Bond
A mobile app designed to enhance family acceptance of LGBTQ+ youth in China by facilitating innovative and meaningful communication between parents and their children.
Family acceptance of sexual minority youth is crucial for both family harmony and the child’s physical and mental well-being.
However, in Chinese society, many parents still struggle to support their children’s minority sexual identities, creating significant emotional and social challenges.
To gain deeper insights into my target users and understand their pain points regarding LGBTQ+ issues, I conducted a user survey and semi-structured interviews with two key groups: sexual minority youth and their parents.
User Survey
Using a structured research approach, I designed a screener, along with close-ended, open-ended, and follow-up questions in the questionnaire. A total of 64 sexual minority youth and 36 parents participated in the survey.
The key findings and insights are as follows:
- Sexual minority youth hesitate to come out to their parents for various reasons, with most respondents expressing discomfort discussing sex-related topics and fear of revealing their sexual orientation.
- Supporting LGBTQ+ teenagers is crucial but challenging for parents. The majority did not support their child’s LGBTQ+ identity, yet 94% acknowledged that their attitude significantly impacts their children.
- Sexual minority youth struggle with identity acceptance, with over 69% facing family opposition and lack of recognition from their families.
Semi-structured User Interview
To refine the problem space and identify specific user pain points, I conducted semi-structured interviews with four target families, ensuring both consistency and flexibility in exploring key issues.
Parents’ perspective: Rejection and Misunderstanding
“We can’t accept sexual minorities because it’s just abnormal.”
“LGBTQs are a group of weirdos who do nothing but destroy society.”
“We don’t want our child to grow up to be a loser.”
Ignorance and Apathy – Lack of understanding leads to misconceptions about LGBTQ+ individuals.
Concern and Worry – Parents fear their children will face challenges and struggle to build a successful future.
Youths’ perspective: Fear and Uncertainty
“I feel terrified to talk to my parents about my sexual identity.”
“I’m still confused about my identity.”
“I’m afraid they won’t be helpful.”
Confusion and Fear – LGBTQ+ youth struggle with how to communicate with their parents and fear rejection.
Trial and Error Opportunity – They seek a way to test the conversation and retreat if it goes poorly.
Secondary psychology research
Moral Licensing Theory & Parental Attitudes
Parents may justify rejecting their child’s LGBTQ+ identity by believing their past moral behavior confirms their overall goodness.
Self-Fulfilling Prophecy & LGBTQ+ Youth
Parents’ negative expectations about their LGBTQ+ child’s future may influence their behavior, unintentionally reinforcing those outcomes. Anticipating rejection, LGBTQ+ youth may avoid discussions, deepening misunderstandings with their parents.
(These two psychological methods above are expected to support this project at the design stages of ideation and concept development as a theoretical foundation.)
Design Goals:
a. Cultivate accepting enviroment for the sexual minority youth by promoting positive communications between the youths and their parents
b. Educate users about the LGBTQ-related knowledge and information so that sexual minority youth can gain more ego identity and their parents can be more supportive
c. Design simple and smooth workflow and clearly presented information that enables the users to comprehend quickly and conveniently
Persona
With the design goals and research insights in mind, I concentrated my findings and interviewed a family to look into patterns in user goals, behaviors, and pain points. My objective was establish and build an emotional connection with my target users.
Family Goal
Increase understanding between parents and children to help their mental wellness within the family.
Family Story
The parents want their son to grow up as a successful individual and help him to be happy. At the same time, Chen never obeyed his parents but hoped to be their pride.
Recently, Chen found out he belongs to the sexual minority group and does not know if he should tell his parents. He is terrified that they will blame him. Equally, Wenlei and Jingya feel like their son is hiding something from them. They feel worried about him.
“What will dad and mom think of me? Will they blame me? I’m so terrified to talk about my sexual identity, and I feel isolated and helpless.”
Needs:
- Find a way to communicate with parents
- Increase ego identity
Motivations:
- To receive understanding and support from parents
- Gain courage and self-confidence
“Chen has always been able to open up to us. We want to know what happened to him recently so that we can help him.”
Needs:
- Know their son’s recent status
- Let him know that they always love him
Motivations:
- To better understand Chen’s physical and mental state
- To find a suitable way to help their son
Solution
I plan to leverage celebrity effect by promoting stories of successful sexual minorities to provide the parents of LGBTQ youth with more perspectives, so that they understand more about sexual minorities. Consequently, they can cultivate an accepting and supportive family environment for the youth to confide in.
Ideation
Building on identified design opportunities, I conducted a convergent brainstorming session and design charrettes, using personas to explore a wide range of possible solutions.
Convergent Brainstorming
I began with an open-ended brainstorming session, generating 16 ideas. After analysis and categorization, I created a convergent brainstorming map, using three colors to distinguish concepts related to information, communication, and ideological integration.
Design Charrettes
To refine and visualize my ideas more comprehensively, I conducted design charrettes, sketching concepts across different focus areas identified during brainstorming.
Multi-end Mid-fidelity
Key Frame Wireflow
Hi-Fidelity Prototype & User Flow
- Sexual minority youths can generate an invite code and share it with their parents.
- With the invite code, the parents can sign up as their children’s linked account.
- BOND generates a personalized LGBTQ-related content ratio timeline for youth users, tailored to their specific situations.
- The content ratio timeline gradually increases family awareness and acceptance by adjusting the proportion of LGBTQ-related content in the feed. Youth can control the pace using a sliding adjustment.
- Sexual minority youth can view their parents’ evaluation scores to gauge the right timing for further communication or coming out.
- At the end of each feed, parents answer two questions reflecting their LGBTQ attitudes, which are scored. These scores help the child user gauge the right time for further communication
- When a parent’s account links to their child’s, a virtual character greets them, revealing its identity at the child’s chosen pace.
- BOND shares two daily success stories of LGBTQ+ figures, using the celebrity effect to boost awareness. The content ratio adapts based on the timeline set by the child.
The BOND app serves as both an information source and a communication tool for sexual minority youth and their parents, bridging the gap between understanding and acceptance.
LGBTQ+ youth in China often struggle with coming out, while parents face challenges in understanding and supporting their child’s identity. BOND facilitates this process by providing educational resources and structured interactions. A key feature allows youth to monitor their parents’ evaluation scores, helping them determine the right time for communication.
By fostering meaningful conversations, BOND helps parents better support their children while empowering LGBTQ+ youth to embrace their identity with confidence, ultimately cultivating a more accepting family environment.
