Tune to Talk is an interactive PC game developed to help people with aphasia (PWA) practice their speech through song. I designed the concept and digital assets of the prototype.
Project type: Graphic Design Tools: Adobe Illustrator, Figma
UI/UX design by Victoria Sze Videos by Shanaya Goel
Research
⅓ of stroke survivors suffer from aphasia—a speech disorder resulting from damage to the language centers of the brain. In cases of non fluent aphasia, patients struggle to express their thoughts. Though their intelligence is preserved, they may stutter or produce very few utterances. This can lead to frustration and the feeling of being trapped in one’s mind. However, many PWA have seen improvements in communication through music therapy! Because speech and song are not processed by the same brain regions, aphasia patients can often sing more than they can say.
Example of Music Therapy
Concept
I began volunteering with the Aphasia Institute of Toronto after learning of the disorder through my neurolinguistics coursework. I used this experience to develop Tune to Talk with Victoria Sze, Shayna Goel, and Tyler Chin at Toronto’s biggest summer hackathon, at Hack the 6ix.
These were my initial ideas for the interface that I presented to my team in sketches. We decided to design a kind of karaoke Quizlet game that could be used to make treatment more fun and accessible.
Functionality
Users can choose from a selection of decks organized by theme. In practice mode, they are prompted to model a video example and repeatedly sing each phrase of the deck set to a familiar tune.
In test mode, users can attempt to speak the same phrases they sang in practice mode. If the attempt is accurate they can advance to the next card. If not, they are prompted to try again.
Design
I created the logo and loading screens to be consistent with the brand identity of a brain training game
The homepage as well as the practice and test modes feature large, high contrast visuals and block typography. My goal was to make an easily discernible, aphasia-friendly interface.
I assisted Victoria Sze in creating the wireframes and interactions for our prototype in Figma. Users can cycle through each deck using click and point, the space bar, or back and forth arrows as we recognize that many PWA also suffer from mobility impairments.