- Introduction
- Team Profile
- Inspiration
- Our Goal
- Our Solution
- Societal Impact
- Technology Stack
- Demonstrations
- Installation Instructions
- Learnings from Our Journey
- Future Enhancements
- Awards
Welcome to Journal Bot, your personal space for confidential and guided self-reflection. Designed to enhance emotional well-being through conversational journaling, Journal Bot introduces innovative ways to foster self-awareness and identify emotional patterns.
Key Features:
- Guided daily journaling with a personal chatbot
- Summaries of daily moods to recognize emotional trends
- A platform for comprehensive self-exploration
Our team consists of dedicated students and recent graduates passionate about technology, based in Vancouver, BC, Canada.
Team Members:
- Amy Nagelberg - Developer with a focus on UI design, development, and full-stack support
- Zoella M. - Developer specializing in ML sentiment analysis and backend development
- Maya Dong - Developer responsible for Cohere API integration, prompt engineering and backend development
- Wendy Tso - Developer responsible for Cohere API integration, prompt engineering and backend development
With rising mental health issues globally, there's an urgent need for accessible interventions. In Canada alone, over 1.6 million youths face mental health challenges, with significant barriers to accessing timely care. Journaling offers a proven avenue for emotional relief, yet many find it difficult to start or maintain. Our project aims to lower these barriers, offering a supportive tool for those in need.
Our mission aligns with the cmd-f hackathon's inclusive healthcare track, aiming to make emotional well-being support more accessible and inclusive.
Journal Bot is an AI-powered platform that provides a confidential and interactive space for users to engage in conversational journaling. By leveraging advanced AI, the platform is designed to be culturally aware and accessible to everyone, supporting a broad spectrum of emotional expressions.
- Bias Mitigation: Journal Bot uses a diverse dataset to ensure an inclusive and bias-free environment, accommodating a wide range of emotional expressions and communication styles.
- Community and Belonging: The platform encourages open dialogue about mental health, fostering a sense of community and belonging.
- Accessibility and Confidentiality: As a free, web-based service, Journal Bot addresses common barriers to mental health care, such as cost, stigma, and geographic limitations.
- Self-Awareness: The tool empowers users to better understand their emotions and patterns, promoting proactive mental health management.
Our solution is built on Cohere's powerful AI API, supplemented by a diverse dataset for sentiment analysis. The user interface is developed using React, ensuring an accessible and engaging user experience.
Explore our development process and solution details on our Devpost submission.
Try out our prototype at Live Prototype (Webpage). Note: This is a prototype; information is not securely stored.
To set up the project locally:
- Clone both this repository and the backend repository.
- Install backend dependencies (
pip install -r requirements.txt) and start the server (python server.py). - In the frontend directory, install dependencies (
npm i) and start the React development server (npm run dev).
- API Integration: We learned to deploy and utilize APIs, enhancing our full-stack development skills.
- Frontend and Backend Integration: Merging these two aspects was challenging yet educational, improving our collaborative development skills.
- Time Management: Balancing project quality with deadlines taught us the importance of effective prioritization and task management.
- Multilingual Support: To increase accessibility, we plan to add support for multiple languages.
- Voice and Image Recognition: Future versions may include alternative input methods to accommodate different user preferences.
- Integration with Mental Health Resources: We aim to connect users with professional mental health resources for comprehensive support.
- Pattern Tracking: Enhancements are underway to enable users to monitor their emotional trends and behavioral patterns over time, fostering deeper self-awareness and more informed well-being strategies.
- Culturally Diverse Data Collection: To ensure the inclusivity of our sentiment analysis, we will continue to diversify our dataset.
Journal Bot was honored with the #forthesocialgood prize provided by the Geocomply sponsor at the cmd-f hackathon, standing out among 54 submissions for its social impact.
Thank you for exploring Journal Bot. Our commitment to enhancing mental health accessibility through technology is at the heart of our project, and we're excited about the potential to make a positive difference in people's lives.