CNN Chat
Partnering with CNN, I ran an eight-month research and design project to create a digital product that aims to help Gen-Z have meaningful discussions about the news.
Contributions:
UX Research Planning
User flows
Wire-framing and Sketching
Prototyping
CNN Partner:
Elayne Safir, Senior Director of Product Design
Faculty Advisor:
Timeline:
January – August 2024
CNN Chat is a conversation space designed to facilitate intimate and meaningful discussions about current events.
The Problem
Gen Z grapples with an overwhelming amount of information on a day-to-day basis. They typically seek out their peers for conversations about news, valuing one-on-one chats over traditional media. Unfortunately, within their families, their perspectives are often overlooked.
The Outcome
I designed key features for CNN's iOS app to improve news communication between Gen-Z and their families.
"Promise to Reply" – keeps emotional labor visible
For Gen Z, the intention to reply and the time invested in responding are often just as meaningful as the response itself. By keeping these efforts visible, we’re highlighting the thoughtfulness that family members put into their communication, strengthening bonds and fostering appreciation.
“You get so busy with just living; with making dinner, doing homework, getting ready for school, getting ready for work.
It's hard to take a moment to pay attention to each other”
– CK, Age 42
Shared reading focus
Highlighting specific areas in an article serves as a focal point, encouraging families to read the text together. It sparks conversations and facilitates the exchange of ideas, making the reading experience less isolating and more communal.
“ [My family] are more responsive and keep discussing when the news is something they can connect to.”
– DG, Age 23
Moments of connection through private comments
70% of our participants said their family members' opinions and backstories are the most compelling reasons to remember and engage with a story.
Comments help embed these personal connections, making stories more impactful and memorable.
“My family's opinions and stories are what make me remember and care about a story.”
– GI, Age 24
Verified Sources
Young people view platforms like TikTok and Instagram as direct news sources, even if their families don't see them as credible. The Verified Source Badge ensures news from reputable outlets, like CNN's TikTok, is recognized as legitimate on third-party social media.
“Because of my age they think I am less reliable even if I'm just reiterating the contents of news articles. They'd rather trust direct sources.”
– NV, Age 19
We started with discovery – desk research, competitive analysis, 2 expert interviews and 6 intercept interviews.
We needed to understand Gen-Z's news consumptions behaviors and the media landscape to build our understanding and identify potential opportunity spaces.
Desk research showed that Gen-Z audiences are the fastest growing segment of digital news consumption.
35% of US online viewership
CNN captures the attention of 25.8M young adults in the age category 18-34.
Consuming news before age
18 years
is a positive predictor of news consumption for 7+ years.
Adolescents are most likely to increase their political & societal interest before age
15 years
Expert interviews showed that young people trust relatable "personalities" more than traditional media.
Nick Jackson
News video creator, 3.1 M followers, Most followed news creator on Instagram
"There’s a personality behind it, so the stories are not going viral, it’s me"
Nick believes his personal brand and style, including making jokes and keeping content relaxed, is what makes his content engaging and sticky for people, as opposed to the impersonal nature of traditional news delivery.
As Joes puts it, "there used to be a town square" for sharing community information. Now there is a "firehose of information" sources and formats, with traditional verification methods and gate-keeping being challenged.
" I found out [about the news] on WhatsApp...
my mom had shared a video in our group chat. "
– S, Age 22
The Gen-Z news diet consists of a flow of information through personal networks.
They prefer the intimacy of a private chats – narrowcasting vs. broadcasting.
Gen-Z audiences feel the deepest personal connection when news comes from their friends and family or influencers they relate to. They are real people who present the information to them instead of faceless websites.
These peer networks manifest in both public and private spheres; public social media feeds as well as more intimate group settings through channels like WhatsApp, Discord, and others.
" Older family members still see us as children – they feel like there's no value in what we choose to share. "
– NV, Age 19
1:1 platforms perform a similar societal function to a dinner table – a space for social bonding – but profoundly impacted by power dynamics.
Power dynamics in families profoundly affect how discussion happens. When young folks share their news to their family groups, they often feel that they cannot share the opinion they really think. This is partially to avoid conflict and partially due to the fear of not getting mutual respect and adequate attention.
