ReTold
Case study: building a better therapy platform
Overview:
What is Retold?
What is Retold?
Retold is a self-counseling platform developed by William Mork and Anders Jader, structured on concepts in psychotherapy known as narrative therapy and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). Retold utilizes perspective swapping as a tool for personal growth and self-inquiry.
Our application invites users to engage in a dialogue with themselves from multiple perspectives-- evoking a conversation of evolving insight and self-discovery.
Releasing 2022.
Problem:
Current self-help and therapy applications are too expensive for the quality of services offered, and are often a time-consuming process.
Current self-help and therapy applications are too expensive for the quality of services offered, and are often a time-consuming process.
Online counseling platforms are dominated by two primary companies; BetterHelp and TalkSpace. By virtue of legal stumbling blocks, these products now promise one-on-one sessions with "licensed therapists" on a flexible schedule.
Community-specific therapy applications have entered the landscape, making similar guarantees for those seeking help with drug addiction, sexual health, PTSD, etc.
Each of these applications (with the exception of AI-powered Youper) rely on traditional models of therapy. While Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is an incredibly effective tool, finding the time to schedule consultations can be difficult, expensive, and in the context of a mobile app-- frustrating. In addition, users are not guaranteed to find quality or even appropriate therapists.
Our Goal:
Design a new type of self-counseling platform inspired by groundbreaking research that lets users help themselves, on their own time, for little to no cost.
Design a new type of self-counseling platform inspired by groundbreaking research that lets users help themselves, on their own time, for little to no cost.
Retold is inspired by the research of Sofia Osimo, Rodrigo Pizarro, Bernhard Spanlang & Mel Slater at the University of Barcelona, who investigated the possibility of self-counseling using virtual reality and perspective swapping.
The VR experiment induced the illusion that the participant was inside the body of a virtual avatar. Participants in the study explained their problems to a virtual therapist sitting in front of them in the virtual space. The users would then occupy the body of the therapist; they listened to their previous concerns from this new perspective, providing advice and asking new questions of their digital doppelganger before re-entering their own avatar. The study showed promise as a medium for self-counseling, as it provided a means of examining one's life at a distance. A conversation from this external viewpoint gives rise to an evolving dialectic with one's self that often leads to insights that would otherwise escape passive awareness.
I and Anders Jader sought to design a self-counseling platform based on this research and the concepts of narrative therapy and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy. An application designed to dissolve the distinction between one's self and others, allowing self-discovery and personal change to grow naturally-- a living diary of one's internal dialogue. This living diary, which can be put down and resumed at any time, cultivates an evolving dialectic with oneself, producing insights into personal predicaments that would otherwise be outside normal awareness. This is not an esoteric concept. We experience the world from the first-person perspective and rarely have the opportunity to swap to the second-person or third-person perspective. This swapping of perspectives inevitably reveals parts of ourselves that we’ve been ignorant to just by virtue of us habitually experiencing the world through one perspective.
Process:
Early sketches and prototypes.
Early sketches and prototypes.
Prototyping: Adobe XD
Asset Generation: Adobe Illustrator
Animation: p5.js
Application Development: React Native
Asset Generation: Adobe Illustrator
Animation: p5.js
Application Development: React Native
Wireframe - Iteration I
User Flow - Iteration I
Results:
Retold is releasing early 2022. Stay tuned for launch specifics and production-related analytics.
Retold is releasing early 2022. Stay tuned for launch specifics and production-related analytics.
