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redduif t1_iw2v8rp wrote

>Researchers Ashley Martin and Malia Mason assert that 90% of virtual assistants are initially programmed with a binary female gender. This matches the negative stereotype of women as compliant and available to serve.

I don't know but generally a gps 'assistent' pretty much tells the driver what to do, turn left, take the third exit, you made a mistake turn around now.

They are much more orders than compliant words of a submissive assistent.
Also, I don't know of any non-gendered vocal product so imo it's biased by habit.

I choose the voice which annoys me the least, whichever gender that is.
Everything has to be about genders these days it seems. Is gender even the right word here or is it more a stereotypical generalization of a female or male voice, which would mostly be related to the sex, rarely the gender.
Do gender fluid people alter the pitch of their voice when they change genders ?

*eta : Just to be clear, i'm not attacking any gender choice or fluidity thereof of people, but the research and products in general making things about gender, just because the topic is popular right now.

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JesustheSpaceCowboy t1_iw31obn wrote

I want to see a psychologist explain why some of us immediately turn it into an Australian. I always go Aussie male as well.

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Whale-n-Flowers t1_iw350oa wrote

I like the Australian male voice because it makes it sound like my buddy and I are going on an adventure.

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JesustheSpaceCowboy t1_iw357zj wrote

That’s why I have mine set to that as well, my phone calls me captain cause it makes me sound like an adventurer

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Whale-n-Flowers t1_iw35qm7 wrote

If I used more voice commands or ever had my phone off silent, I'd definitely try to find if Brent Spiner has made one as Data.

Honestly, I rarely even turn the GPS voice on these days. Haven't actually heard from my adventure buddy in half a decade.

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_ZombieHero_ t1_iw3ai08 wrote

I went with Aussie female. My kids are constantly asking what the accent is

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DarkTreader t1_iw387um wrote

I don’t think it’s the prevailing opinion that navigation voices are “commanding”. While they aren’t timidly saying “would you please turn right?” They are being assistants. You initially ask the device to give you directions, thus freeing you up to concentrate on operating the vehicle. You are delegating, you are in charge, and the voice is giving clear instructions as a helper but in no way do most people consider these commands. If you miss the turn it recalculates and gives you new directions. You are free to ignore them. They are clearly subservient to you in operation so I believe your perception, while perfectly valid for you, is in the minority and navigation is by no means designed to be a commander but an assistant. If they felt any more forceful people would less likely to use them.

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redduif t1_iw3jvh6 wrote

I wrote a whole reply to this but frankly the original study being behind paywall this article might not represent it properly, so I scrapped that.

To illustrate "If they owned a gendered technology item, participants felt more attached to the item. Gendered items also led to more negative stereotypical thinking about gender."

What does that even mean?

"The researchers acknowledge that the participants were all from the United States, and it is possible that these results may not apply in all cultures where gendered technology is present".

I sought for this information indeed, because they talked about cars.
A car in french is female, in dutch it's male although one wouldn't know without a dictionary.
In Spanish it is male.
While they specify geographical location, the article doesn't specify native or even secundary language.

A prominent vacuum robot is called Roomba.
The 'a' may suggest it's rather female.

So before going in a whole discussion of gender perception, I'd need to read the premise of the study.
This article to me suggests they started out with some negative suppositions, which could bias the conclusions, and participants speaking other languages may have an influence on their perception of gendered objects as English is one of the very few gender neutral languages.
Although it's rather mothership for exemple, so it exists unofficially for some words.
And while mustang had Boss they also had Shelby, being quite the cool car in several movies, so what does that mean in their affection yet negativity conclusion ?

While in a way one could argue negative publicity is also publicity, just based on this article I'm not convinced there is any link to gender perception of objects and the reason to buy that object or not.

Especially since assistant voices are often a choice on each product rather than having to choose male female or neutral beforehand.

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DarkTreader t1_iw3osg4 wrote

All this is good, I’m merely disputing your statement in the second paragraph that directions are “commands”. I think this is important to your thesis because you believe the article made some unsupported assertion while your statement about directions being commands i believe commits the same error. Everything else I have no dispute with.

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moutnmn87 t1_iw5b1i6 wrote

Im not sure being more forceful would make people less likely to use assistant apps . Both my girlfriend and I would choose pick a grumpy sailor mouth voice for the hos of that was an option.

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Agariculture t1_iw3ko8j wrote

I prefer my navigation app to have a british females voice.

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redduif t1_iw3llck wrote

And so as to go from the article, is that because of some greater affection towards them is or stereotypical negativity because you needed it to be a subordinate and thus a female according to them?

And also, if the best navigation system had only neutral or male voices, would you rather have bought/used an inferior system with a female voice ?

Because that's kind of what they suggest.

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Agariculture t1_iw3nqn1 wrote

I have has many nav systems in the last 20ish years. I have a British female voice because I can and I like the sound. If it wasn’t available I couldn’t care less.

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redduif t1_iw4ghnf wrote

Same here. Not about the voice but the principle.

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nonxoperational t1_iw3c2k7 wrote

“Everything is about gender” cries the person who’s complaining that everything is about gender…

You’re not in traffic, mate. You are traffic.

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Sir_Bax t1_iw2wt7e wrote

>I don't know but generally a gps 'assistent' pretty much tells the driver what to do, turn left, take the third exit, you made a mistake turn around now.

>They are much more orders than compliant words of a submissive assistent.

So boomer wife stereotype?

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redduif t1_iw2xly7 wrote

Maybe more gen x? Eta unless they chose a male voice of course, not sure what that would be. Daddy maybe ?

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