ABSTRACT
Women employed in video game companies are facing several barriers regarding equality and career chances. Scholars argue that career development of women is at times hindered because of hegemonic masculinity in organizations, with networks and other social factors playing a more important role than qualifications. This means that women miss out on career opportunities in a thriving and future driving industry. Yet, as gendered working environments are considered to be the result of social construction, they can also be restructured. To explore the drivers of these aspects, we conducted a qualitative field study in a video game company in a large city in Germany to understand what challenges regarding masculinity exist and how they are dealt with. Our lessons learned contribute to the realization of more gender-sensitive working environments in the video game sector and, as a result, of more diverse video games as well. Furthermore, a native English speaker dealt with typos and linguistic infelicities.
Supplemental Material
- Joan Acker. 2006. Inequality regimes: Gender, class, and race in organizations. Gend. Soc. 20, 4 (2006), 441--464.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Michael Ahmadi, Anne Weibert, Corinna Ogonowski, Konstantin Aal, Kristian Gäckle, Nicola Marsden, and Volker Wulf. 2018. Challenges and lessons learned by applying living labs in gender and IT contexts. In Proceedings of the 4th Conference on Gender & IT, 239--249.Google ScholarDigital Library
- Lauren Alfrey and France Winddance Twine. 2017. Gender-Fluid Geek Girls: Negotiating Inequality Regimes in the Tech Industry. Gend. Soc. 31, 1 (February 2017), 28--50. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1177/ 0891243216680590Google ScholarCross Ref
- Albert Bandura. 1982. Self-efficacy mechanism in human agency. Am. Psychol. 37, 2 (1982), 122--147.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Shaowen Bardzell. 2010. Feminist HCI: Taking Stock and Outlining an Agenda for Design. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '10), 1301-- 1310.Google ScholarDigital Library
- Laura Berger, Yvonne Benschop, and Marieke van den Brink. 2015. Practising gender when networking: The case of university--industry innovation projects. Gend. Work Organ. 22, 6 (2015), 556--578.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Hannah Riley Bowles. 2013. Psychological Perspectives on Gender inNegotiation. In The SAGE Handbook of Gender and Psychology. SAGE Publications, Ltd, London, 465--483. DOI:https:// doi.org/10.4135/9781446269930.n28Google ScholarCross Ref
- Virginia Braun and Victoria Clarke. 2006. Using thematic analysis in psychology. Qual. Res. Psychol. 3, 2 (2006), 77--101.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Tor Busch. 1995. Gender differences in self-efficacy and attitudes toward computers. J. Educ. Comput. Res. 12, 2 (1995), 147--158.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Judith Butler. 2004. Undoing gender. Routledge, New York & London.Google Scholar
- Justine Cassell. 2003. Genderizing HCI. In The Human-computer Interaction Handbook, Julie A. Jacko and Andrew Sears (eds.). L. Erlbaum Associates Inc., Hillsdale, NJ, USA, 401--412. Retrieved March 18, 2019 from http://dl.acm.org/ citation.cfm?id=772072.772100Google Scholar
- Cliff Ed Cheng. 1996. Masculinities in organizations. Sage Publications, Inc.Google Scholar
- Sapna Cheryan, Allison Master, and Andrew N. Meltzoff. 2015. Cultural Stereotypes as Gatekeepers: Increasing Girls' Interest in Computer Science and Engineering by Diversifying Stereotypes. Front. Psychol. 6, (2015).Google Scholar
- Sapna Cheryan, Victoria C Plaut, Paul G Davies, and Claude M Steele. 2009. Ambient belonging: how stereotypical cues impact gender participation in computer science. J. Pers. Soc. Psychol. 97, 6 (2009), 1045.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Shira Chess and Adrienne Shaw. 2015. A Conspiracy of Fishes, or, How We Learned to Stop Worrying About #GamerGate and Embrace Hegemonic Masculinity. J. Broadcast. Electron. Media 59, 1 (January 2015), 208--220. DOI:https://doi.org/ 10.1080/08838151.2014.999917Google ScholarCross Ref
- D Jean Clandinin and F Michael Connelly. 2000. Narrative inquiry: Experience and story in qualitative research. Jossey-Bass, San Francisco.Google Scholar
- David L. Collinson and Jeff Hearn. 2005. Men and Masculinities in Work, Organizations, and Management. In Handbook of Studies on Men & Masculinities, Michael S. Kimmel, Jeff Hearn and R.W. Connell (eds.). SAGE, Thousand Oaks, 289-- 310. DOI:https://doi.org/10.4135/9781452233833.n17Google ScholarCross Ref
