Bachelors: Older citizens and the digitized public sector

"Older citizens' use of and challenges with the digital services of the public sector"

For my bachelors project, I chose to focus on older Danish citizens' use of and challenges with the increasingly digitized public sector. The project resulted in a redesign of Borger.dk, shaped with the insights acquired through multiple user participation sessions.

For the re-design of Borger.dk, I decided that it should be possible to have the interface vary depending on who uses it. Here, the user has selected the interface designed specifically for the elderly, indicated by the button's change of color. With this feedback, the user can now proceed to the main page.

As was mentioned quite a lot by the the elderly participants at the workshop, navigation is one of the primary pains in their use of borger.dk and similar interfaces. When exploring a website, the participants might have been able to find what they were looking for, but then felt lost and compelled to go all the way back to start. I wanted to include some breadcrumbs and ideally make them a little more aesthetically pleasing than is seen above. However, the participants didn't seem to take to a less traditional UI, hence the very retro-looking breadcrumbs.

Based on the insight that elderly users tend to leave their documents open in order to better find them, I decided to use thumbnails to give a comprehensive overview without crowding the screen and providing easier navigation. While the thumbnails are very small and this doesn't quite match the principle of higher visibility, the users were able to recognize documents faster from just the shape of the text.

Skills demonstrated

• Qualitative Research
• Participatory Design
• User Interviews
• Workshop Facilitation
• Co-design
• Accessibility & Inclusive Design
• User-Centered Design
• Wireframing & Prototyping
• Research Synthesis