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Designing for the Arab World
DIS2017 WORKSHOP PROCEEDINGS
ArabHCI.ORG
WORKSHOP TITLE Designing for the Arab World http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/3064857.3064860
WORKSHOP ORGANIZERS Ebtisam Alabdulqader, Newcastle University, UK [email protected] Norah Abokhodair, University of Washington, USA [email protected] Shaimaa Lazem, SRTA-city, Egypt [email protected]
Proceedings of the DIS 2017 Workshop on Designing for the Arab World, June 11, 2017, Edinburgh, UK.
© 2017 Copyright is held by the contributing owner/author(s).
POSITION PAPERS
05 Designing for Diversity: Development of a Digital Platform Aiding Refugees Anne Weibert, Konstantin Aal, Duy Vu, Volker Wulf
11 Challenges and Opportunities in Designing Interactive Systems in the Arab Region Aisha Ahmed AlArfaj
16 HCI research in the Iraqi context Haneen Qarabash
21 Human Computer Interaction in the Arab World: Challenges and Opportunities Areej Mawasi, Sulafa Zidani
24 Western Design, Arab Adoption: Social Media Platforms and Arab Cultural Contexts; The Case of Saudi Women’s Online Practices Ghayda Aljuwaiser
30 Arabs Are Not Refugees Nor Terrorists Sara Nabil, Ali El-Bastawissy, Peter Wright
34 Marital Matchmaking Technologies In Saudi Arabia Adel Al-Dawood
39 Designing for Resilience with Unaccompanied Migrant Youth from the Arab World Franziska Tachtler
41 From Europe to Egypt: Designing, Implementing and Evaluating Interactive Systems in-the-Wild Eslam Nofal, Sandy Claes, Andrew Vande Moere
46 Social Media for Change in the Arab World Rina R. Wehbe
51 Accessibility in the Arab World for People with Disability: Issues and Insights Mohammad Othman
Designing for Diversity: Development of a Digital Platform Aiding Refugees
Abstract This work focuses on the ongoing design process of a digital platform bridging among the information, orientation and communication needs of refugees, migrants and local volunteers and professionals supporting their resettlement process. The design process follows a participatory action research approach. Including the refugee, volunteer and profess-sional users into the design process, it spans a broad variety of user backgrounds from European and Arab contexts. Structural specificities of this grounded design of a low-threshold solution are detailed and discussed.
Author Keywords Interactive; Design; Diversity; Migrants; Participatory Action Research; Refugees; ArabHCI.
ACM Classification Keywords H.5.2. User Interfaces: User-centered Design.
Introduction Forced migration movements continue to be among the grand challenges affecting countries around the world. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) there are around 14 million refugees [15] currently seeking shelter from war, conflict and oppression. The biggest driving force for migration continues to be the conflict in Syria; among the other
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Anne Weibert University of Siegen Siegen, Germany [email protected] Konstantin Aal University of Siegen Siegen, Germany [email protected]
Duy Vu appcom Interactive GmbH Düsseldorf, Germany [email protected] Volker Wulf University of Siegen Siegen, Germany [email protected]
reasons are the continuing violence in Iraq and Afghanistan, oppression and abuse in Eritrea, and great poverty in Kosovo [3].
The reception and accommodation of large numbers of refugees has imposed grand social, structural, logistical and financial tasks on countries and therein cities. Here, professionals as well as numerous volunteers are aiding refugees in the clearance of their legal status, taking care of housing, food, medical care, enabling the learning of the new language, creating points of contact with local citizens, in the long run aiming to establish a stable social basis within the new community [14].
The contribution of this work is the presentation of a digital platform bridging among the information and communication needs of refugees, migrants and the local volunteers and professionals supporting their resettlement process. It reports on the ongoing design process of this platform that is developed and built following a participatory action research approach [10,13,16] and spanning a broad variety of users backgrounds from European and Arab contexts including the refugee, volunteer and professional users into the design process. Thus it allows for the grounded design [17] of a low-threshold solution.
Related Works HCI research has explored technology use among settled or settling refugees [1,2,16,19], and it has taken up on refugee needs with a number of ICT-solutions. Each of these is tending to a specific aspect of the information and communication challenges involved in the process of forced migration and then resettlement. Among them are local orientation [2],
health [9], communication [8] and community building [16,19].
Designing for Diversity: Methodological Challenges The design work with a group of users that not only brings along a broad range of backgrounds with regard to education, culture, social practices, language and ICT skills [5] but is also fragile in its legal and societal position and status, bears a number of methodological implications.
The platform design aims to foster participation in the sense of digital empowerment – a process that in the long run is enhancing citizen participation in the community [11]. Our work is predicated on principles of participatory action research [10,13,17], thus taking digital empowerment to the grounded [18] development and design stage of the platform.
A regular, long-term engagement of the researchers, two of who are also the authors of this paper, in refugee cafés and computer clubs [16] enables trust building with refugees and volunteers alike (Figures 1&2). These places have been established as points of contact, where newly acquired language skills can be practiced, questions about aspects of everyday life can be asked, problems talked about and computer skills be acquired and applied, e.g. when searching for housing online or writing a job application. It is in these places that topics, questions and challenges determining the resettlement process are gathered in participant observation and thereafter documented in the form of field notes by the researchers, who participate as tutors in the voluntary work. Informal, semi-structured interviews with refugees, volunteers and professionals
Figure 1: Learning about technology in the computer club.
Figure 2: Engaging in Making activities at the Refugee Café.
supplement and further specify these observations. With the help of interpreters of Arabic and Farsi it is ensured that all questions and the overall purpose of the project are fully understood at all times.
For concept generation and early prototype iteration [7], personas are generated [6,7,12] based on qualitative data from an end user survey.
Designing for Diversity: Experiences Four overarching topics have determined the early design stages of this project. They are described below.
Common Language The development of the platform brings together a broad variety of languages – not only with regard to national languages but also in terms of technical language (“Platform, Website… before we started this project, for me that was all the same”, one volunteer describes how his technological understanding had widened and language had become more differentiated.). Early steps in the design process were concerned with ensuring a common understanding of technological steps taken as well as social and cultural issues involved. This was the case, e.g. when volunteers were developing a first understanding of the platform and of possible interactive features, such as a wizard (see Figure 3) aiding with finding a language course, or an interactive city map. This also showed when refugees were describing their visions for platform features aiding with the resettlement, as well as reservations, e.g. when it came to login procedures.
Issues of (ICT) Literacy How should information be conveyed? And for whom is this relevant? These two questions became central very quickly, as researchers, designers, refugees and
volunteers came to realize that they all bring along a variety of literacy and ICT skill levels. As a consequence, information that initially might have been conveyed as plain text for volunteers would be processed in a more visual style (see Figure 3) in order to be accessible for refugee users of the platform, who may not yet have acquired advanced skills of the new language or be familiar with reading a different writing. Furthermore, the delightful design creates a better user experience for both target groups, refugees and volunteers.
Figure 3: A search function for local information on language courses is designed in a visual way to be accessible for refugees from a variety of backgrounds.
