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class project @ Cornell University  |  Jan - May 2022

Forum Website: Online Forum for Promoting Ethical Design Practice 


Description


Designers can report unethical design cases, which will then be approved and anonymised by the board members that run the forum. From this system, end-users can view anonymised cases with explanations. After understanding the issue, users can voice their opinion on the case by voting and/or participating in the forum discussion. Journalists can eventually publicise the issue and help bring more awareness to the unethical design cases. The public attention from publicizing can pressure the company to change unethical behaviors to keep its public image.

Team


3 Product Designers

My Role


Product designer

Tools


Figma
Miro
user interviews
literature analysis
affinity diagram
storyboard
low-fi prototype
mid-fi prototype
usability testing
 

Background

Are digital products really user-friendly as they claim?


In the digital age we live in, we are constantly surrounded by digital products, giving partial, if not full, control of our online behaviour to user experiene designers. Unfortunately, not all user experience design is made in favour of users.

Example: Infinite Scrolling


Infinite scrolling leads to mindless content consumption by constantly stimulating the brain with new information, which can cause addiction and emotional issues. These mental harms violate ACM’s ethical Code 1.1, which emphasizes contributing to society and human well-being, recognizing that all people are stakeholders in computing.

Ethical User Interfaces: Exploring the Effects of Dark Patterns on Facebook (https://dl.acm.org/doi/fullHtml/10.1145/3411763.3451659 )
DARK PATTERNS IN THE MEDIA: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW (https://www.ceeol.com/search/article-detail?id=840080)

What harms have been caused by unethical designs?


In addition to the infinite scrolling case we introduced earlier, many cases are showing how bad design can harm people. We read the book ‘Ruined by Design’ to understand the issue in-depth and were introduced to many cases. These cases motivated us to remedy the situation. We share cases that we find noteworthy in this report.

Problem Statement:



Why do designers and companies often avoid addressing unethical design practices?

Making ethical design choices is..complex


The core reason of unethical UX design has to do with the nature of companies. Companies’ primary concern has to do with making profit. It is difficult to prioritise ethical concerns when it is at the cost of creating less profit, as that puts UX designers at the risk of losing their jobs.

David VS Goliath

Fight against tech giants alone? There are people who did!

Even with the risk of losing their jobs, there have been some cases of whistleblowers who reported unethical behaviors within the company[1]. As a result of whistle-blowing, they lost their jobs and suffered until they find another community. However, thanks to their sacrifices, the Silenced No More Act was established to give rights to tech industry workers to reveal unethical issues, regardless of NDA.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/oct/08/tech-whistleblowers-facebook-frances-haugen-amazon-google-pinterest

Silenced No More Act, is it enough?

People can talk freely regardless of NDA now. However, what about passive aggression?

Starting in 2022, it will make it easier for workers to speak out about racism and other forms of harassment, including unethical acts or design and abuse in the workplace, even if they sign non-disclosure agreements. However, it doesn’t mean it can protect whistleblowers from passive aggression at work. There can be Indirect hatred, harassment, and attack.

Research and Analysis

Academic Papers, Books, and Websites

Our literature review examines the pros and cons of current state-of-the-art approaches at a conceptual level, supported by over 10 references to previous works. It highlights the gap between academic discussions on ethical design and the practical challenges UX designers face in corporate environments, where profits often take precedence over ethics. Although online groups exist for UX discussions, there is no dedicated organization to effectively address unethical design cases. Current forums are disorganized, lack anonymity, and fail to focus adequately on unethical practices. To address these issues, we propose creating an anonymous forum where designers can report unethical designs, with a board to clarify and address these concerns for broader understanding and action.

Semi-Structured Interview

To further understand what challenges UX designers in the industry face when they try to design ethically, we conducted a series of semi-structured interviews. Through this interview, we aim to find opportunities for supporting ethical design practice.
Participant Recruitment


The interview was constructed with various people working in the tech industry that filled out the survey that was posted on various designer communities working in tech companies (Reddit and Facebook groups). The survey consisted of three parts: an in-depth identification of the individual, his or her thought on ethical design, and an optional interview sign-up.
Online Interview via Zoom

After participants signed up, we conducted Zoom interviews. We presented examples of unethical design and asked for their thoughts, followed by questions about their own experiences with unethical design in their companies and how they handled them. Finally, we inquired about the support they would need to choose ethical design in their workplace.

Analysing the Findings

Affinity Diagram

From our interviews, we created an affinity diagram that revealed three main components valued by industry professionals for voicing opinions on unethical design.

Persona

From the interviews and affinity diagram, we identified the challenges and needs of UX designers and developed a persona for our solution.

Converting Challenges into Opportunities

From the interviews, we identified three key challenges to address: fear of exposure, feeling powerless, and the need for external support.

Design and Implementation

A solution that can address 3 design objectives:

Online forum where designers can anonymously report unethical designs made in the company.

We developed a system for anonymous reporting of unethical designs, where users view and vote on anonymized cases. Journalists can then publicize these issues to raise awareness and pressure companies to improve.

Who are the users of our system?

Storyboard

The storyboard outlines how our solution could help prevent the implementation of unethical design by giving voice to designers within large tech companies with strict hierarchical structure

Low-Fi Prototype

Interface that follows 3 design objectives: Anonymity, user input via discussion, and public shame

Evaluation of the Low-Fi Prototype

We proceeded to evaluate the prototype with 5 UX designers, classmates, and a professor.

We categorized feedback into four groups: moral standard, internal process, UX designer related, and motivation. Then, we developed solutions for specific questions under each category.

Design Language

The overall design of the website aims to encapsulate the theme of transparency portraying the transparency with its users the UX designers wish to achieve with ethical design practice.


The Final Solution:

This is the finalised layout of our website, with its key functions highlighted and explained.
The mid-fidelity prototype can be found here.

Evaluation, Discussion, and Conclusions

Evaluation

To evaluate our design, we conducted evaluation interviews with our primary users: UX designers,  end-users, and journalists. We also retrieved external validity from Juwon Kim, a UX researcher with 5 years of UX design experience.

Limitations and Discussion

We reflected on our current design and concluded with the following three major limitations that should be fixed going forward: 


Incomplete Prototype

A fully working prototype would have provided insights into user flow and helped assess the website's structure and submission process.


Limited Feedback

More interviews with the existing prototype could have identified additional improvement opportunities.



Not Tested with Actual Case

Testing with a real unethical design case would have offered a complete view of the process from anonymization to publication and provided genuine reactions from end-users and designers.

How can we improve the prototype in the future?

After evaluation, we came up with four changes that could be made to our current design to enhance the usability of the website.
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