- Tammy Duerden Comeau and Candace L Kemp. 2007. Intersections of age and masculinities in the information technology industry. Ageing Soc. 27, 2 (2007), 215--232.Google ScholarCross Ref
- R.W. Connell. 1995. Masculinities. Allen & Unwin.Google Scholar
- R.W. Connell and James W Messerschmidt. 2005. Hegemonic masculinity: Rethinking the concept. Gend. Soc. 19, 6 (2005), 829--859.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Mia Consalvo. 2012. Confronting toxic gamer culture: A challenge for feminist game studies scholars. Ada J. Gend. New Media Technol. 1, 1 (2012), 1--6.Google Scholar
- Mia Consalvo and Christopher A Paul. 2013. Welcome to the discourse of the real: Constituting the boundaries of games and players. In FDG, 55--62.Google Scholar
- Will H Courtenay. 2000. Constructions of masculinity and their influence on men's well-being: a theory of gender and health. Soc. Sci. Med. 50, 10 (2000), 1385--1401.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Angela R. Cox. 2018. Women by Women: A Gender Analysis of Sierra Titles by Women Designers. In Feminism in Play, Kishonna L. Gray, Gerald Voorhees and Emma Vossen (eds.). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, 21--36. DOI:https://doi.org/ 10.1007/978--3--319--90539--6?Google ScholarCross Ref
- Mary Crawford. 2003. Gender and humor in social context. J. Pragmat. 35, 9 (September 2003), 1413-- 1430. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/S0378--2166(02) 00183--2Google ScholarCross Ref
- John Creswell, William Hanson, Vicki Clark Plano, and Alejandro Morales. 2007. Qualitative Research Designs: Selection and Implementation. Couns. Psychol. 35, 2 (2007), 236--264.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Caroline Criado Perez. 2019. Invisible Women: Exposing data bias in a world designed for men. Chattoo & Windus, London.Google Scholar
- Barbara Czarniawska. 1997. A narrative approach to organization studies. Sage Publications.Google Scholar
- Marjorie L DeVault and Chrys Ingraham. 1999. Metaphors of silence and voice in feminist thought. In Liberating method: feminism and social research, Marjorie L DeVault (ed.). Temple University Press, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 175--186.Google Scholar
- Michele D. Dickey. 2006. Girl Gamers: The Controversy of Girl Games and the Relevance of Female-Oriented Game Design for Instructional Design. Br. J. Educ. Technol. 37, 5 (2006), 785--793.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Catherine D'Ignazio, Alexis Hope, Becky Michelson, Robyn Churchill, and Ethan Zuckerman. 2016. A Feminist HCI Approach to Designing Postpartum Technologies: "When I First Saw a Breast Pump I Was Wondering if It Was a Joke." In Proceedings of the 2016 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '16), 2612--2622. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1145/2858036.2858460Google ScholarDigital Library
- Rosalind Edwards and Melanie Mauthner. 2002. Ethics and Feminist Research: Theory and Practice. In Ethics in Qualitative Research, Melanie Mauthner, Maxine Birch, Julie Jessop and Tina Miller (eds.). 14--31.Google Scholar
- Nathan L Ensmenger. 2012. The computer boys take over: Computers, programmers, and the politics of technical expertise. MIT Press.Google ScholarDigital Library
- Kim Etherington. 2004. Becoming a reflexive researcher: Using our selves in research. Jessica Kingsley Publishers.Google Scholar
- Rhonda Evans, DeAnn K Gauthier, and Craig J Forsyth. 1998. Dogfighting: Symbolic expression and validation of masculinity. Sex Roles 39, 11--12 (1998), 825--838.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Clare Farquhar and Rita Das. 1999. Are focus groups suitable for 'sensitive'topics. In Developing focus group research, Rosaline Barbour and Jenny Kitzinger (eds.). SAGE, London, 47--63.Google Scholar
- Sarah Fox, Rachel Rose Ulgado, and Daniela Rosner. 2015. Hacking Culture, Not Devices: Access and Recognition in Feminist Hackerspaces. In Proceedings of the 18th ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work & Social Computing (CSCW '15), 56--68. DOI:https://doi.org/ 10.1145/2675133.2675223Google ScholarDigital Library
- Silvia Gherardi. 1995. Gender, symbolism and organizational cultures. SAGE.Google Scholar
