Hi there! I'm Nala
A Financial Decision Buddy!
Have you ever felt like
you could make better spending decisions,
but don't know how to?
Well...
I was created to help with that!
With university students facing
increased financial pressure from rising student debt,
this puts them at risk of
falling into poverty even with a job.
If young people manage their finances well,
they could reduce this risk.
However, research shows that
less than 4 out of 10 young people and children in the UK
have received financial education at school.
Due to this unequal access,
some young people may be at a disadvantage.
This has motivated my friends to support
Goals 4 (Quality Education) and 1 (No Poverty) of the SDGs.
Their aim is to broaden access to financial education
in hopes of reducing poverty.
To better understand young people’s financial literacy,
my friends conducted a survey & interviews
with young adults across Europe & Asia.
After analysing the questionnaire’s data,
they found that 58% of participants felt that
their spending habits could be improved,
and 52% wished they knew how to budget
and optimise their spending.
Specifically in the areas of entertainment and food,
such as clothes and grocery shopping.
Using their findings, my friends created Lisa the Persona.
They wanted to build a product to
to upskill Lisa’s financial decision-making.
Boosting her confidence and ability
to make well-thought-out purchasing decisions.
After brainstorming ideas that Lisa might like,
they used the criteria matrix to evaluate their ideas
against a set of user requirements.
The winning idea was a robot dog that would
physically interact with users to guide their decision.
To test the idea, my friends walked participants
through an initial product storyboard.
Participants found the concept interesting and innovative,
but wanted something more portable and less intrusive.
Using their feedback,
my friends further developed the idea and created me!
A financial decision buddy that helps users
make optimal purchasing decisions
through real-time feedback.
Users will provide me with their previous shopping bills,
and set their budget, goals and preferences
which I will learn from.
On shopping trips, I (the phone) can be easily
slot into the phone clamp with movable ears and
clipped onto the user’s shopping bag or trolley.
As they shop, I’ll provide cost-tracking information
and analyse the decisions that have been made.
The camera-embedded necklace helps me see
the items that have been picked up or remove and
provides haptic feedback to notify users
when there’s a change to the cart status.
For example, when they’re reaching their budget.
So how does the user know if a decision is optimal or not?
Well, my facial expressions and ears act as indicators.
If the decision is optimal, I’ll be happy.
However, if a sub-optimal decision puts
the user at risk of overbudgeting,
my emotions will drop and
I will provide suggestions on how to prevent this.
At the end of the shopping trip,
users are provided with a performance report to see
what went well and what could be improved.
They also gain in-game coins based on their performance
to upgrade and decorate their decision buddy’s home.
To further support users on their learning journey,
the app provides a supportive space where
users can look up product reviews from
others with a similar budget and preference,
or even ask the community for financial tips.
My friends conducted user tests with 5 participants
in a mocked supermarket setting.
The first test was a click-through test
of the app using an interactive prototype.
While the second was a Wizard of Oz experiment,
where my friends simulated my real-time item tracking,
decision support and haptic feedback necklace.
They wanted to see how participants
would respond to me in a shopping scenario.
My friends found that implementing
affective physical interactions
like my cute ears and facial expressions
helped improve users’ compliance and
attentiveness to the suggestions I gave.
4 out 5 participants also said that my suggestions
and reporting improved their confidence in decision-making.
Overall, participants gave me an average score of
85% against the evaluation criteria.
Despite this, there is still room for improvement.
Some participants would prefer
a more motivating reward such as shopping vouchers,
while a participant stated that over time,
they may be over-reliant on me.
For future development,
my friends hope to create different levels of
support and incentives which would
promote users to be self-dependent over time.
Based on the user testing results,
my friends believe that in the long run,
I could help people develop their critical thinking and
and decision-making skills through real-life practices,
thus improving their financial behaviour.
This affective interaction can also be used
in other educational settings
to deliver more engaging content,
such as a virtual teaching assistant.
I hope that in the future,
there would be more widely available products like me
to help make education more accessible and fun for all,
and in turn, help equip young people
with the skills to escape or prevent poverty.