NSPCC

Helping parents keep children safe on social networks

Summary

Aim: Enable parents to make sense of the jungle of social networks and apps their kids are using on a daily basis.

Outcome: A digital tool that educates parents about the potential dangers their kids may face when using social networks.

Consultancy: Beyond, London
Role: UX strategy | UX design

 
 

Challenge

Smartphones are being used increasingly by children and new social networks and online games are cropping up all the time. Kids as young as 7 use apps to send and share pictures and messages to their friends. Many game-play apps involve sharing details and connecting with strangers. For parents it can be difficult to stay on top of it all. There’s often a lack of information when it comes to reporting abuse, maintaining privacy and understanding how to stay safe online.

The NSPCC partnered with Mumsnet to source information on networks and games to give them a rating on core categories like signing up, reporting, privacy and safety advice. Data would be sourced by parents and 2,000 young people to ensure that all perspectives were taken into account. A panel of more than 500 parents from MumsNet reviewed 48 of these sites finding all those aimed at adults and teenagers made it too easy for children under 13 to sign-up. On more than 40 percent of the sites, the panel struggled to locate privacy, reporting and safety information.

 
 

Approach

We interviewed a group of 15 parents during a fast paced 2 week research period. Understanding the existing knowledge gaps parents have about social networks, how well they communicate risk to  their kids today, and what their main concerns and needs are about todays digital influences. 

Research activities:

  • Ethnographic research and interviewing – with parents and kids at home, in youth centres, outdoors

  • Diary studies – parents documenting conversations with their kids around social networks and the times their kids spend playing with apps and networks online

All insights gathered during the immersion were synthesised to develop scenarios that informed a number of rapidly sketched prototypes.

The NSPCC had recently been rebranded and as such, the new brand needed to be applied across all new digital touch points. Small interactions were carefully crafted and tested with our parents panel. One key insight from our research was that parents weren't able to recall app names but were almost always able to memorise visual cues such as colour and logo. We therefore included a search feature that allowed to 'Filter by colour' which resonated hugely with the parents and was evolved in the iOS and Android app to 'Search by colour'. The app icon and social networks logos needed to take centre stage within the layout of the pages. We therefore decided to pair back unnecessary brand elements and visual distractions that would potentially dilute the core actions within the interface.

Interactions such as voting mechanisms (toggles) and information elements were designed to be tactile and playful, which in itself conveyed the brand effectively.

 
 

Outcome

“Please pass on our very grateful thanks for a most excellent Share Aware parent tool – it’s really brilliant and we’re very excited about it.”
— Director of Communications NSPCC