On to Matters of Avatar Sex and Gender. After this discussion, you will be able to explain the importance of avatar sex and gender. Recognize some cues to sex and gender in avatars, and avoid the consequences of stereotypes, and objectification in your avatar design. Avatar sex and gender matter. They are different, but they are also related. Sex is dimorphic, it's binary. Male or female. It's an essential human determination. You want to know if someone is male or female, why? because maybe you'll mate with them or not. Maybe you can predict their behavior based on whether you think they are male or female and you should be able to predict how you should act with them at least in general, there are rules about social interactions based on sex. But gender is slightly different. It's a continuous concept. It's culturally determined. It's experienced internally and expressed externally. You can be feminine high or low, or in the middle. You can be masculine high or low, or in the middle. If you're both feminine or masculine or about at the same level, that's called androgynous and it's important for people to understand gender in a way that guides their behaviors as well. But it's more fluid, we should say. Sex and gender about salient and computer-mediated contexts. Because from the computers as social actors perspective, humans did not evolve to distinguish mediated from real representations. What do I mean by that? Well, we respond to a human in the same way as we respond to an avatar, because an avatar looks like a human. It moves, it talks. The more realistic it is, of course, the more we are likely to do this. But this is important, because it means when an avatar has a sex or a gender implied in its design, humans, users will react to that avatar according to the same guidelines. The same stereotypes that they do in regular human human interactions. And so we should know that these stereotypes are guiding our behaviors in the virtual spaces, as well as physical spaces. For example, gendered avatars are expected to have gendered knowledge. Looking at avatar voices, children trusted computer voices that were female when they talked about princesses and make up, but male when they talked about dinosaurs and football. Adults trusted male voices on a math tutorial. Talking about math concepts, but female voices when talking about relationships. And now, with even very simple, crude not dynamic avatars, research has found that when men and women use these simple avatars in a math competition context, they'll perform better on the math task than when they use a female avatar. So that's the stereotype that men are better than women at math, being manifested through our phenomenon called stereotype threat and the avatar context. Another study found that when people use male avatars, they're more likely to stand further apart from each other than when. They're using a male and a female avatar or a female, and a female avatar. And finally, female avatars are more likely to receive harassment in virtual spaces as well as help, maybe unwanted attention or even wanted help. Some men will choose female avatars in order to get more gifts. Some women will choose male avatars in order to avoid negative attention. So we should keep in mind that the stereotypes of physical contexts bleed into the virtual contacts of avatar use. How exactly sex or gender implied in an avatar? Well, for female avatars, there are exaggerated breasts and rears. The waist is narrow. The shape is generally the idealized hourglass shape. There's a focus on sexuality. But for males, there's facial hair. Of course, strong jawlines, excessive musculature. These are cues to power and aggression. The clothing for men flaunts that musculature. For women, the clothing flaunts their sexuality. And so this is stereotypically. Maybe typically, traditionally how avatars have implied sex and gender in their design. This can have negative consequences. It can lead to objectification or the treating of a person as an object and not a person. So women are generally objectified more than men. In video games, they're treated as sex objects, damsels in distress. They're the reward for beating the game. They have more revealing clothing, hypersexualized body parts and there are negative effects of using sexualized characters. It leads to lower self-efficacy for women, that feeling of being capable to accomplish something that reduces when they use sexualized characters. It leads to the perception of women as being less intelligent. It increases the likelihood of men to sexually harass women and it increases self-objectification for both men and women using hypersexualized or hypermuscular avatars, or seeing these characters in media increases the likelihood that you'll judge yourself based on appearance. And you'll become preoccupied with your body, it'll increase depression, eating disorders, etc. So objectification is negative and should hopefully be avoided by your avatar designs. What about empowerment, though? There are role model characters like Lara Croft from Tomb Raider and people might argue that she empowers the user. She is sexualized, but she is also strong and capable. The problem is that she also potentially disempowers users through the sexual objectification in the way that she is depicted. Research suggests that when people use sexualized representations, it leads to a feeling of disempowerment, even when that character is somewhat like a role model. And you might have noticed the design of Lara Croft has become less hypersexualized over the years, possibly responding to this critique. What about the idea that sex sells? So you should increase the sexuality of your characters in order to sell your products. Research suggests that there is little to no relationship with market success. Sexier characters do not necessarily lead to sexier sale numbers, if you know what I mean. For you as a designer, you should consider the effects of characters. The avatars that you're designing, that could possibly have negative effects. And then hopefully, you could design sex and gender into your avatars in ways that lead to positive effects. Both for your bottom line, your money, your adoption, your use, but also for your user's experiences and here are some specific design suggestions. So offer a role model that boys and girls can both identify with. Make sure your character interactions are socially appropriate for both male and female users, regardless or considering the gender that their avatars are displaying. Make sure that when you use sex appeal, you know that it's going to skew your audience toward men. And so be wary of that and use it in appropriate ways or when you're certain that, that's okay. All female gamers are not alike. Consider that, nor are males. But if you want to enhance your female audience, make sure you include feminine qualities. Don't worry as much about rejecting male users. Men are also interested in feminine qualities in avatars. Men are actually less likely to feel negative about using a female character than women are about using a male character according to multiple studies. And so don't worry about giving too many feminine qualities to your avatars. It will not necessarily alienate your male users. Customization, allow a plethora of options. Feminine, masculine, allow them to be androgynous. This will help people identify with your characters. Make sure that the female personas in your primary characters are diversified. There are many different female personas that offer different appeals not just sex, but also intelligence, humor, etc., and then try to transcend social norms. Go beyond just what you see in your regular media. Think about how you might actually change the norm of how media is produced, how avatars are produced in the future and that means you can acknowledge gender. Put them into your interactions, but not in sexes ways iIn ways that add value and complexity to the users experience. So to recap, sex is different from gender, but it matters in avatar use. People respond to sex and gender the same way they respond to human sex, and gender, and that's through stereotypes, and you should be weary of those stereotypes. Recognize that sexuality and female avatars or musculature in male avatars prompts those stereotypes, and possibly leads to objectification which has negative effects. So when you design your avatars, you should focus on providing realistic role models with a balanced appeal across gender with a plethora of customization options and diverse female characters that can act as role models. And hopefully through all of this, you will avoid sexism and lead to products, avatars that sell and that kind of Meaningful positive effects on your users. Thank you very much. Catch you next time. [MUSIC]