Issues of Access, Power and Control It quickly turned out that for each of the different user groups there is a different set of regulations, restrictions and structures, which – sometimes visible, sometimes as underlying issues – affect involvement in the design process and as a result ultimately the opportunity for platform access. This became apparent,
The Platform To ease the resettlement process for refugees is the overall aim of the platform. This might be addressed from two perspectives: upon entry to the site, platform users could make a language choice and be asked whether they “are new” or “want to help”. This basic distinction may then determine the display character of all content that is subsequently accessed by the user, but this can also overlap. Topics mainly directed towards the refugees are concerned with everyday life, local orientation, access to education, housing, legal issues and an overview on numerous help institutions. Topics mainly directed towards volunteers describe requirements and potential difficulties of voluntary work with refugees, provide an overview on administrative and legal issues, and importantly directions to respective professional help institutions and an access to all useful information, to help the refugee efficiently.
e.g. in discussions among refugees about privacy issues online, and about how much personal information is appropriate to reveal online. While social media is named to be an important connection to family and friends left behind in the respective countries of origin, it is simultaneously described to be a powerful technological means where caution has to be exercised as one never knows, who has access to the content – “even if I lock it [the account], I can never be sure it’s private”, as one refugee has put it, describing how he thought that taking sides politically in the digital sphere might endanger lives of family or friends left behind.
Aspects of power and control were an issue when interactive elements like the city map were discussed and volunteers and professionals voiced their concern about potential misuse of the platform (“How can we control the content that users create and contribute?”). As a result, standardized visual input options as well as social mechanisms like cross-checking content before it is published are explored to secure quality standards.
Networking and Best Practices As the platform initiative does not set out to re-invent the wheel, a good deal of energy was first invested in local networking with projects and initiatives that provided or were currently working on aspects of possible relevance for the platform. An example is language learning, where city officials as well as social workers from different initiatives were already striving to find solutions to enable a structured overview on available courses and access regulations. “Currently it’s a mess and even professionals don’t have an overview about all the regulations”, one volunteer describes. Access to courses is depending on legal status and country of origin of the refugee – and on a spot
available in a class, as these quickly fill up and frequently keep long waiting lists.
With a decrease in numbers of newly arriving refugees in early 2017, city municipalities set out to close more and more of the accommodation facilities that had been hastily established about two years ago when numbers of newly arriving refugees had peaked. This development had a significant impact on the platform development process, as volunteers were pushing for new ways to (re-)connect with the refugees, who are now living in individual apartments and are thus much less easy to reach out to. From the perspective of the refugees, this new situation with more and more individual, singled out accommodation increased the difficulties to reach out for help, information and guidance. Here, the platform is apt to be a digital place to turn to for initial orientation.
Conclusion and Future Works As our design process involves a broad variety of user backgrounds from European and Arab contexts, it has become apparent early, how social and developmental design steps need to be closely aligned and linked. Our long-term participatory action research approach is not only capable of laying the grounds for a stable basis of trust that is needed when working with a group of participants as fragile in its legal and societal position and status as are the refugees. By fostering involvement in the design process in a sense that Mäkinen [11] has described to be digital empowerment, a process is triggered that in the long run may be capable of enhancing citizen participation in the community. Future works will further develop and refine the platform and its features, as well as focus on its aiding function for the resettlement process of refugees.
Acknowledgements Our thank goes to the refugees, volunteers and professionals who have shared with us their perspectives and experiences, thus shaping the platform design in centrally meaningful ways. Funding for this work is provided by EFRE (FKZ EFRE-0800485).
References 1. Aylett, R., Kriegel, M., Lim, M. Y., Dias, J.,
Leichtenstern, K., Ho, W. C., & Rizzo, P. (2009). ORIENT: interactive agents for stage-based role-play. In Proc. of the 8th International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems-Volume 2 (pp. 1371-1372). Int. Foundation for Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems.
2. Baranoff, J., Gonzales, R. I., Liu, J., Yang, H., & Zheng, J. (2015). Lantern: Empowering Refugees Through Community-Generated Guidance Using Near Field Communication. In Proc. of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference Ext. Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 7-12). ACM.
3. BBC News (2016). Migrant crisis: Migration to Europe explained in seven charts. BBC News. Online: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34131911 (accessed 23.3.17)
4. Collin, S., & Karsenti, Th. (2012). ICT and Migration: A Conceptual Framework of ICT Use by Migrants. World Conference on Educational Multimedia, Hypermedia and Telecommunications, 1492-1497.
5. Collin, S., Karsenti, Th., & Calonne, O. (2015). Migrants’ Use of Technologies. An Overview of Research Objects in the Field. In Journal of Technologies and Human Usability. Vol. 10, Issue 3-4, (pp.15-18). Common Ground Publishing.
6. Grudin, J., & Pruitt, J. (2002). Personas, participatory design and product development: An infrastructure for engagement. In Proc. of the Participatory Design Conference (pp. 144-152).
7. Hanington, B., & Martin, B. (2012). Universal methods of design: 100 ways to research complex problems, develop innovative ideas, and design effective solutions. Rockport Publishers.
8. Holmes, P., & Janson, A. (2008). Migrants' communication practices with ICTs: tools for facilitating migration and adaptation?. International journal of technology, knowledge & society., 4(6), 51-62.
9. Howard, E., & Owens, C. W. (2002). Using the internet to communicate with immigrant/refugee communities about health. In Proceedings of the 2nd ACM/IEEE-CS joint conference on Digital libraries (pp. 397-397). ACM.
10. Kemmis, S., McTaggart, R. (1988). The action research planner. Deakin University Press.
11. Mäkinen, M. (2006). Digital empowerment as a process for enhancing citizens' participation. E-learning and Digital Media, 3(3), 381-395.
12. Miaskiewicz, T., & Kozar, K. A. (2011). Personas and user-centered design: How can personas benefit product design processes?. Design Studies, 32(5), 417-430.
13. Tacchi, J. A., Slater, D., & Hearn, G. N. (2003). Ethnographic action research: A user’s handbook., UNESCO.
14. The Guardian (2015). Germany’s response to the refugee crisis is admirable. But I fear it cannot last. The Guardian. http://goo.gl/lLuBPB.
15. UNHCR (2016). UNHCR Global Appeal 2016-2017 Update - Populations of concern to UNHCR. Online: http://www.unhcr.org/publications/fundraising/564da0e3b/unhcr-global-appeal-2016-2017-populations-concern-unhcr.html (accessed 23.3.17)
16. Weibert, A., Wulf, V. (2010). All of a sudden we had this dialogue...: intercultural computer clubs' contribution to sustainable integration. In Proc. of
the 3rd int. conference on Intercultural collaboration (pp. 93-102). ACM.
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19. Xu, Y., Maitland, C., & Tomaszewski, B. (2015). Promoting participatory community building in refu-gee camps with mapping technology. In Proc. of 7th Int. Conf. on Information and Communication Technologies and Development, (p. 67). ACM.
Challenges and Opportunities in Designing Interactive Systems in the Arab Region
Abstract In recent years, the Arab region has witnessed a huge development in the adoption of technology. The use of the internet has been widespread, especially through mobile phones, which give access to websites and a variety of applications anywhere and anytime. Most of these applications have been designed in Western countries. They can be used for different contexts such as social media, education and e-commerce. This can lead to several challenges because of the differences in cultures and languages. Therefore, it is essential to understand the users’ culture and language when designing or enhancing interactive systems and to know how to localise them. In addition, the importance of involving users before designing a system should be considered more in the Arab region. This statement will
explore briefly the design challenges in the Arabic context, focusing on the culture and language, the researcher’s experience, and the HCI research and education in the Arab region. It will conclude with some recommendations and suggestions for future research.
Author Keywords Social media; design; m-commerce; culture; language; Arab; mobile applications.
ACM Classification Keywords H.5.m. Information interfaces and presentation (e.g., HCI); Miscellaneous.
