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Media, Law & Policy

Unless Designers and Users Intervene, Expect More Missteps in an AI World

Tuesday, May 28, 2019, By Keith Kobland
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facultyMaxwell School of Citizenship and Public AffairsResearch and Creative

Jamie WindersA recent report by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) paints a troubling future for artificial intelligence in terms of promoting dominant gender norms. UNESCO鈥檚 report maintains digital assistants like Alexa and Siri create a model of 鈥渄ocile and eager-to-please helpers鈥� that reinforce 鈥渃ommonly held gender biases that women are subservient and tolerant of poor treatment.鈥� Maxwell School Professor Jamie Winders, director of the Autonomous Systems Policy Institute (ASPI), says despite the report, we can expect more of the same unless the public demands changes.

鈥淥ne of the things that decades of research in the social sciences and humanities has shown us is that there is a two-way street between identity categories like gender and race and the material things that fill our daily lives,鈥� says Winders. 鈥淓verything from the furniture in our homes and paint color on our walls to the kinds of wallets and shoes we wear is gendered. In the 21st century, those things that fill our daily lives now include virtual assistants like Alexa or Siri. These assistants are meant to behave like human assistants, so it鈥檚 not surprising that they mimic dominant gender norms. By definition, these assistants are meant to be helpful, and around the world, 鈥榟elpful,鈥� assisting roles are strongly associated with women.鈥�

Winders says in the case of these virtual assistants that gendered assumption is built into their design. 鈥淎lthough you can opt for a 鈥榤ale鈥� voice for most virtual assistants, the default remains a female voice鈥搃n the same way that the 鈥榙efault鈥� assumptions about who makes the best personal assistant point to women,鈥� says Winders.

黑料不打烊鈥檚 ASPI was created in part to research this very issue. 鈥淎s we see more and more AI-driven products attempting to mimic human behavior, those products will continue to reflect and reinforce dominant gender norms, unless we, as designers and users, intentionally intervene,鈥� according to Winders. 鈥淲ithout a strong focus on representation (whose voices, images, accents, etc. are being used and not used) at ‘every’ step from design to regulation to daily use in the life cycle of these 鈥榮mart鈥� technologies, we will continue to see these missteps.鈥�

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