Girls and Boys stay in to play
Creating inclusive and exclusive computer
entertainment for children
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Summary of SIGIS project
James Stewart
University of Edinburgh
j.k.stewart@ed.ac.uk
SIGIS
• Strategies of Inclusion: Gender in the
Information Society
• 5 centres/countries, 20 experts
• 48 cases
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Designers/producers
Users
Public private and voluntary sectors
Products, education, services
Play and fun
• Cross cutting analysis
• Several volumes, website,leaflets,
papers, and book appearing soon
• www.sigis-ist.org
Pleasure, Play and Fun
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The Gathering: Computer parties as means for gender inclusion
Hege Nordli,
The Gathering Experience: A User study of a Computer Party Hege
Nordli
The Gender Game: A study of Norwegian computer game designers
Helen Jøsok Gansmo, Hege Nordli, Knut H. Sørensen,
Computing: Excludingly boring at school, includingly cool at home
Helen Jøsok Gansmo
IT Beat: Bringing Pop and Glam to IT Lisa Pitt
Don't leave IT to the boys! Lisa Pitt
Boys and girls stay in to play: Creating computer entertainment for
children James Stewart
Girls Just Want To Have Fun Aphra Kerr
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Inclusion through fun and play,Helen Jøsok Gansmo
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SIGIS Approach
• Social Shaping of Technology & Social
Learning
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Robin Williams, James Stewart and Roger Slack (2005) Experimenting with Information
and Communication Technologies: Social Learning in Technological Innovation, Edward
Elgar
• ICTs and gender have multiple meanings
and practical embodiment, that change
dynamically, and shape each other =>
changing artefacts and usages
• Study strategies of inclusion, and the
engagement of users with them.
• Aim to produce guidelines for Practionners
and Policy Makers
Themes
• Informal learning
• Informal economy of everyday life: local
experts
• Fun and pleasure
• Self-inclusion
• Sources of inspiration for design
• Gender sensitive design
• Empowerment of women designers
• Construction of the User
Resources for building
representations of the user
indirect
evidence
about users
direct
involvement
of user
- little market info on
existing users
- demand/market for
representation
other products
of user
- competitors
- user panels
- market research
- trials
- innofusion
constructions of the user
- visions of technology
- fictions/myths? about the user
- expert proxies eg experience of
engineers/intermediaries
Play, leisure and ICT
• ICTs can be used for leisure and play in
many ways.
• Traditional ‘game’ just one playful use.
• Fun and play in non-leisure: work,
learning etc: design of technology as fun.
• Legitimacy of types of play
• Emergence of many new playful uses of
ICTs in recent years.
• Look at idea of ICT-based play rather
than gaming
• Robots, i-TV, mobile phones, chat, blogs,
diaries, music etc
Dimensions of Consumption (Holt
1995)
Autotelic
Instrumental
Object Action
EXPERIENCE
INTEGRATION
Interpersonal
PLAY
CLASSIFICATION
STRUCTURE
of ACTION
PURPOSE OF ACTION
Holt, D. B. (1995). "How Consumers Consumer: a Typology of Consumption Practices." Journal
of Consumer Research 22(June): 1-16
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Girls and Boys stay in to play
• Ijsfontein, Amsterdam
• Games and multimedia play and
education products for children
(Museums, CD Rom, interactive TV)
• Interaction designers
• Work primarily on commission
• Outside mainstream ‘boy game’ culture
• Girl-game niche emerged by chance.
• General Store, Hema approached them
for ‘girl games’
• Interview with MD and female designer
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (LZW) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
Mijn idool
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (LZW) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (LZW) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (LZW) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
Ik ben een ster
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (LZW) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
Boys2Girls
Shaping design
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Interaction design concept
I-methodology
Artist’s creativity
Testing with users (demand)
Experience with existing products
Research on supply of related products
Criteria of commissioning organisation
• Girl-games - ‘Girly’ content
• Aesthetics - physical world, ‘girly’ design.
• Gender neutral - Multiple interaction styles Cooperation and competition, goals and
exploration.
Constructions of users
• Designers
– Children as particular users of games and
entertainment
– Boys and girls as different types of users of games and
play:
• Publishers and designers:
– Recognise market, but not willing to take risk
• Museums and education publishers
– Recognise age but not gender
• The General store
– A particular girl-child market not currently well served
• Parents
– Educational concerns and differentiated attitudes to
girls and boys play and ICT use.
• Girls
– What is appropriate and desirable in play, aesthetics
and ICTs
Findings I
• Girls play differently to boys: spectrum
• Games industry is boy-focused.
• ‘Girl games’ can be used as a strategy for product
differentiation.
• Products can be made inclusive – appealing to
boys and girls, or exclusive, appealing to girls only.
– Girl Content: need to make what girls want - multiple
interpretations of this.
– Interaction style and game structure involving cooperation
and exploration
– Need to balance cooperative with competitive game
elements, and undirected exploration with goals to create
a compelling inclusive product.
Findings II
• Girl appeal not demanded or recognised by many
of those commissioning work.
• The design process is typically is informed by own
memories and dominant market form of
entertainment for girls and traditional girl themes
• Edutainment important feature of play products for
girls, especially around purchasing.
• Parents key intermediaries
• Play products not recognisably ‘video games’ education, life-play, complementary to other media
forms
General Design
Conclusions
• Do not apply a dichotomous and fixed gender
perspective.
• Gender awareness on the other hand is crucial,
but the product does not need to be labelled with
gender.
• Start from established interests seems to be a
more fruitful strategy
• Make the technology flexible and open to
alterations in line with the user's preferences and
interests
• Contribute to deconstructing the binary images
of gendered ICT practices, but be subtle rather
than explicit in your attempts to change ICT and
gender.