Introduction Challenges with culture and language Usually, interactive systems for the Arab region are designed and developed by Western countries or translated directly. However, they should be localised to some extent. Designers and developers should consider the cultural aspect of the region before designing and developing a system. They should involve the users and study their culture using different cultural models such as Hofstede, Hall or Trompenaars. In addition, developers should have general knowledge about the users’ preferences and cultural factors in the
Copyright is held by the author/owner(s). DIS '17, June 10–14 2012, Edinburgh, UK ACM
Aisha Ahmed AlArfaj Newcastle University Newcastle, UK [email protected]
design, for example icons, colours, symbols and language [4].
As mentioned before, we should consider the cultural dimensions before designing interactive systems. By taking Saudi Arabia as an example in Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, we can see that it scores 95 in power distance. This means that there is a hierarchical order [5]. We can think about some design implications of this dimension, such as having different hierarchical levels where different people complete a task. In addition, Saudi Arabia scores 25 in individualism, which means that it is a collectivist society where people belong to a group [5]. They relate and take care of each other [5]. From this, we should think when designing that people like to share within their group or inner circle of family and friends. A study in 2012 showed these dimensions and suggested rules for how to adapt a website to fit them [10]. For example, live chat and a social responsibility policy should be considered for a collectivism dimension. Another study discussed the influence of Hofstede’s culture dimensions on the information architecture [8].
Some studies show that there are many differences in preferences between the West and Saudi Arabia. For example, in Western countries a high text-to-image ratio is recommended, but Saudi Arabians prefer a high image-to-text ratio [4].
Several studies discuss the direction and positions of the elements because the Arabic language is written from right-to-left but the numbers are left-to-right; the layout should therefore follow the same direction [3,6,9,11].
Furthermore, designers and developers should cover even the small details in their culture customisation, such as unit measurements, the Hijri calendar, the 12-hour clock system, structure, graphics and colours [2,3,6,7].
The religious and traditional aspects are important [7]. For example, if a system uses inappropriate pictures that are against the country’s religion or traditions then people may avoid using it again.
If the system already exists in Western countries, it should not be translated directly. The culture and the users’ needs should be considered. Therefore, it is important to think of having high-quality translation with culture customisation and content localisation [6, 9]. Some studies demonstrate that one of the challenges that may face designers and developers is focusing on language-specific features such as key search words [11].
The focus on culture should not be limited to colours, layout and language; it should consider how people will accept the idea of the system and how they will trust it. Therefore, the focus should be on users, and their needs and desires. An in-depth investigation should be carried out before designing a system.
Experience and interest (m-commerce, social media and sharing economy) I have worked and trained in different places, and had various learning experiences in different environments. While studying for my undergraduate degree, I trained in three places. First, I trained for two months in the Banque Saudi Faransi where I gained knowledge about working in a bank. I was introduced to the tasks that
employees should complete and I was shown their system. After that, I trained in the Security Forces Hospital. I produced some tutorials and explanations to show doctors how to use the new system that had been installed in the hospital. I also worked at King Fahad Medical City for seven months, as part of my graduation project, and then an additional three months as a volunteer to complete projects I had started with them. I worked as a project manager and programmer, giving me additional experience and knowledge.
From my experience, I found that users are almost never involved in any stage of a system design. However, in some cases they may be involved in the testing stage. This gap between the designers/developers and users leads to an unsuitable system. However, if the users are involved and their opinions investigated during or before the designing stage, then the system can be more effective and productive.
In addition, as part of my PhD, I am looking at some Arabic applications and websites that are related to e-commerce, m-commerce, and the sharing economy. I found that some of them have been translated directly into Arabic without considering the culture differences or the users’ needs. There are many great ideas that convert to applications but unfortunately they are not used. This is because the designers and developers did not consider the users’ needs and they did not involve them in the designing stage.
There are some applications that have a successful design but are still not popular. As I mentioned before, if the culture is considered and, for example, if the
applications enable users to share links within that app or provide a way of inviting their friends and family to join, possibly gaining a discount or credits, others will come to know the application and its popularity will increase.
In Saudi Arabia, people use social media applications to sell or buy products, mostly through peer-to-peer interactions. They may trust this method because they are mostly in contact with their friends and family, and they can share their experiences of buying a product. In addition, they can share product information by mentioning each other under the product’s image, for example in Instagram. In addition, you can find many comments under product images in Instagram. However, it is rare to find reviews for products on a website. These facts are all related to culture, and if investigated deeply, a conclusion with design implications can be drawn. Moreover, buyers have direct contact with the seller and this can give them more confidence and trust. If buyers have a question about a product or need more information, they can contact the sellers directly and mostly they will have a direct response. However, using a website and sending an e-mail to ask about product details may take a day, which users will not prefer.
In addition, usability in some of these Arabic applications is not considered. Users find it difficult to use the application or difficult to do a task, and for this reason they avoid using the system again.
HCI research and education There is a gap in research in the Arabic context. The existing papers are mostly published in unknown or low-ranked journals. In addition, researchers need to
be more organised and work together. There are some frameworks or models for designing in Arabic language but they are not validated and they need to be studied further. Unfortunately, new researchers even produce new frameworks and do not validate or study the existing one. In addition, it is rare to find research that provides recommendations for systems or algorithms for searches in Arabic.
The HCI subject is taught in most Arabic universities for computer sciences students. However, it is taught in English using books and materials from Western countries. This may lead to not improving Arabic websites or not knowing how to design for the Arab region. Also, students mostly receive lectures for the theoretical part but these do not cover the practical part. Even if they cover the practical part, they mostly use materials from Western countries.
Recommendations and future research The existing literature should be organised and collected in a library. In this case, researchers will not duplicate other people’s work and designers can check if. Moreover, previous studies that focus on designing for different cultures should be reviewed to gain knowledge about these differences and how they may relate to our culture.
As mentioned, the users’ involvement is important before designing a system to determine their needs and preferences. It is also important to involve them during the design phase by showing them a prototype design and testing it. Also, a usability test should be conducted.
Guidelines and standards for designing interactive systems should be developed and generated. This has also been suggested by previous studies [1].
In addition, researchers could cooperate and work together to collect and develop materials that may help to enhance the current systems and to develop well- designed systems. Conducting workshops to talk about HCI research and education in the Arab region is essential, as is publishing the information that was shared in these workshops. Researchers should also consider studying recommendation for systems and algorithms related to searching, and creating or altering the existing ones so that they are useful in Arabic searches.
HCI students should be taught with examples from real life, or using current websites and applications so that they can improve or criticise them. It is important to have HCI materials that suit the Arab region. Students should understand the importance of involving users at different stages. Also, the importance of usability guidelines and testing should be presented to students.
References 1. Al-Sa'di, A., Parry, D. and Carter, P., 2014.
Usability considerations for educational tablet applications using an Arabic interface. In Information and Communication Systems (ICICS), 2014 5th International Conference on (pp. 1-6). IEEE.
2. Alexander, R., Thompson, N. and Murray, D., 2016. Towards cultural translation of websites: a large-scale study of Australian, Chinese, and Saudi Arabian design preferences. Behaviour & Information Technology, pp.1-13.
3. Alhumoud, S., Alabdulkarim, L., Almobarak, N. and Al-Wabil, A., 2015. Socio-cultural aspects in the design of multilingual banking interfaces in the arab region. In International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (pp. 269-280). Springer International Publishing.
4. Almakky, H., Sahandi, R. and Taylor, J., 2015. The Effect of Culture on User Interface Design of Social Media-A Case Study on Preferences of Saudi Arabians on the Arabic User Interface of Facebook. World Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology International Journal of Social, Behavioral, Educational, Economic, Business and Industrial Engineering, 9(1), pp.107-111.
