In this project, we met challenges, we learned, we grew.

One of the challenges that we faced over the quarter was assuming what our users wanted/needed based on our personal bias about our user group. Conducting research and empathizing with our users helped in realizing that many of those assumptions had been incorrect. As user-centered design practitioners, our priority is to advocate for our users. We have learned that making assumptions about what our users think or feel without the support of research, although remarkably easy to do, actually pushes us away from the people we are designing for.

If allotted more time, we would want to practice participatory design. What could be more user-centered design than if our users actually designed the system? As we mentioned earlier, it’s very easy to introduce our own, subjective assumptions into our design process. Those assumptions often contribute to the detriment of our objectives. If we had the opportunity, we think it would be so beneficial to work directly with more visually impaired people.

Looking back on our design, we had several areas where we saw room for improvement. One such improvement is giving our users more autonomy when using the product. For example, our users could set the radius for “Around Me” to widen or limit the range of landmark locations received. Another aspect we could have worked on is letting users choose between voice feedback or haptic feedback when pressing buttons.

The most surprising thing we came across was that sometimes designing too much can be harmful. Designing for people with visual impairment, we gradually understood the importance of maximizing our signal-to-noise ratio, the appropriate amount of functions in accordance with our users, which could be applied to countless other design projects.