Brain Smart

Jamma Wellbeing sought to scale its award-winning Brain Smart programme, based on Agneta Johansson's 2024 book Brain Smart: Improving Wellbeing by Understanding Your Brain, into a cross-platform mobile application. The goal was to translate this neuroscience-based education model and its five-step SODIA framework into a structured, interactive product, transforming a facilitator-led programme into a self-guided digital experience capable of reaching a much wider audience.

Before the app, the programme had been delivered entirely in person, reaching individuals across custodial institutions, schools, and community settings. The app shipped in January 2026, making it accessible for the first time without a trained facilitator present.

The project needed a clear information architecture to present complex neuroscience concepts in a digestible format across connected screens, while keeping the instructional flow of the original material intact. The book's text was carefully reviewed and condensed to improve clarity and readability on mobile.

The five-step SODIA framework was reimagined as a guided journalling feature, with interaction patterns designed to encourage reflection and active engagement. The experience had to balance structured progression with user autonomy, integrating responsive Rive animations to create a dynamic and supportive learning environment. The goal was a cohesive system where learning, interaction, and motion work together to strengthen understanding and support habit formation.

I led UX and UI design across the full project, from initial discovery through to shipped product, covering user research, information architecture, interaction design, design system, character design, illustration, and motion design in Rive.

Information Architecture & Content Sequencing

The core challenge was taking a carefully structured book and turning it into a mobile learning experience without losing what made it work. This meant breaking complex neuroscience concepts into digestible chapters and making sure users moved through the content in the right order. Quizzes and animations were brought in selectively, only where they genuinely added something to the learning rather than just making it feel more interactive.

Interaction Design & User Flows

The SODIA process was reimagined as a guided journalling tool built into the app. This meant structuring timed prompts, emotional labelling, reflective input, and annotation logic into a flow that felt clear and repeatable, and that could support habit formation over time. The trickier decisions came in the Investigate step, where the design had to strike a balance between guiding the user and giving them enough space to think for themselves.

Character Design, Illustration & Motion

I designed the Brain Smart world from the ground up, including the main mascot, its range of expressions and poses, supporting characters, chapter headers, activity screens, and icons, all consistent in style. Animations were built in Rive using state machine logic, so the character could respond to what the user was doing and make the experience feel genuinely alive. Getting this to work well required close collaboration with the developer to ensure smooth performance across the app.

Privacy-Focused UX

The SODIA journal captures emotional states and personal reflections, among the most sensitive data an app can handle. Designing the consent flows, data structures, and user-facing privacy controls required particular care, especially given the platform's use by minors and individuals in custodial settings. Safeguarding and clarity around data handling were treated as core design concerns, not compliance checkboxes.

Designing for a Diverse User Base

Brain Smart was built for everyone, from teenagers navigating school anxiety to adults in custodial settings. That range became a core design constraint. The app had to feel appropriate and trustworthy across a very wide audience, threading the line between accessible and patronising, and between warm and overly clinical. Age rating and content sensitivity added further considerations, particularly given the platform's use in safeguarding-sensitive environments.

Translating a Linear Book into a Digital Product

The book follows a deliberate sequence where concepts build on each other, and the SODIA process only makes sense once the foundational neuroscience is in place. The app had to respect that without feeling like a glorified e-reader. Every interactive element needed to earn its place, used only where it genuinely helped understanding or added something meaningful to the experience.

Making the Mascot Work

An animated character in a mental health context carries real risk. Done poorly it feels gimmicky or patronising; done well, as Duolingo shows, it builds genuine emotional connection across sessions. Animations were built in Rive with state machine logic, allowing the character to respond to user input. Getting this right required close collaboration between design and development.

Designing for Privacy

The SODIA journal captures emotional states and personal reflections, among the most sensitive data an app can handle. Designing the consent flows and privacy controls required particular care, especially given the platform's likely use by minors and people in the criminal justice system.

Designing for Limited Connectivity

Prisons have restricted and inconsistent internet access. Where the app was intended to support in-person programme sessions in institutional settings, it needed to account for offline use, low-bandwidth environments, and the reality that many users would only access it intermittently, often on a shared device.

This project combined the conceptual complexity of a public health intervention with the craft demands of a consumer mobile product. Getting the interaction design right mattered not just for engagement, but for whether users in difficult circumstances could build healthier habits.

Before the app, the Brain Smart programme had been delivered entirely through labour-intensive, in-person facilitation. The app now makes it accessible without a trained facilitator present, opening it up to communities that had no previous access.

The app shipped in January 2026, roughly a year after development began, bringing Jamma Wellbeing's award-winning programme into a scalable digital format for the first time.