5. Geert Hofstede. What about Saudi Arabia?. Retrieved April 5, 2017 https://geert-hofstede.com/saudi-arabia.html
6. Ibrahim, A. and Busalim, A., 2013. Framework for localization of B2C e-commerce websites in Saudi Arabia. In Research and Innovation in Information Systems (ICRIIS), International Conference on (pp. 582-857). IEEE.
7. Khan, H.U. and Alhusseini, A., 2015, July. Optimized web design in the Saudi culture. In Science and Information Conference (SAI), 2015 (pp. 906-915). IEEE.
8. MacDonald, C.M., 2015. Culture and information architecture: A study of American and Arab academic websites. Proceedings of the Association for Information Science and Technology, 52(1), pp.1-4.
9. Muhanna, M. and Jaser, E., 2014. HCI-Based Guidelines for Electronic and Mobile Learning for Arabic Speaking Users: Do They Effectively Exist?. In International Conference on Universal Access in Human-Computer Interaction (pp. 378-387). Springer International Publishing
10. Pasi, S.J.A. and Liginlal, D., 2012. CULTURAL ADAPTATION AND ARAB E-COMMERCE: AN EXPLORATORY STUDY. e-society, p.249.
11. Zawati, S.N. and Muhanna, M.A., 2014. Arabic mobile applications: Challenges of interaction design and development. In Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing Conference (IWCMC), 2014 International (pp. 134-139). IEEE
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HCI research in the Iraqi context
Abstract Research on Human Computer Interaction requires an understanding of the context, environment, and culture of the population of interest. This understanding can only be achieved by working within that context and being close to it. In this position paper, I will try to give an insider look at the use of technology and research on human computer interaction in Iraq, which is a context that is similar to many Arab countries but at the same have some unique aspects and circumstances that shaped it differently. This paper contains the authors account and opinion that may differ from other Iraqi researcher but can offer a personal experience of someone who lived all their life in Iraq.
Introduction Human computer Interaction has been gaining a lot of interest due to technology infiltrating our lives and becoming an integral part in our daily routines. Technology now can be in the house, the street, in our
pockets and even on our clothes. So, it is inevitable that a lot of research will be done on this technology and how people interact with it. However, that research has been mostly focused on people in the west (mainly Europe and the USA)[1], which is understandable due to the researcher communities being mainly based there or the funding coming from there. Although lately researcher have been branching out and expanding their research to other countries and cultures. There is great interest in looking at how technology can help disadvantaged communities in places like India and Africa. In addition, the latest refugee crisis had pushed the researchers to look for technological solutions that can help the refugees and the people working with them. That branching in interest opens new opportunities for HCI research in different cultures and places and allows researchers from these cultures to connect and work together. But, to do that, the context of this research and the environment must be understood and communicated clearly so that these will not be wasted efforts on either side.
The Arab context is an interesting case to look at when thinking about HCI research around the world. There is sometimes this assumption that all Arab countries are similar, and that what would work in one place would be applicable in another if they are both Arab countries. That assumption is simply inaccurate. There is huge diversity in the Arab world, and while we do have a common language and many customs in common, we
Haneen Qarabash
Open Lab- School of Computing
Science
Newcastle University
2
also have many differences. Iraq, I believe, is a unique case due to the events of the last three decades which make it a very different context from other Arab and non-Arabic countries. Not many countries have gone through three devastating wars, a decade of severe sanctions, and another following it with constant political, economic, and security instability. In this position paper, I will try and to shed some light on the Iraqi context that any researcher interested in working within should understand. This paper may be also useful to people considering doing research in places that had similar experience of multiple wars and unrest.
The Iraqi Context To understand the Iraqi context, it is important to know about the political and economic situation in Iraq in past few decades. Iraq has gone through many changes that were drastic enough to alter how people lived and interacted, so it is essential to know what and how these changes came to be. However, there is understandably a lack of research in these areas, and while the political situation has been discussed and a lot was written about it, the effects it had on the use of technology in the country are not researched and very little of it was documented. Thus, this positon paper will hold my account of the events and changes and how I experienced it as an Iraqi citizen who lived through it all.
The 70’s and 80’s
Iraq had a huge push for development everywhere in the country in the late 70’s and early 80’s. There was interest in education, infrastructure, and technology, which put the country on bar with many western countries in life style and access to services. That
however did not last long due to the eight years’ war that put most of the countries resources into the battle field. The war ended in 1988, but its effects on the economy and the people where there and the recovery in these cases takes a long time. Unfortunately, Iraq did not have that time as it was involved in another war only two years later.
The 90’s and early 2000’s
The war in 1990, was very damaging to the economy, infrastructure and of course the people. Iraq lost the war and harsh sanctions were placed on the country by the United Nations Security Council. The sanctions prevented Iraq from trading with any country and where kept in place until 2003. Twelve years of being totally excluded from the world while recovering from two terrible wars was very hard for the Iraqi people who suffered from shortage of food, medicine and other necessities. So, while the world was experiencing the huge technology boom that came with the World Wide Web, wireless communications and mobile phones. Time in Iraq stood still. There was no internet, no mobile phones, no personal computer, etc. While children in the west were learning programming in schools, children in Iraq did not know what a computer is and only had TV to show what technology the world has.
A change did happen in the late 90’s and early 2000’s, when the Oil for food program was in effect. The government started offering limited access to the Internet that were unfortunately not available to everyone, and required the person to have a computer which was rare in Iraqi households in that period due to the difficult financial situation of many families.
3
Although it is important to note that even though equipment was not always available, the study of computing Science in the country was still very strong. Many universities offered computing courses and learning how to use a computer was mandatory in almost all STEM fields. In addition, there was a plan by the government to offer wireless connectivity but they did not come into action before 2003.
So, until 2003, most Iraqi people did not have any access to a computer, the internet, mobile phones or any kind of technology that was available in other places. People were isolated from the world technology and unaware of much of the development happening elsewhere.
2003 till now
The third war we went through and the end of the government was the catalyst that brought enormous changes to the Iraqi people and society. The market was suddenly open after twelve years of sanctions and it was flooded with basically everything. Suddenly, the people had access to computers and phones, satellites dishes and the internet. The technological situation went from nothing to everything within few years. That
turned Iraq into a consumer market. Iraq has no ability to produce any of these technologies and not much consumer awareness of their use. Iraqi people have missed the gradual learning curve others who were exposed to it throughout the years had. Within ten year every house acquired a satellite dish to access hundreds of TV channels. Everyone now has a smart phone and Internet has become a must, even though most only use it for social media.
I admit though that there is a bit of exaggeration in my last paragraph as the society has faced big economical changes. Those changes pushed many under the poverty line and these people are still unable to afford any technology. But the explosion of technology use in Iraq after 2003 is very real.
While there is no research or statistics on the use of internet, smart phones or any other technologies in Iraq that I could find. The report from the Central Statistical Organization in Iraq on the number of active sim cards offers a good indication on how quickly the technology has been adopted into the Iraqi people’s lives, especially when you remember that there were almost no wireless communications before 2003 and everyone used the land lines for calls.
4
The report indicates that in 2006 there were about 9 million active numbers. In 2014 that number increased to 35 million. The report estimated the population of Iraq to be about 36 million. It basically means that people were using more than one phone number at a time and that leads us to conclude that they owned more than one mobile phone. This is very possible as the market was over saturated with all kinds of mobile phones at very affordable prices. In addition, the phone companies were giving incentives and free offers to attract customers in this market that was untapped before. Looking at the report again we notice that the number decrees in 2015 to about 33 million, which may be due to people starting to settle for one network over the other. Although more data is needed to make any conclusion. See figure (2)
HCI research in Iraq Now that we have an idea of what the situation in Iraq looks like, (although it is a very vague one), we can start discussing the state of HCI research in Iraq.