- Elena Gorbacheva, Jenine Beekhuyzen, Jan vom Brocke, and Jörg Becker. 2019. Directions for research on gender imbalance in the IT profession. Eur. J. Inf. Syst. 28, 1 (2019), 43--67.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Jolie O. Graybill, Maria Taesil Hudson Carpenter, Jerome Offord, Mary Piorun, and Gary Shaffer. 2013. Employee onboarding: identification of best practices in ACRL libraries. Libr. Manag. 34, 3 (February 2013), 200--218. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1108/01435121311310897Google ScholarCross Ref
- David Hankerson, Andrea R Marshall, Jennifer Booker, Houda El Mimouni, Imani Walker, and Jennifer A Rode. 2016. Does technology have race? In Proceedings of the 2016 CHI Conference Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems, 473--486.Google ScholarDigital Library
- Orit Hazzan and Yael Dubinsky. 2006. Empower Gender Diversity with Agile Software Development. In The Encyclopedia of Gender and Information Technology, Eileen Trauth (ed.). Hershey, Pennsylvania, 249--256.Google Scholar
- Cedric Herring. 2009. Does Diversity Pay?: Race, Gender, and the Business Case for Diversity. Am. Sociol. Rev. 74, 2 (2009), 208--224.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Ramon Hinojosa. 2010. Doing Hegemony: Military, Men, and Constructing a Hegemonic Masculinity. J. Mens Stud. 18, 2 (April 2010), 179--194. DOI:https://doi.org/10.3149/jms.1802.179Google ScholarCross Ref
- Laura E Hirshfield. 2010. " She Won't Make Me Feel Dumb": Identity Threat in a Male-Dominated Discipline. Int. J. Gend. Sci. Technol. 2, 1 (2010).Google Scholar
- Karen Holtzblatt and Nicola Marsden. 2018. Retaining Women in Technology. In 2018 IEEE International Conference on Engineering, Technology and Innovation (ICE/ITMC), 148--155.Google Scholar
- Yasmin B. Kafai, Carrie Heeter, Jill Denner, and Jennifer Y. Sun. 2008. Beyond Barbie and Mortal Kombat: New Perspectives on Gender and Gaming. MIT Press.Google Scholar
- Elisabeth K. Kelan. 2010. Gender Logic and (Un)doing Gender at Work. Gend. Work Organ. 17, 2 (March 2010), 174--194. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1111/ j.14680432.2009.00459.xGoogle ScholarCross Ref
- Aphra Kerr. 2006. The business and culture of digital games: Gamework and gameplay. Sage.Google Scholar
- John Kirriemuir and Angela McFarlane. 2004. Literature Review in Games and Learning. NESTA Futur. Res. Rep. Report 8, (2004). Retrieved from https://telearn.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-00190453Google Scholar
- Rachel Kowert, Ruth Festl, and Thorsten Quandt. 2014. Unpopular, Overweight, and Socially Inept: Reconsidering the Stereotype of Online Gamers. Cyberpsychology Behav. Soc. Netw. 17, 3 (March 2014), 141--146. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1089/ cyber.2013.0118Google Scholar
- Rachel Kowert, Mark D. Griffiths, and Julian A. Oldmeadow. 2012. Geek or Chic? Emerging Stereotypes of Online Gamers. Bull. Sci. Technol. Soc. 32, 6 (December 2012), 471--479. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1177/0270467612469078Google ScholarCross Ref
- Terry A. Kupers. 2005. Toxic masculinity as a barrier to mental health treatment in prison. J. Clin. Psychol. 61, 6 (June 2005), 713--724. DOI:https://doi.org/ 10.1002/jclp.20105Google ScholarCross Ref
- Sarah-Jane Leslie, Andrei Cimpian, Meredith Meyer, and Edward Freeland. 2015. Expectations of brilliance underlie gender distributions across academic disciplines. Science 347, 6219 (2015), 262-- 265.Google Scholar
- Linda Lindsey. 2015. The Sociology of Gender Theoretical Perspectives and Feminist Frameworks. Routledge.Google Scholar
- John Lofland and Lyn Lofland. 1995. Analyzing social settings. Belmont CA Wadsworth (1995).Google Scholar
- Judith Lorber. 2011. Gender Inequality: Feminist Theories and Politics. Oxford University Press, Oxford.Google Scholar
- Hans Lundkvist. 2015. Gender Aware Employer Branding: How to Become Authentic, Unique and Attractive. Int. J. Bus. Manag. 10, 11 (October 2015), 62. DOI:https://doi.org/10.5539/ijbm.v10n11p62Google ScholarCross Ref
- Patricia Maguire. 1987. Doing Participatory Research: A Feminist Approach. Center for International Education, School of Education, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.Google Scholar
- Patricia Maguire. 2001. Uneven Ground: Feminisms and Action Research. In Handbook of action research: participative inquiry and practice, Peter Reason and Hilary Bradbury (eds.). SAGE, London, 59--69. Retrieved March 12, 2019 from https://nls.ldls.org.uk/welcome.html?ark:/81055/vdc_ 100025506362.0x000001Google Scholar
- Jane Margolis and Allan Fisher. 2003. Unlocking the Clubhouse: Women in Computing. MIT Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
