Redesigning a Would You Rather Game to Better Facilitate Social Connections in Public Spaces

This capstone project presents a 'Would You Rather' icebreaker game that was redesigned to help facilitate social interaction and improve feelings of community and togetherness among strangers in public settings. Although the advent of the internet and the personal phone have helped people stay connected over large distances, there is an argument to be made that modern technology has also made it easier for people to ignore strangers physically around them in their day to day. This can lead to an overall decrease in people's sense of local community and increased feelings of isolation. Prior research produced a demo for a functional 'Would You Rather' icebreaker game that was meant to help strangers socialize with one another, but was not designed with a public environment in mind. Thus, our aim is to
design, make, and test a new version of this project with the goal of creating a tool to help facilitate social connection in public spaces.