Generally, research in Iraqi Universities is not well funded, if funded at all. The students usually pay for any expenses that their research requires and the same happen with faculty members. This has led people working in computing science to limit the scope of their research and work mostly with the technology available in the university itself, and that is most likely only a computer. So, it is understandable that students will focus more on algorithms, optimization, and security in their research rather than going out and doing user design, or collecting empirical data. The lack of funding also discouraged any type of longitudinal studies since any researcher will try and minimize the costs.
Looking through the journals published in Iraq, I found only seven that publish papers on computing science related topics, and two of them were also about math and engineering as well [3]. Those journals while indexed online and offer abstracts, provide no option of obtaining the papers themselves without buying a physical copy of the journal. Since that option is not
05
10152025303540
2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
Active simcards
Figure 1: estimated number of active sim cards (in millions)
5
available to me, I had to rely on the abstracts to find out what kind of research is usually published. From my search, it appears that papers in those journals are very focused on technical and theoretical work and I did not find a single paper that would fit into the definition of HCI. That does not mean that this kind of research does not exist, but if it did exist it is not easily found.
In addition, from my own experience as a teacher at Baghdad University, I noticed that teaching in the computer science department is very focused on programming and learning how to use and fix computers. Lately there has been attempts at teaching mobile app development but it was also focused on the actual development and programming part with little about the user experience. I did find out while researching for this paper that the Iraqi University for technology is teaching an HCI course. However, after contacting the teacher and obtaining their syllabus I found that they were using the same syllabus from a US university without changing it to fit the actual context of the students. Although I cannot say whether this would work or not since it is the first time they are giving that module and the semester has not ended yet. Talking to the students and the teacher after and seeing what they learned would be very interesting.
From all the above, we can see that HCI is not well recognized in Iraq, and while there might be Iraqi researchers who are working in the field, their contribution is not easily accessible or publicized.
There is however an increase in the adoption of technology in everyday life, especially on social media. We can see online shops advertising their goods and services. As well as efforts from the government to
offer electronic services as a part of a large project for electronic government. These new trends make it necessary for researcher to step up to the challenge and start making real effort to study and understand the use of technologies in the Iraqi context and compare it to other countries. This will help advice and guide the effort s to integrate technology into the Iraqi society.
References
1. Henrich, J., Heine, S., & Norenzayan, A. (2010). The weirdest people in the world? Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 33(2-3), 61-83. doi:10.1017/S0140525X0999152X
2. Reports from the Central Statistical Organization in Iraq. Accessed on (9/4/2017), from http://www.cosit.gov.iq/en/trans-comm-statistics-2
3. Iraqi list of academic journals, Accessed on (9/4/2017), from http://www.iasj.net/iasj?func=subject&cpId=21&uiLanguage=en.
Human Computer Interaction in the Arab World: Challenges and Opportunities
Areej Mawasi Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College
Arizona State University Tempe, AZ, USA [email protected]
Sulafa Zidani Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism
The University of Southern California Los Angeles, CA, USA
ABSTRACT
HCI interdisciplinary nature is one of the major challenges that traditional education systems have. In the Arab World, we identify related challenges, as will as, opportunities that may help in introducing HCI concepts and principles to researchers in Academia and Industry in the Arab World. Creating an ecosystem in which private sector, philanthropy and public sector, may contribute to research in Academia generally, and HCI related projects specifically. We emphasize here the role of academic researchers as individuals in building bridges with the Arab World through identifying the potential in the region.
Author Keywords Arab World, HCI, Education, Interdisciplinary studies, User Experience.
ACM Classification Keywords Design, HCI, Human Factors, Theory, Education
INTRODUCTION
The Arab World is constantly developing in the field of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI). This development, however, faces a unique set of challenges in the contexts of the Arab World which are different from those challenges it faces in the West. HCI is an interdisciplinary which stands at the intersection between behavioral sciences, computer sciences, and design. The educational system in the Arab World, however, is not interdisciplinary in its nature. This has meant that, so far, many examples of user experience (UX) research and research related to design practices in HCI contexts are found away from academia, for example in non-governmental organizations (NGOs), Fabrication Labs, and digital media civil society activism. In this position paper, we would like to bring up the roots of the major challenges to the field of HCI in the Arab World, and propose some practical solutions that can be taken in the future as steps to bring the field of HCI closer to academia, and ultimately, closer to the local communities across the Arab World. The paper will begin with an introduction to the authors and their connection to the topic. This is followed by an elaboration on the roots of five major challenges we see
when it comes to the field of HCI in the Arab World and proposed solutions, ending with some concluding remarks.
About Authors
Areej Mawasi: I am a graduate student at Arizona State University studying Educational Technology and Instructional Design. I am also a research assistant at Center for Science and the Imagination. My research focuses on interaction design and HCI in learning environments. I earned my bachelor's degree at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Business Administration and Humanities Studies. During my studies, I worked as academic coordinator for Arab students at the College of Engineering Jerusalem. My academic experience in Learning Sciences and professional background in design and social media management in the US and the MENA region have taught me that interdisciplinary studies are critical for the development of projects that seek to solve real-world problems. I have experience as a digital literacy instructor with several organizations, including the Activate Program of Transparency International, in which participants were trained to design technological solutions that fight corruption. Sulafa Zidani: I am a PhD student at the University of Southern California's Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism. My research focuses on new media, participatory culture, and digital language and power dynamics, with special interest in China and the Arab World. I speak English, Arabic, Hebrew, Mandarin, and French. Prior to joining the Annenberg, I worked as a language teacher, research assistant, and translator in Palestine, Israel, China, and the US. I earned my BA and MA from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Asia Studies and Communication and Journalism. My MA thesis investigated the complex relationship between political power and new media by focusing on the use of counter-power expressions born in the online discourse on the Chinese microblogging website Weibo. She has also studied Arabic forms of digital creativity through a collaborative analysis of "Gangnam Style" remakes as identity practice. At the moment, I am working on a few projects, including one on algorithm based recommendation and social identity, a project about data dynamics between governments and corporations, as
well as a book chapter dealing with Arabic online humor and politics. My past experience teaching different languages and working in translation as well as my academic experience in the field of cultural communication have led me to be interested in HCI in the Arab World. I believe HCI can have a significant positive influence in the field of education in the Arab World and see it as having potential to empower people of different ages.
From Aims of Educations to HCI According to the framework of 21st century skills and competencies that was introduced by the OECD, learners of education systems need to develop skills and competencies in the following dimensions: (1) Information (2) Communication (3) Ethics and Social Impact. The goal of this three-dimensional framework is to prepare learners to play a role in their societies, contributing economically and socially as local citizens, as well as in the world as global citizens. They are expected to be innovative, problem-solvers, and active citizens. The focus on these dimensions has changed the aims of education [1]. Pedagogy also has developed as both teachers and learners are exposed more to digital literacy development tools [1]. The aims of education transformation are significantly influenced by different elements globally, such as: economics and entrepreneurship, globalization, migration and change in workforce needs. These aims of education give us an introduction of the importance of interdisciplinary approaches in education systems, in order to fulfill the social, economic and industrial needs of the 21st century. In addition, the emphasis on the cooperation between the public sector and civil society, the private sector, philanthropy, and international affairs is key to achieve these goals.
The field of HCI has emerged as a result of interdisciplinary research work of different fields—industrial and academic—including: engineering, computer science, design, psychology, learning sciences, and others [2]. The intersection between these fields makes it possible to understand the relationship between technology, human behavior, and usability of technology products. It also helps in planning, designing, studying and evaluating technological tools that serve people's well-being in different life practices (sport, health, leisure, education). This interdisciplinary is a result of the needs of the industry on one hand, and the needs of researchers from all these fields to collaborate for the sake of developing research-based products that are relevant to daily life uses and solve real-world problems [3].