We established a "feeling heard" framework to structure our research methodologies.
This helped us questions before and after testing like:
Did you feel family members are sensitive to your thoughts and feelings in news communication?
Did you feel family members paid attention to you in news communication? How could you tell?
On a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being the least likely and 5 being the most likely, how likely do you think you would feel that you received empathy in this conversation?
Five Metrics of
The "Feeling Heard" Framework
Voice
"I can express and say freely what I want to say."
Attention
"The other person focuses their attention on what I'm saying."
Empathy
"The other person tries to emotionally understand me."
Respect
"The other person values what I say." In other words, "I'm worth listening to."
Common Ground
"The other person tries to understand my point of view to reach a consensus."
I facilitated workshop sessions with GenZ and their families to co-develop the solution.
We developed the solution side-by-side with our participants by running brainstorming sessions in a workshop format with our participating families.
How might we break learned barriers and empower Gen Z to confidently participate in family discussions, express their views, and find their place at the table?
We planned and ran user research sessions with 40+ users.
Most participants were aged 18 to 23. We also tested with 4 family groups to get a better sense of family dynamics.
I maintained a anonymized Notion database to keep track of all the participants, their availabilities and their recruitment status. We split the effort of recruitment and facilitating the sessions by assigning the responsibilities to each person in turn.
15+ Research Workshops
I planned and facilitated 1:1 workshops with Gen-Z participants to understand the news consumption patterns of younger demographics, and map out the channels and platforms preferred by users.
5 Diary Studies
Affinity Mapping + Prioritized Hypotheses
I facilitated sessions in which my team affinitized our findings and then prioritized findings to test, which helped us focus on the most important and feasible things to pay attention to, so we didn't waste time on less useful ideas.
Iterative design ideation with rapid testing rounds
We did multiple rounds of design ideation starting from the lowest fidelity with testing in each phase.
With jobs-to-be-done we narrowed to an ideal outcome for users. Storyboards and paper prototypes helped to quickly capture ideas for peer critique. User flow maps helped identify how features connected to each other and mapped to users' established patterns.
Because CNN had an existing design language we skipped wire-framing and went straight to medium fidelity prototypes in Figma.
User testing shaped design decisons like layout, user flow and and visual cues to help users learn new chat patterns.
We developed the solution side-by-side with our participants by running brainstorming sessions in a workshop format with our participating families.
BEFORE TESTING
Users had to learn new chat interaction patterns
Four out of Six users struggled to navigate the new "Promise" chat interfaces. We experimented with different visual cues to help guide users.
AFTER TESTING
Icons + Labels + Confirmations to help users learn
Visual cues, clear text labels, and feedback mechanisms guide users through interactions, making the interface more intuitive and reducing the learning curve.
Expert reviews from media literacy advocacy groups shaped a more compassionate style of engagement.
Megan Fromm
Education Manager,
National Association for Media Literacy Education
Peter Adams
Senior VP of Research and Design,
The News Literacy Project
BEFORE TESTING
Family members engage in competitive trivia contests based on recent news articles. This potentially
had the possibility for harm, based on the content on the news pieces.
AFTER TESTING
Engage collaboratively, not competitively
Use other motiviators – celebrate family contributions in a way that recognizes and rewards positive engagement and contributions to the family dynamic.
This was my first time leading discovery in a research project, and I’m proud of the insights we achieved.
It taught me the importance of ethical research methods, alongside valuable lessons in teamwork and project management.
Anti-Oppressive Research Practice
The project opened my eyes to the influence of power dynamics in a research environment. I discovered how critical it is to approach participants with empathy, identifying your own biases, and actively working against reinforcing any existing inequalities.
Facilitating meetings effectively
Our early meetings were unstructured, leading to hours of circular discussion. Taking turns as facilitators, with agendas and clear next steps, transformed our productivity and taught us about each other's leadership styles.
Recruitment bias concerns
Limited budgets meant relying on friends and family for participants, raising concerns about bias. Intercept interviews were useful, but could not go in-depth. It was a real eye-opener about the challenges of recruitment in research.
Decision-Making as a Team
One of the hardest parts was narrowing down our design focus. Voting and documenting decisions helped us reach consensus. We learned to support team choices, even if they weren’t our own.