- Nicola Marsden and Monika Pröbster. 2019. Personas and Identity: Looking at Multiple Identities to Inform the Construction of Personas. In Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems - CHI '19, 1--14. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1145/3290605.3300565Google ScholarDigital Library
- Crystle Martin and Matthew Rafalow. 2015. Gendered Barriers to Participation in Gaming Culture. In GenderIT 2015 Advancing Diversity (ICPS: ACM international conference proceeding series), 49--52. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1145/2807565.2807713Google ScholarDigital Library
- Seonaidh McDonald. 2005. Studying actions in context: a qualitative shadowing method for organizational research. Qual. Res. 5, 4 (November 2005), 455--473. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1177/1468794105056923Google ScholarCross Ref
- Seonaidh McDonald and Barbara Simpson. 2014. Shadowing research in organizations: the methodological debates. Qual. Res. Organ. Manag. Int. J. 9, 1 (2014), 3--20. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1108/ QROM-02--2014--1204Google ScholarCross Ref
- Danaë Metaxa-Kakavouli, Kelly Wang, James A. Landay, and Jeff Hancock. 2018. Gender-Inclusive Design: Sense of Belonging and Bias in Web Interfaces. In Proceedings of the 2018 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems - CHI '18, 1--6. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1145/ 3173574.3174188Google ScholarDigital Library
- Marc J. Natale. 2002. The effect of a male-oriented computer gaming culture on careers in the computer industry. ACM SIGCAS Comput. Soc. 32, 2 (2002), 24--31. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1145/566522.566526Google ScholarDigital Library
- Su Olsson. 2000. Acknowledging the female archetype: women managers' narratives of gender. Women Manag. Rev. 15, 5/6 (August 2000), 296-- 302. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1108/09649420010372959Google ScholarCross Ref
- Benjamin Paaßen, Thekla Morgenroth, and Michelle Stratemeyer. 2017. What is a true gamer? The male gamer stereotype and the marginalization of women in video game culture. Sex Roles 76, 7 (2017), 421-- 435. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-016-0678-yGoogle ScholarCross Ref
- Julie Prescott and Jan Bogg. 2011. Segregation in a male-dominated industry: Women working in the computer games industry. Int. J. Gend. Sci. Technol. 3, 1 (2011).Google Scholar
- Julie Prescott and Jan Bogg. 2013. The Gendered Identity of Women in the Games Industry. Eludamos J. Comput. Game Cult. 7, 1 (2013), 55--67.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Julie Prescott and Jan Bogg. 2014. The Experiences of Women Working in the Computer Games Industry: An In-Depth Qualitative Study. In Gender Considerations and Influence in the Digital Media and Gaming Industry. IGI Global, 92--109.Google Scholar
- Bonnie Ruder, Dwaine Plaza, Rebecca Warner, and Michelle Bothwell. 2018. STEM Women Faculty Struggling for Recognition and Advancement in a "Men's Club" Culture. In Exploring the Toxicity of Lateral Violence and Microaggressions, Christine L. Cho, Julie K. Corkett and Astrid Steele (eds.). Springer International Publishing, Cham, 121--149. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1007/978--3--319--74760--6_7Google ScholarCross Ref
- Laurie A. Rudman and Julie E. Phelan. 2008. Backlash effects for disconfirming gender stereotypes in organizations. Res. Organ. Behav. 28, (January 2008), 61--79. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/ j.riob.2008.04.003Google Scholar
- Steven P Schacht. 1996. Misogyny on and off the "pitch" the gendered world of male rugby players. Gend. Soc. 10, 5 (1996), 550--565.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Michael Schmalz. 2015. Limitation to Innovation in the North American Console Video Game Industry 2001--2013: A Critical Analysis. Electron. Thesis Diss. Repos. (2015). Retrieved from https://ir.lib.uwo.ca/etd/3393Google Scholar
- Stephanie Schnurr and Janet Holmes. 2009. Using humor to do masculinity at work. In Pragmatics & Beyond New Series, Neal R. Norrick and Delia Chiaro (eds.). John Benjamins Publishing Company, Amsterdam, 101--124. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1075/ pbns.182.05schGoogle Scholar
- Adrienne Shaw. 2012. Do you identify as a gamer? Gender, race, sexuality, and gamer identity. New Media Soc. 14, 1 (2012), 28--44.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Dorothy E Smith. 1987. The everyday world as problematic: A feminist sociology. University of Toronto Press.Google Scholar
