HCI researchers have increasingly studied how technology might improve the lives of marginalized workers. We explored this question through a qualitative study with home health aides in New York City, a vulnerable group of frontline caregivers whose work with patients is poorly paid and highly stressful, often involving life-or-death situations. To elicit the perspectives of aides and their supervisors on how technology interventions might contribute to moving aides towards a better future, we created a design provocation that centers aides' needs and suggests more equitable roles for them within the home care ecosystem. Findings from design sessions with 16 aides, nurses, and aide coordinators illuminate the ethical and pragmatic dilemmas inherent in this complex ecosystem, and show that designing technology for equity requires attention to structural problems in addition to workers' stated needs. We analyze our findings through the lens of social justice-oriented interaction design, and discuss how our work extends key strategies within this framework.
This paper reports on the value conflicts that beneficiaries experience when engaging in the monthly ritual of the biometric authentication of their fingerprints to claim state-sponsored food entitlements in India. Drawing on value-based orientations to HCI inquiry, the study locates the interactions around the biometric process to illustrate the ways in which beneficiaries find their values of time, dignity, and privacy, consistently disregarded by the interactive demands of the biometric system. Additionally, to cope with these value conflicts, some beneficiaries pass on the responsibilities of completing the biometric process to the children in their families. While adult beneficiaries are vocal and articulate about the value tensions in their lives, children cope with the anxieties of interacting with the biometric process, silently; even as they experience conflicts in their education, play, and study time.
This paper argues for a conceptual framework that treats user consent in interactive technologies as a design challenge necessitating careful, culturally-informed consideration. We draw on recent work in HCI as well as queer and feminist theory that understands consent as rooted in negotiating agency in order to frame our exploration of unique difficulties and potential solutions to meaningful opportunities for user consent in the design of computational technologies. Through a critical analysis of three video games that offer different models of consent—each of which communicates different values through its design—we introduce the concept of consent mechanics. Consent mechanics describe designed interactions that allow players to consent to or opt out of in-game experiences, often those related to sexuality or intimacy. Here, we approach video games as windows onto design considerations surrounding interactive technologies more broadly, suggesting crucial questions and tactics for how to design user agency ethically into computational systems.
Learning about alternatives to violence is an essential part of change work with domestic violence perpetrators. This is complex work, seeking to tackle a sensitive issue by involving the development of deep, embodied learning for perpetrators who may lack perspective on their behaviour. Interactive storytelling has been providing users with the opportunity to explore speculative scenarios in a controlled environment. We discuss the design of Choice-Point: a web-based application that allows perpetrators adopt the role of different fictional characters in an abusive scenario for conveying the essential skill of perspective-taking. We evaluated Choice-Point through trials with three groups of perpetrators, a support group of victim-survivors and an expert critique from support workers. We discuss challenges in using such technologies - such as our system – for engagement; the value of perpetrator agency in supporting non-violent behaviours, and the potential to positively shape perpetrators' journeys to non-violence within social care settings.
Toxicity in online environments is a complex and a systemic issue. Collegiate esports communities seem to be particularly vulnerable to toxic behaviors. In esports games, negative behavior, such as harassment, can create barriers to players achieving high performance and can reduce enjoyment which may cause them to leave the game. The aim of this study is to investigate how players define, experience and deal with toxicity in esports games that they play. Our findings from an interview study and five monthly follow ups with 19 participants from a university esports club show that players define toxicity as behaviors disrupt their morale and team dynamics, and are inclined to normalize negative behaviors, rationalize it as part of the competitive game culture akin to traditional sports, and participate a form of gamer classism, believing that toxicity is more common in lower level play than in professional and collegiate esports. There are many coping mechanisms employed by collegiate esports players, including ignoring offenders, deescalating tense encounters, and using tools to mute offenders. Understanding the motivations behind collegiate esports players' engagement with toxicity may help the growing sport plot a positive trajectory towards healthy play.