W.A.S.H.
Niyousha Saeidi
Project Summary
This research addresses critical gaps in female sanitation and hygiene education among adolescent girls in Mozambique. Despite efforts in Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH), most solutions remain generic, overlooking cultural specificity, technological limitations, and gendered experiences in low-income regions.
Through a Human-Centered, Women-Centered, and Participatory Design approach, the project developed a mobile application tailored to support adolescent girls with practical and culturally relevant resources on menstrual health, hygiene, and community knowledge sharing. Designed in partnership with the NGO Waterlution, the app features content delivery modules, health journaling, and social support systems.
Following a three-phase design process, ideation, iterative prototyping, and full-scale testing—the tool was refined with feedback from local participants and international experts. The final prototype demonstrates how digital design, when grounded in local realities and co-designed with users, can serve as a scalable intervention to enhance wellbeing and empower communities.
Keywords: Culturally Sensitive Design, Mobile Health, WASH, Mozambique, Human-Centered Design, Gender and Technology, Social Innovation