NEURO-DIVERGENT SOLUTIONS
2019 ∙ Product design ∙ Neurodivergence ∙ ADHD ∙ Medication ∙ Planning
2019 ∙ Product design ∙ Neurodivergence ∙ ADHD ∙ Medication ∙ Planning
I tend to be a forgetful person, as are many other people with ADHD. Luckily there is medication to manage this, which of course only works if you take it. Forgetful as I am, I do not always remember whether I’ve already taken my meds or not.
This is why I’ve made a medicine bottle that indicates if it was recently opened. When the bottle is opened, the light on the cap turns on and stays on for a set time (adjustable anywhere from 10 minutes to 24 hours). This way, just by glancing at it, you’ll know whether you’ve taken your pills or not.
The working principle of the medicine bottle can also be reversed, meaning a light is on until the bottle is opened. This way it acts more as a reminder to take your medication rather than to indicate that you’ve already taken it.
For people with ADHD, it can be hard to regulate their attention, this does not just mean that it is hard to focus on tasks. On the contrary, it can feel impossible to pull away from something. At times, this means a lot of stuff gets done, but it is not very sustainable to work on something for eight hours straight without having any food or bathroom breaks. Additionally, appointments tend to be forgotten.
This desk light mock up can be used as a visual reminder to smoothly guide you through all your scheduled tasks for the day. To do so it is linked to your Google Calendar, the colour of the light matches the colour you chose for your event in Google Calendar. For example, you plan half an hour to eat your breakfast, after that, a hour and a half of studying, followed by a short break and a half hour to summarize a lecture. By giving all these tasks a different colour in your Google calendar, the desk light will indicate the beginning of a new task.
The desk light enables you to stick to your planning without constantly having to check your calendar or have your workflow disrupted by an alarm.
Whenever I have a lot on my plate, am stressed or feel overwhelmed, household chores are always the first things to be neglected. Ultimately this will only worsen the situation, because not having an organised home to return to after a long day, results in more stress.
In this mock up I combined analogue and digital planning to create a clear overview when planning household chores. You are visually reminded when you’re at home and you can check your planning whenever you’re on the road.
When you put a magnet on one of the day-squares it is detected and automatically added to a to do-list in an application on your smartphone. The application shows the to do-items from the planning board at the top of the list in a grey box. Other to do-items can be added in the application as well, giving you a complete overview of what needs to be done during the week.
