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Even if it doesn’t seem like it, teens are listening, and so the words we use with them matter. Whether they’re hearing from a parent, guardian, teacher, or mentor, young people are most receptive to messages that are honest, straightforward, and most of all, nonjudgmental.
It’s with this in mind that Discord designs our touchpoints with teen users, like when we communicate an action we’ve taken on their account or deliver in-the-moment guidance about a user’s digital safety. For example, when a teen may have broken one of Discord’s Community Guidelines, or if they’ve received a potentially unwanted message, Discord may alert them and give them tools to educate and protect themselves.
That’s where our product and content designers come in. They develop the alerts to ensure that whatever pops up, the message is first and foremost clear to the person receiving it, but also helpful and relevant to the situation at hand. They also follow an important principle of communicating with a teen (or with anyone for that matter), which is to avoid being judgy.
This work is rooted in research and is empathetic to the teen experience, because the ultimate outcome is users’ safety.
Jenna Passmore is a leader on the Discord’s Safety team who designs these experiences. Passmore follows a set of design principles focused on empowering teens to make safe decisions that will allow them to be their most authentic selves online.
Based on those principles, here are three ways Discord uses language to be helpful to its users, especially during times when they need guidance.
When designing safety alerts, Discord uses plain language, avoids idioms and metaphors, and keeps sentences and words short when possible. This makes alerts easier to understand in the moment, without overloading users with information. This can be particularly useful for users who may be in a heightened emotional state, for example, if they just got a notification that they violated Discord’s anti-harassment policy or they want to report someone else for harassing them.
Our design team tries to put themselves in the teens’ shoes in those moments. To imagine what their emotional state might be at the time. The simpler we can make options for them, the better. We try to make it easier for them to move through the flow so they are clear about what's supposed to happen.
Simple language is timeless. It isn’t trendy or metaphorical. And it translates better across different languages and cultures.
Take for example when a teen receives a DM from a user for the first time and Discord may provide some helpful education about online safety.
With features like Discord’s Teen Safety Alerts, Discord partnered with a leading child safety non-profit Thorn to design features with teens’ online behavior in mind. The goal is to empower teens to build their own online safety muscle—not make them feel like they've done something wrong. So Discord builds teachable moments and guidance into our products, using language that aims to restore the user’s sense of control, without shaming them.
“With teens, because they can't opt out of some of these alerts, we want it to feel more like a guide—a guardrail versus a speed bump,” said Passmore, the lead product designer for the Safety team. “A speed bump is saying, ‘Hey, you're doing something wrong, you need to check yourself.’ But we built Teen Safety Alerts to feel more like guidance.”
This alert will encourage them to double check if they want to reply, and will provide links to block the user or view more tips for staying safe. The goal is to empower teens by providing information that helps them make important decisions to protect themselves.
When a teen encounters potentially harmful or sensitive content or has a run-in with another user who is acting hostile, they, too, may be in an activated emotional state. They may be angry at the other person, or even at themselves. This is common with cyber-bullying, which researchers say can lead to depression and feelings of low self-esteem and isolation.
Our approach is to meet them in that mindset. This means offering them options and reminding them that they have options like blocking a person or reporting a message. We create a space to acknowledge what they’re experiencing.
It’s also important not to dwell on the upsetting incident. Instead, Discord uses language that aims to move the teen out of that emotional state and into a place of self-awareness. This can help them to calm down and feel more in control.
A users’ mindset matters to Discord. That is why we try and choose our words so carefully to support in the best possible way.
