Do Good Project Week 4- Project Proposal 4 & Defining Problem Statement

Primary Research

In Week 4, I seek for another interview with 3 users to gather deeper information on their pain points. From the past interview, I understand that most of them encounter stress, anxiety, and even depression due to the highly competitive environment. They care about how people judge them and always make comparisons with others. Thus, I wonder why do they care so much and I hold another session to interview further.

Google Form

User Interview- Google Form

Follow Up-User Interview

Interview Screenshots

User Response

Insights

• 100% of the interviewees feel stressed when they always compare themselves with others due to the highly competitive environment. When they see others doing a better job than them, they will start to doubt and question themselves.

• 100% of the interviewees have low self-esteem when others did a better job than them. Others are always better than them even though they did a better job than others. However, when they didn't get recognition from others, they will start to have low self-value. They will feel demotivated, sad, and hurt, and even run away from the problem faced. 

• 66.67% do not see their strength but only their weakness.

• 100% of the interviewees like to overthink and imagine how people will judge them. 66.67% will think a lot before speaking because they are afraid that talking about something that others don't like. They are afraid of the judgment of others on themselves. 

• 100% of the interviewees found it hard to focus on the present. 33.33% still live in the past thinking about the mistakes that he had done.

• 100% of their negative mindset include:-
• Am I trying my best? Did I disappoint them? Why am I so useless? I'm not worth living in this world. 
• Why others are always better than me? Why I can't be perfect? 
• 自己很没用， 反正都没用了为什么还要做， 为什么我还在这边做这种东西
• 就算我做了也不会做到像他们那么好。我开始逃避自己， 不表现自己
• 怎样才算最好， 不要try更好
• 不要期望就不会有失望

• 100% of the interviewees think their overthinking (negative mindset) is a burden to them because they are fully controlled by the negative thoughts in their heads. They will start to be unhappy and imagine things that might not happen. 33.33% do not dare to try anything when they are influenced by a negative mindset. 

• 66.67% of the interviewees try to take the negative mindset as part of the journey in life. 33.33% rather prefer the negative mindset does not exist.

• 33.33% try to believe in negative but it had ruined quite some of his relationship because he is too negative. 33.33% do not know the way to overcome negative thoughts. 33.33% try to seek advice from their friends and think about the passion of her life and the motive of doing something. 

• 100% of the interviewees seldom think about positivity because the environment is too negative. 33.33% found it hard to imagine something positive.

• 100% of the interviewees do not see a negative mindset as a positive outcome in life.   33.33% mentioned that the negative mindset makes her realize that she lacks insecurities and lack of love.

• 33.33% visualize something positive as:-
• Believe in yourself. Speak what we want. 开心就好. Be confidence

• Visualization of positive:-
• cloud, colorful, sunlight, dreamy, sky, light ray, hope, bright, happy

• Visualization of negative:-
• Glitch, RGB, noises, 假的positive
• 假假的rainbow but 可能下一秒很想要吸走你
•  一片黑 cz I don't want to see myself, but 我不希望那道光出现

• Visualization of beautiful:-
• the process itself that could charm the audiences' heart
• the balance between negative and positive
• something that has stories and meaning
• sea- not beautiful but peace

Cycle of Mindset

Highly competitive environment > Self-compare between peers > Low Self- Esteem > Stress > Overthink (Self-doubt) > Controlled by negative mindset > Hurt/ Lack of motivation

Secondary Research

• The “Malaysia’s Healthiest Workplace” survey conducted by AIA Vitality, revealed that “some 53% of Malaysian employees reported at least one dimension of work-related stress, while 12% experienced high levels of anxiety or depression.”
• The main reasons are due to the competition and the need to compete with and outdo one another.

What is social comparison? 

• People judge themselves by comparing their attitudes, abilities, and attributes to those of others through the social comparison process. Most of the time, we try to compare ourselves to people in our peer group or who are similar to us. (Cherry, 2020)
• Studies found that individuals between the ages of 18 and 25 were in the throes of identity exploration, possibilities, and instability, prompting them to compare themselves to others more than any other age group.
• Negative effect: Researchers discovered that people with poor self-esteem or who have just had a setback can feel worse when they make upward social comparisons, resulting in a drop in mood and, in some cases, an increase in stress. (Scott, 2020)

Negative Self-Talk (Negative Mindset > Self-talk)

• Negative self-talk is an internal dialogue you have with yourself that may be limiting your ability to believe in yourself and your abilities, as well as your ability to achieve your goals. It's any thought that undermines your ability to make positive life adjustments or your belief in your own ability to accomplish so. Negative self-talk is not only stressful, but it can also be detrimental to your achievement. (Scott, 2020)
• Focusing on negative thoughts may lead to decreased motivation as well as greater feelings of helplessness.

Problem Statement

Social comparison among peers leads to the spiral of negative mindset

Project Purpose

Empowering

Helping people to do things they otherwise couldn't do, helping people go beyond their limits.

Idea & Concept

Main concept

Embrace our negative mindset as part of the flow of life and realize the beauty of both positivity and negativity in our inner self

Rationale

People often deny or overlook their inner shadow and thought that pursuing the positive is how we should live. But the truth is that both positive and negative make us who we are. This physical installation aims to help people accept their negative mindset and realize the beauty of both positive and negative elements inside us and how they complete ourselves to survive in this challenging environment. We should accept and follow the flow of life which makes us who are we today.

Idea & Concept

Melda is an interactive jellyfish that could listen and respond to human. Jellyfish is used as the main visual element as we can learn how to accept our negative and positive mindset as part of the flow of life. We should not resist things from happening but to accept and learn to survive just like jellyfish. This installation is made for single user interaction to discover their own mindset and visualize the beauty of it through light installation. When the user speaks or make choices, Melda will respond through lights. At the end of the interaction, it will form from a transparent jellyfish into a colourful ones which represents the beauty of the combination of both positivity and negativity. 

Target Audience

Young adults who aged between 18-30 years old are experiencing spiraling of negative mindset due to social comparison

Creative Process

For this week, I analyze the problems that current young adults and facing and think of a solution for them. For the next step, I'll be trying to do hands-on Arduino and fabrication for the physical built. Besides, I will have to think of the content planning that fits my rationale. 

I've been thinking hard to propose ideas to solve the user's needs. In the meantime, I constantly seek consultations from another lecturer, who is Ron to branch out my idea. He suggests me to utilize the intonations of humans to portray the negativity and positivity within our inner self. However, the technical side will be quite tough for me as it uses machine learning to train the intonation system. Besides, I also have to learn C++ script from scratch in order to do the light installation. Moreover, I have to find visuals that symbolize the meaning that could impact the audience on the experience. I'm undecided whether to propose my visuals in either indirect or abstract form. Thus, there is more research to be done in order to find the right direction for the project.

Bibliography

• Cherry, K. (2020) Social Comparison Theory in Psychology. [online] Sep 19. Available at: https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-the-social-comparison-process-2795872 
• Scott, E. (2020) The Toxic Effects of Negative Self-Talk. Verywellmind. [online] Feb 25. Available at: https://www.verywellmind.com/negative-self-talk-and-how-it-affects-us-4161304 
• Scott,E. (2020) The Stress of Social Comparison. Verywellmind. [onlne] Nov 26. Available at: https://www.verywellmind.com/the-stress-of-social-comparison-4154076 
• The Edge Markets (2021) Millennials are the most stressed-out generation at work. Dec 17. Available at: https://www.theedgemarkets.com/content/advertise/millennials-are-most-stressedout-generation-work