Reflections on HCI Challenges in Arab World In the specific context of the Arab World, HCI faces a unique set of challenges. While some of these challenges
are common to other educational systems, others are tied to specific conditions in the Arab World.
First of all, the education system in the Arab World is more traditional by nature. Educational institutions like colleges and universities tend not to collaborate, majors and specializations tend to be segregated. The public and private sectors are also separated in their work from academia, and do not collaborate with academia often. This leads to a limitation in interdisciplinary, which is crucial for a field like HCI.
The lack of interdisciplinary studies and collaboration brings about a challenge for engineers and computer scientists who do not have a background in conducting qualitative studies or ethnographic studies. Such studies can contribute immensely to developing effective HCI technologies, and the lack of such research methods leads to a limitation in the ability to conduct design-based research, to make evaluations, and involve users in the design process (what is known as Participatory Design).
Furthermore, there is a lack of collaboration between the corporate sector and academia. For example, there are very few examples of philanthropy and tech companies which support eco-development of projects in Academia. The collaboration between such corporations and academia is vital for the discovery of new ways to advance science, design, and learning. A relationship of this kind can be mutually beneficial; with more educated design and engineering, businesses will be able to develop models or products which bring them more profit, all the while developing science, knowledge, and advancing education. Adding to that, interdisciplinary and collaborative approaches bring new set of tools and build a foundation for innovation, which we believe have technical and strategic benefits for both business and academia.
There are also challenges related to the linguistics of the Arab World. Arabic language is divided into literary and colloquial, with major differences in colloquial dialects across the Arab World. This multitude of languages has affected the quality of digital content. In order to improve digital content, there need to be developed algorithms that are able to recognize and differentiate between dialects.
The tradition of the literary dialect as the main dialect has also stood in the way of developing content which is more user-friendly. This is a fact that must be acknowledged and accepted for the sake of improving digital content that is suitable for Arabic speaking users from different regions with different colloquial dialects.
New Approaches HCI has great potential in the Arab World. The field can overcome the challenges it faces by advocating for interdisciplinary in higher education. This change begins with individuals like us, sharing ideas with academics in the
Arab World. Individuals are capable of making a significant change through education and through fostering relationships across borders—not only of countries, but also of academic fields and occupations. The tech industry and academia must also collaborate in research projects. While the academic field of communication, for example, looks down upon user experience research (UX), this type of research can contribute greatly to deepening the understanding HCI. We propose 3 ecosystem related solutions to make collaborations possible: (a) Involving IT and UX experts from the industry in the process of development and research design. (b) Building connections with philanthropic organizations. (c) Taking civil society and public sector into account in the connecting of design-based research and participatory design (For example: Citizen Science, Sensr Project [4], Designing for Syrian Refugees [5], Health Applications for Refugees [6], Digital Storytelling Workshops [7], Design and Participations Patterns in Makerspaces and FabLabs [8]). Furthermore, in order to understand the challenges as well as the opportunities of HCI in the Arab World, there needs to be a database of existing works and scholars dealing with this area of research. This can be done through a crowdsourcing project which will contribute to community building among the community of researchers.
Lastly, while the linguistic issues discussed above pose a challenge to the current state of HCI in the Arab World, they actually have great potential for building strong systems of artificial intelligence and machine learning. Such systems can eventually be part of designs that are suitable for an increasingly larger audience.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
This position paper is a condensed overview of the state of HCI in the Arab World as we see it today. These challenges should not be seen as a hindrance to the development in the field, but rather as departure points for opportunities for creativity, interdisciplinary collaboration, and a contribution to science and education. The political instability in a number of Arab countries should also not be seen as a hindrance. Thanks to existing technologies, collaboration is now possible across borders, and this presents a change for developing much needed "educated designs" that support the development of science and education equally across the globe. We believe that is possible, especially with well documented digital citizenship in the Arab World, and increasing involvement between researchers and civil society organizations.
REFERENCES [1] Ananiadou, K., & Claro, M. (2009). 21st century skills and competences for new millennium learners in OECD countries. [2] Sears, A., & Jacko, J. A. (Eds.). (2009). Human-computer interaction: design issues, solutions, and applications. CRC Press. [3] Zimmerman, J. (2003). Position paper on design in HCI
education. Human-Computer Interaction Institute, 244. [4] Kim, S., Mankoff, J., & Paulos, E. (2013, February).
Sensr: evaluating a flexible framework for authoring mobile data-collection tools for citizen science. In Proceedings of the 2013 conference on Computer supported cooperative work (pp. 1453-1462). ACM.
[5] Abir Kopti and Xiao Mina. 2017. How Do You Say…? Notes and First Impressions of Translation Challenges in a Refugee Camp in Serbia. (February 2017). https://medium.com/@meedan/how-do-you-say-notes-and-first-impressions-of-translation-challenges-in-a-refugee-camp-in-serbia-ac042e64c9b3 [6] Talhouk, R., Ahmed, S. I., Wulf, V., Crivellaro, C.,
Vlachokyriakos, V., & Olivier, P. (2016, May). Refugees and HCI SIG: The Role of HCI in Responding to the Refugee Crisis. In Proceedings of the 2016 CHI Conference Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems (pp. 1073-1076). ACM.
[7] Sawhney, N. (2009, June). Voices beyond walls: the
role of digital storytelling for empowering marginalized youth in refugee camps. In Proceedings of the 8th International Conference on Interaction Design and Children (pp. 302-305). ACM.
[8] Bar-El, D., & Zuckerman, O. (2016, February).
Maketec: A Makerspace as a Third Place for Children. In Proceedings of the TEI'16: Tenth International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction (pp. 380-385). ACM.
1
Western Design, Arab Adoption: Social Media Platforms and Arab Cultural Contexts; The Case of Saudi Women’s Online Practices
Abstract
This short paper discusses my experience as a Saudi
female researcher studying Saudi women's online
practices on social media platforms (SMP), besides
being an international student doing her PhD in a
western context1 (UK). I begin by summarizing my
ongoing research aim, objectives and methodology. I
then highlight some initial findings of my study and the
challenges I face when I illustrate — to a western
audience — how Saudi women adopt and appropriate
their online practices on SMP considering their cultural
contexts e.g. Saudi traditions, norms and values. I
summaries by arguing that understanding Arab online
practices by generalizing overall the Arab region is
inaccurate, as Arabs cultural contexts differ across
countries. Furthermore, from my own research
experience, users’ online practices in the same country,
namely Saudi Arabia, cannot be generalized either.
Hence, I conclude by stressing the need for HCI to
focus more on cross-cultural differences in technology
adoption.
Author Keywords
Technology adoption; Technology appropriation; social
media platforms; online practices; Arab culture, cross-
cultural studies.
1 E.g. U.S, U.K and European countries
Ghayda Aljuwaiser
Sheffield Hallam University
Sheffield S1 1WB, UK
ac.uk
2
1. Research Summary:
1.1 Aim and Objectives:
Saudi women who use social media between the
are the focus of this thesis, which aims to
discover Saudi women’s online practices2 in and
across different social media platforms (e.g.,
Twitter, Facebook and Instagram), and to explore
the relationship between these practices and
Saudi women’s identities both online and offline.
The objectives of this study can be delineated as:
(1) discover Saudi women’s online practices
across different SMP, (2) explore the relationship
between these practices and Saudi women’s
identities.
