim: Exploring Design Requirements of Technological Mental Health Resources

The following aims guide the UX research project:

  • Gaining an understanding of how social-ecological systems support and hinder unaccompanied migrant youth in using mental health apps as one form of resource
  • Exploring the design opportunities and requirements of technological resilience resources as an integrated part of unaccompanied migrant youth’s social-ecological environment


UX Research Methods

  • Co-Design Workshop
  • Thematic Analysis
  • Mind Mapping Activities
  • Ideation Methods
  • Development of A Design Framework
  • Conceptualization of Design Examples

Software

  • MAXQDA - Software for Qualitative Analysis
  • InDesign
  • Photoshop
  • Premiere Pro