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WellConnected: Strengthening Social Connection and Well-Being

Thriving Youth in a Digital Environment (TYDE) Large Seed Grant

Helping young adults understand, strengthen, and diversify their social networks through personalized digital interventions designed to support healthy social connection and well-being.

A modern vector illustration of four diverse college students sitting on a blanket on a green campus lawn, laughing and drinking coffee. Above them, a glowing digital network diagram with nodes symbolizes friendship links. In the foreground, a close-up of a smartphone screen shows a cheerful user interface with a gold badge that reads 'Connection Goal Achieved!
Conceptual illustration of the WellConnected digital intervention. The graphic highlights the bridge between mobile technology and real-world social interaction, depicting first-year college students building diverse, meaningful social networks to combat loneliness and improve community belonging.

Description

Social connection is fundamental to health and well-being, yet major life transitions—such as starting college—can disrupt existing relationships and make it difficult to build new ones. Using a human-centered design approach, WellConnected develops personalized, AI-enabled approaches to help young adults understand, strengthen, and diversify their social networks, drawing on social network and behavioral science. The platform helps users visualize their connections, reflect on their social network, set personally meaningful goals for building and maintaining relationships, and receive personalized recommendations for taking action. By combining insights from an individual's social network with AI-driven personalization, WellConnected aims to support the development of meaningful, supportive, and diverse social connections.

Instead of leaving friendship up to chance, the platform lets users visually map out their current and potential friends into everyday categories like dorm mates, teammates, or classmates. To help users track their relationships, every contact has a "status bubble" that slowly drains over time and resets whenever they hang out or send a text. It acts as a gentle, visual nudge to reach out before a friendship starts to drift. On top of that, WellConnected helps users set personal social goals—whether that's deepening a specific bond, meeting new people, or bringing different friend groups together—and suggests realistic, tailored next steps based on their actual network to help them make it happen.

Team