1.2 Methodology:
A qualitative multi-method approach is adopted,
including online observation in the form of
Netnography (Kozinets, 2010) and semi-
structured interviews (King & Horrocks, 2010). A
pilot study was conducted between March -
September 2015, to test the data collection
techniques. The second phase of data collection
was conducted between February - April 2017. In
total, twelve Saudi women from different cities in
Saudi Arabia (Jeddah, Riyadh and Dammam) are
recruited, using purposive and snowball sampling.
2. Initial findings:
Preliminary results of my data analysis indicate
that the relationship between Saudi women’s
online practices and their offline identities is a
2 Mundane activities on social media platforms
non-linear one, online practices impact offline
identities and vice versa; offline identities can be
represented online as a part of their online
identities. Moreover, Saudi women do develop
different online identities across different
platforms, as their online practices vary across
SMP by appropriating platforms’ features and
affordances. However, the similarities between
online and offline need further investigation.
3. Cross-cultural adoption:
Through my research experience of more than
two years as a doctoral researcher doing a
research on a non-western context, I here
highlight indicative examples, of cross-cultural
technology adoption differences. Which may
suffer from lack of comprehension of the western
perspective, especially regarding the impact of
technologies e.g. SMP which is a non-linear-
relationship; cause and effect one. Yet, a
continuous identity negotiation process.
3.1. Audience awareness/Context-collapse:
Though Audience-Contexts collapse has been a
focus of several studies (Marwick & Boyd, 2011;
Sibona, 2014; Vitak, Lampe, Gray, & Ellison,
2012), the case of Saudi users in general and
Saudi women is distinctive. For instance, if the
audiences’ segregation is among academic-non-
academic or family-friends in western contexts,
the case of the Saudi culture is more complicated.
Saudi women are aware of online audiences
where their online practices adhere to social
censorship; how their practices may be judged
culturally as taboos, such as: veiling, expressing
controversial opinions e.g. Political, religious
3
ones. This evolves from the societal pressure,
either from their nuclear family or extended
family e.g. family heritage, family last name.
3.2. Scalable privacy; scalable sociality:
One of the few studies that have scoped how
cross-cultural adoption of SMP differ is Miller et al
(2015) which coined the term ‘scalable sociality’.
‘employed to differentiate platforms as more
private or more public sites for socialising’ and
‘that each of these platforms corresponds to a
position of greater or lesser privacy and smaller
or larger groups’ (Miller et al, 2015, pp. xvii- 5).
Similarly, the case of my initial findings has
scoped how Saudi women consume social media
platforms as a scalable sociality where Twitter, for
example, is considered public, Facebook semi-
public and Instagram private. These different
platforms are understood in this research as
different online spaces where Saudi women’s
online identities and representations differ
significantly. To my best knowledge, no other
attempts – excluding Miller et al (2015) project -
have examined comparatively how non-western
users adopt SMP3.
3.2.1. How SMP interfaces are adopted
differently across-cultures:
Another vital angle in SMP adoption by Saudi
women — in the case of my research — is how
these platforms’ interfaces allow them to switch
their online representations and practices. Such
as how they use Facebook features: don’t search
3 In the case of Miller et al (2015) they have studies 9 countries:
Brazil, Chile, China, England, India, Italy, Trinidad and Turkey.
for me, close this post to friends only or certain
friends, also disallow others to tag them in
pictures etc. to segregate their audiences
because of the fear that their appearance would
be an appropriate to their friends or families (Al-
Saggaf, 2015). All of which are interfaces’
features that Saudi women appropriate across
different SMP in following their cultural norms,
traditions and values.
3.2.1. How SMP interfaces are adopted
differently across-cultures:
Another vital angle in SMP adoption by Saudi
women — in the case of my research — is how
these platforms’ interfaces allow them to switch
their online representations and practices. Such
as how they use Facebook features: don’t search
for me, close this post to friends only or certain
friends, also disallow others to tag them in
pictures etc. to segregate their audiences
because of the fear that their appearance would
be an appropriate to their friends or families (Al-
Saggaf, 2015). All of which are interfaces’
features that Saudi women appropriate across
different SMP in following their cultural norms,
traditions and values.
3.3. Veiling and opposite gender
communication is only the surface:
I observed, through presenting and
communicating my research in Europe, that
western perspective considers Saudi women’s
practice of unveiling online as an evidence of
freedom. Moreover, as one of the most ‘attractive’
impacts of the internet and SMP on the Saudi
culture. I acknowledge that I myself, as a young-
4
naive researcher, was fascinated at first about
Saudi women detaching from such restrictions.
Hence, the more I immerse myself in the data
analysis, I realise how the relationship between
the online/offline spheres more profound than
veiling. How many of existing cultural norms,
traditions and values have changed, in terms of
religious beliefs and fundamentals. Such
transformations are the critical impacts, where
the academic sociological approach is the most
sophisticated to illustrate and explain (I will tackle
this later in the summary section).
3.4. How activism is understood differently
across communities; women activism as an
example:
At this point, and considering what has been
discussed previously, the interest of western
academia in activism - I here speak about the
Saudi context in general and Saudi women in
particular –lacks the awareness of what does
activism mean for Saudi women? How it evolves,
understood and practiced. The fact that Saudi
women themselves hold confronted opinions
toward activism. The scheme of applying the UK
feminist movement, for example, on Saudi
women’s ‘online activism’, overlooks Arabs,
Muslims and Gulf countries sociological and
cultural backgrounds.
3.5. Naivety in understanding Arabs’ online
practices as one entity:
The final point I want to discuss in this short
paper, is how all of which cultural differences are
also the case of other Arab countries’ as well.
Despite the commonalities between Arab
countries’ societies, for example, Egypt, Tunisia,
Bahrain and even the UAE, hence, their cultural
contexts vary. Therefore, understanding how Arab
adopt technology needs to recognize that even
Arab countries cultures are different, in fact, even
within such countries there are sub-cultures.
4. Summary:
I here summarise by stressing that HCI needs
further investigation into Arabs’ technology
adoption, considering their cultural contexts.
Whilst, a number of HCI and CSCW scholars have
tackled technology adoption by MENA4 users (see
Al-Ani, Mark and Chung, 2012; Mark, Al-Ani, and
Semaan, 2015; Wulf et al., 2013; Al Omoush,
Yaseen, and Atwah Alma’Aitah, 2012). And GCC5
also (Abokhodair, Abbar, Vieweg, & Mejova, 2016;
Abokhodair, Hodges, & Vieweg, 2017; Abokhodair
& Vieweg, 2016; Vieweg & Hodges, 2016).
Hence, the sociological perspective, such as
Digital Sociology Lupton, D. (2014) is
underrepresented. Adopting such perspective,
could construct theoretical frameworks on
different regions’ culture’s appropriation. Taking
into consideration the emerging WWW3
technologies, there is a gap to be filled by
examining the vice versa relationship, between
the social aspects and the techno features.
4. Summary:
I here summarise by stressing that HCI needs
further investigation into Arabs technology
adoption considering their cultural contexts. The
4 Middle East and North Africa 5 Gulf Cooperation Council
5
sociological perspective, such as Digital Sociology
Lupton, D. (2014), should construct theoretical
frameworks on different regions’ culture’s
appropriation. Taking into consideration the
emerging WWW3 technologies, there is a gap to
be filled by avoiding generalisation and look
indepth into differentiates rather than similarities.
Moreover, examining the vice versa relationship
between the social aspects and the techno
features.
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ACM.
