Gender Stereotypes in Interaction Design. Render Me – Augmented Reality Masks to Inhabit the Metaverse

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to understand how digital systems interact, reproduce societal power structures, and mimic the male canon in digital systems. Thus, it is necessary to understand how the algorithms of biometric technologies and Artificial Intelligence systems used in the categorization of images contribute to the inception of biases and stereotypes. In response to this question, the Render Me project was developed, which simulates how biometric technologies and design choices can marginalize individuals.

Through a Feminist Speculative Design methodology, a fictional brand was developed that sells digital skins (augmented reality filters in Spark AR Studio) that protect the physical identity of its users against data capture and against surveillance of their real faces. This is meant as a satirical approach, as the female subject is placed as the main figure, abandoning the ideal of the man at the centre of the world that served its humanist desires. This female subject, however, is crossed by all the stereotypes attributed to her in the physical world. A skin is assigned to the user through the choice of keywords derived from the Myers-Brigg Type Indicator (MBTI) model. Additionally, only female masks can be purchased to navigate the entire metaverse, which vary their visual configuration according to female stereotypes. There are six skins in its current iteration, but it is intended that others can be developed in the future, representing other axes of identity such as race, class, and gender. In this way, the project aims to be an awareness tool for the perpetuation and amplification of gender stereotypes in digital systems. In short, by centering the female subject as the main figure, the Render Me project hopes to stimulate critical thinking about how technological objects reproduce ingrained prejudices and preestablished ideas and paradigms which might actually be causing harm.