We were motivated by the lacking, but still developing mental health accessibility. Resources like therapists and psychiatrists can be expensive, not to mention that the topic is considered a taboo in certain communities. Our members go to therapy and have encountered these issues, thus having a very personal relationship with the topics addressed. Passionate about the change we need, our team utilized its skills to build a hub of information and resources for the general public.
Our website provides streamlined resources to extensive mental health topics such as depression, anxiety, adhd, student support, etc. We have also included a multitude of resources and links to more information from trustworthy sources. From relaxing music to around 100 tips, we were determined to address as many categories as possible. Our project also features an interactive chatbot capable of holding smalltalk and giving specific responses depending on your needs. It covers the hot topics of exams, COVID-19, depression, body dysmorphia, anxiety, treatment, LGBTQ+, and more!
- Determine roles
- Decide on project
- Preliminary research
- Create goals + project pipeline
- Get started on wireframe for website(Figma)
- Acquire training dataset for chatbot(Kaggle, compiled example questions). Work on intents and entities
- Translate Figma design into HTML + CSS(Replit)
- Evaluate and improve chatbot, deploy onto website(IBM)
- Finish styling and transfer content to website, final touches
We had difficulties arranging group meetings and keeping each other constantly updated due to scheduling conflicts and time zone differences(we live on opposite sides of the world!). It was also hard familiarizing ourselves with a new tool(IBM Watson), but through tutorials and documentation, we were able to push through the challenges.
We are incredibly proud of ourselves for completing a functioning project. This was one of our member’s first hackathon, and more than half of us are beginners in the hackathon field, so we are amazed at our quick progress and teamwork! Much of the codes and functions of our project were new to us as well.
We learned how to utilize IBM Watson and much more about mental health! Some of us explored bootstrap and web design/styling, and we discovered more about machine learning and its applications.
Going forward, we’d like to implement a functioning search bar and refine the chatbot in order to recognize a wider range of topics. We would also like to add a feature where the user can like the songs or any information that they like and save them in their account. Additionally, we would also like to make some changes in the styling of the website and add more information and pages into the website.