- Statistik der Bundesagentur für Arbeit. 2017. Beschäftigte - statistik.arbeitsagentur.de. Retrieved October 20, 2017 from https://statistik. arbeitsagentur.de/nn_31966/SiteGlobals/Forms/Rubri kensuche/Rubrikensuche_Form.html?view=processF orm&resourceId=210368&input_=&pageLocale=de &topicId=746716&year_month=201703&year_mont h.GROUP=1&search=SuchenGoogle Scholar
- Andrea H. Tapia and Lynette Kvasny. 2004. Recruitment is Never Enough: Retention of Women and Minorities in the IT Workplace. In Proceedings of the 2004 SIGMIS Conference on Computer Personnel Research: Careers, Culture, and Ethics in a Networked Environment (SIGMIS CPR '04), 84-- 91. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1145/982372.982392Google ScholarDigital Library
- T. L. Taylor. 2012. Raising the Stakes: E-Sports and the Professionalization of Computer Gaming. MIT Press.Google Scholar
- Helen Thornham. 2008. "It's A Boy Thing": Gaming, gender, and geeks. Fem. Media Stud. 8, 2 (June 2008), 127--142. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1080/14680770801980505Google ScholarCross Ref
- Cherie Todd. 2015. Commentary: GamerGate and resistance to the diversification of gaming culture. Womens Stud. J. 29, 1 (2015), 64.Google Scholar
- Melissa Tyler and Laurie Cohen. 2010. Spaces that matter: Gender performativity and organizational space. Organ. Stud. 31, 2 (2010), 175--198.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Maja Van der Velden and Christina Mörtberg. 2012. Between need and desire: Exploring strategies for gendering design. Sci. Technol. Hum. Values 37, 6 (2012), 663--683.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Roli Varma. 2007. Women in computing: The role of geek culture. Sci. Cult. 16, 4 (2007), 359--376.Google Scholar
- Lotte Vermeulen, Mariek Vanden Abeele, and Sofie Van Bauwel. 2016. A gendered identity debate in digital game culture. Press Start 3, 1 (2016), 1--16.Google Scholar
- Liisa A. Von Hellens, Sue H. Nielsen, and Eileen M. Trauth. 2001. Breaking and Entering the Male Domain. Women in the IT Industry. In Proceedings of the 2001 ACM SIGCPR Conference on Computer Personnel Research, 116--120.Google Scholar
- Mihaela Vorvoreanu, Lingyi Zhang, Yun-Han Huang, Claudia Hilderbrand, Zoe Steine-Hanson, and Margaret Burnett. 2019. From Gender Biases to Gender-Inclusive Design: An Empirical Investigation. In Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems - CHI '19, 1--14. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1145/ 3290605.3300283Google ScholarDigital Library
- Candace West and Don H Zimmerman. 1987. Doing gender. Gend. Soc. 1, 2 (1987), 125--151.Google ScholarCross Ref
- Johanna Weststar and Marie-Josée Legault. 2018. Women's Experiences on the Path to a Career in Game Development. In Feminism in Play, Kishonna L. Gray, Gerald Voorhees and Emma Vossen (eds.). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, 105--123. DOI:https:// doi.org/10.1007/978--3--319--90539--6?Google ScholarCross Ref
- Volker Wulf, Kaoru Misaki, Meryem Atam, David Randall, and Markus Rohde. 2013. On the Ground in Sidi Bouzid: Investigating Social Media Use During the Tunisian Revolution. In Proceedings of the 2013 conference on Computer supported cooperative work, 1409--1418.Google ScholarDigital Library
Index Terms
- Hacking Masculine Cultures - Career Ambitions of Female Young Professionals in a Video Game Company
Recommendations
Feminist Living Labs as Research Infrastructures for HCI: The Case of a Video Game Company
CHI '20: Proceedings of the 2020 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing SystemsThe number of women in IT is still low and companies struggle to integrate female professionals. The aim of our research is to provide methodological support for understanding and sharing experiences of gendered practices in the IT industry and ...
Sexism in online video games: The role of conformity to masculine norms and social dominance orientation
Sexism toward women in online video game environments has become a pervasive and divisive issue in the gaming community. In this study, we sought to determine what personality traits, demographic variables, and levels of game play predicted sexist ...
Fragile Masculinity: Men, Gender, and Online Harassment
CHI '20: Proceedings of the 2020 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing SystemsHarassment is a persistent problem in contemporary online environments, with women disproportionately experiencing its most severe forms. While critical scholars posit that online gender harassment may be linked to men's anxieties about fulfilling ...
Comments