Project: CHI Design brief

Goal 16: “Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions”

Figma Jam

Google Docs

Skills & Tools

Callista Faustine

Sakshi Khilari

Sumedha Kulkarni

Tanvi Gawande

2024

Group members

Year

Jane is a young adult in the early stages of her first relationship. She needs a benchmark for healthy relationships because it will help her identify abusive behaviors, engage in conversations, find resources, and challenge harmful social norms to improve her relationship.

Problem Statement

What is Domestic Abuse?

Domestic abuse is a pattern of repetitive behavior in which the abuser exerts power and control over the victim through various forms, including psychological, emotional, sexual, physical, and financial abuse. 

Early Signs of Abuse

This research tries to identify factors that promote healthy relationships by studying young adults in their first relationships. It also seeks to inform early interventions that teach essential relationship skills, such as emotional regulation and conflict management, fostering healthier relationships throughout their lives.

Why Southeast Asia?

Traditional gender roles and community values shape young adults’ relationships in Southern and Southeast Asia, where unique cultural dynamics highlight a gap in research compared to Western contexts.

Why Young Adults?

  1. Navigating First Relationships: Many experience their first serious relationships without understanding what a healthy partnership looks like.

  2. Social Pressure and Lack of Benchmarks: Without clear benchmarks, young adults often confuse care with control, making them vulnerable to emotional abuse.

  3. Influence of Social Media: Social media pressures young adults to hide relationship struggles, allowing unhealthy dynamics to persist.

  4. Barriers to Open Communication: Cultural norms in South and Southeast Asia often prevent young adults from discussing dating with parents.

  5. Opportunity for Awareness: This is an opportunity to break harmful cycles and empower young adults to build healthier relationships.


Our final solution is an exhibition leading users through various immersive and interactive experiences. 

Target Audience for the Exhibition

We’re targeting visitors who come with friends, as they offer support and a fresh perspective on relationships. We encourage conversation to spark discussions on healthy and unhealthy behaviors. While open to all, we focus on friend groups to avoid potential confrontations or defensiveness with couples.

This space is a quiet, safe place for anyone feeling upset. It has plants, small pond, and open skies to help people feel calm. There are seats spread out so everyone can have their own space, and you can easily get to it from any room.

An immersive room showcasing local film clips that highlight subtle emotional abuse in Southeast Asian relationships, helping visitors recognize and relate to these issues in a new context.

Each tile on the floor will have behavioral traits. If the tile is unhealthy, it will turn red, but if it is healthy, it will turn green.

Text frames will show how abuse progresses from subtle tactics like gaslighting to more harmful behaviors, illustrating its impact on daily life.

The mirror changes from pink to red, symbolizing the shift from romance to abuse. As participants move through, it becomes foggier, showing the distortion of perspective and loss of self in abusive relationships.

Lastly, we designed a booth where visitors can release emotions by writing about their experiences and shredding the paper.

Visitors can anonymously share advice or thoughts on abuse, which staff can display on a board. In the resources area, participants can take brochures with abuse definitions, hotline contacts, and a QR code linking to shelters, NGOs, and counseling services.