Beyond the Boolean: How Programmers Ask About, Use, and Discuss Gender

TL;DR

This study explores how software developers approach requesting gender information, revealing limited consideration of inclusivity and necessity, with implications for improving gender inclusivity in software design.

Contribution

The paper provides the first qualitative analysis of developers' attitudes and practices regarding gender disclosure in software, based on interviews and social media analysis.

Findings

Developers rarely consider the necessity of gender data.

Inclusive gender options are infrequently understood or implemented.

Most developers do not critically evaluate how they request gender information.

Abstract

Categorization via gender is omnipresent throughout society, and thus also computing; gender identity is often requested of users before they use software or web services. Despite this fact, no research has explored how software developers approach requesting gender disclosure from users. To understand how developers think about gender in software, we present an interview study with 15 software developers recruited from the freelancing platform Upwork as well as Twitter. We also collected and categorized 917 threads that contained keywords relevant to gender from programming-related sub-forums on the social media service Reddit. 16 posts that discussed approaches to gender disclosure were further analyzed. We found that while some developers have an understanding of inclusive gender options, programmers rarely consider when gender data is necessary or the way in which they request gender disclosure from users. Our findings have implications for programmers, software engineering educators, and the broader community concerned with inclusivity.