Arabs Are Not Refugees Nor Terrorists
Sara NabilOpen Lab, Newcastle UniversityNewcastle Upon Tyne, [email protected]
Ali El-BastawissyFaculty of Computer ScienceMSA UniversityGiza, [email protected]
Peter WrightOpen Lab, Newcastle UniversityNewcastle Upon Tyne, [email protected]
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AbstractA number of recent misconceptions around Arabs and theunrest in some Arab regions are behind the clear and evi-dent lack of research and collaboration in the area of ArabHCI research. This leaves the HCI community focusingsolely on refugee-related research in a way that not onlyunder-represents but misrepresents Arabs in many differentways. In this paper, we tackle a few of the challenges thatstand in the way of proper collaboration and representationof over a 366 Million Arab people located in the heart of ourworld. We also present some of the potentials and opportu-nities that lie beneath the surface of such engagement andcollaboration in different HCI topics.
Author KeywordsHCI Research; Interaction Design; Arab; Digital Civics;Community Building; Digital Health and Education.
ACM Classification KeywordsH.5.m [Information interfaces and presentation (e.g., HCI)]:Miscellaneous
IntroductionIn the recent years, the word ‘Arab’ has unfortunately be-come often a synonym to either problem: ‘terrorism’ and‘refugee crisis’. Although in the research community mostdo not adopt this mindset, we have to admit it is imposing a
clear impact on HCI Arab-related studies (if any) in the an-nual global venues and among our community in general.This may not be specific to the HCI research field, but it isa significant missed opportunity for HCI research in partic-ular. Although the crisis of Syrians (and Palestinians beforethem) has been occupying the media headlines for the pastfew years, it does not represent the major challenges andopportunities for HCI research in the ‘Arab World’.
Country Population
Egypt 94,666,993Algeria 40,263,711Iraq 38,146,025Sudan 36,729,501Morroco 34,242,806Saudi Arabia 28,160,273Yemen 27,392,779Syria 17,185,170Tunisia 11,134,588Somalia 10,817,354Jordan 8,185,384Libya 6,541,948Lebanon 6,237,738UAE 5,927,482Palestine 4,451,014Oman 3,355,262Kuwait 2,832,776Qatar 2,258,283Bahrain 1,378,904Mauritius 1,348,242Djibouti 846,687Comoros 794,678
Table 1: Statistics of all 22 Arabcountries showing 2016 estimatespopulation per country. Sourcecia.gov[3]
Who are the Arabs?First, we need to identify who do we exactly mean by ‘Arabs’.Unlike a common misconception, Arabs are not an ethnicgroup, nor they all have a common religion, colour, race,heritage or traditions. Although the majority of Arabs aremiddle-eastern Muslims, what is truly common among themis the ‘Arabic’ language, being the official used and spo-ken language (with various dialects) in all the region fromthe Atlantic ocean of north-west Africa to the Arab gulf inwestern Asia. Table 1 shows the list of Arab countries withpopulation and latest GDP.
With the total Arab population over 366 Million and the Syr-ian refugees estimated around 11 Million [2], we shouldnever perceive Arabs only as refugees or simply frame ourresearch agendas with fellow Arabs in this single (yet im-portant) matter. Scrolling Google search for "Arab", we findthat almost all the top search results are about refugees!however when we re-run the search excluding it using theexpression "Arabs -Refugees", we start to realise the othernormal aspects Arabs have (like any other people) in termsof results related to Politics, Arts, Culture and Social Events.
Arabs in HCI ResearchIn HCI research, It is actually quite difficult to find HCI pub-lications that are tackling any Arab-related topic other thanrefugees which seems to be getting a growing attention in
our community [7, 9, 5]. On the other hand, the number ofpapers affiliated to Arab universities that are accepted inHCI international conferences and journals are around 1%of the total number of contributions [scopus.com]. However,there are good attempts to change this through engage-ment opportunities such as the upcoming CHI’17 SIG meet-ing for "HCI Across the Arab World" and the DIS’17 work-shop on "Designing for the Arab World" [1]. Such events notonly helps to promote HCI research in the Arab countriesbut to facilitate collaboration among HCI researchers andpractitioners in the Arab community with well-establishedHCI research labs worldwide.
Arab-HCI OpportunitiesDigital CivicsAs they are mostly developing countries, the Arab statesare in a position where various opportunities lie within evolv-ing their systems using technology in areas of politics, civicservices and public engagements. Crowd-sourcing alsoforms a great opportunity either through social media ordifferent developed applications and mobile Apps. For ex-ample, Bey2ollak App [6] has been released since 2010 toexchange information and updates about ‘traffic’ in over-crowded Cairo is still used with great success, utilizing thepower of crowd-sourcing over 1 Million subscriber/citizen.The role and impact of social media in the Arab spring isalso both significant and still continuing to date as the un-rest often fluctuates in certain areas. Moreover, ‘charity’ isconsidered a major part of the Arab community often play-ing the major role in handling different financial and socialrequirements of people with special needs lacking any gov-ernmental funds. Although charity takes a religious sensethroughout the Arab region (being an essential duty and pil-lar of Islam), the use of technology in supporting this areahas not been investigated thoroughly yet.
Education and HealthEducation for both school children and university studentsis suffering from deep problems which need research intohow technology can support young people catch-up withthe evolving world around. This population form about halfof the total Arab citizens (e.g. 52.5% of Egyptians are underthe age of 25 [3]). Literacy is also an opportunity in sev-eral Arab countries where illiteracy is still a significant prob-lem, even among those who currently own and use mobilephones!
With a rapidly growing population that 1) lacks access toproper health-care, 2) suffers shortage in care and supportof special needs and 3) suffers relatively-high fatality ratesamong infants and ‘senior citizens’ in many areas, health-related research creates a wide design space for enhancingtheir conditions, researching the causes and supportinginteractive solutions through technology-based applications.Finally, in addition to medical issues, other health-relatedareas such as nutrition, fitness and weight-control are alsoburning issues within such communities.
History, Art & CultureWith the rich history of the region, being the land of the old-est civilizations in the world, we can imagine how Arabshave accumulated all the heritage of 5,000 years of culture,history and social traditions. For instance, 20 papers tack-led Japanese and Chinese traditions in HCI venues, butnone for Arabs [4]. This may be caused by their lack of in-terest to represent and study these topics, but also may bethey are not being accepted for publication.
Social coherence and family bonds in the Arab World areknown to be among the strongest when compared to otherparts of the world. This creates a great opportunity to studycommunity-related topics such as families, social engage-ments, events and traditional ceremonies.
ChallengesAlthough there are massive potentials and numerous clearopportunities for research and collaboration with the Arabs,there are still a number of challenges and barriers for find-ing common grounds.
GeopoliticsSince the independence of the current 22 Arab states inthe 1950s, 60s and 70s from colonial powers back then(Great Britain, France, etc), Arabs have been trying to sur-vive numerous post-occupation problems that are critical,complicated and crucial to their development. Although nat-ural disasters (e.g. volcanoes, earthquakes, tsunamis, etc)are not common in the region, most of these countries havesuffered from civil wars, border conflicts or uprisings/ revo-lutions. With the exception of the gulf states, all these andother major geopolitical issues have left the region in tur-moil even before the latest formation of terrorist group(s).
IslamophobiaThe idea of involving Arabs as our colleagues, co-authorsand participants usually brings some fears in the form of‘Islamophobia’. Although there are 1.7 billion Muslim in theworld, out of which only 20% are Arabs, some still (even un-intentionally) relate Islam with Arabs with terrorism. Thereis no need to mention that terrorists raising a certain flagdo not necessarily represent or belong to it in any way, asevident by the 99.9999% of non-terrorists (in all religions).Still, we need to clarify that both terms are not synonym inthe first place; that is, not every Arab is a Muslim and notevery Muslim is an Arab. For example, Egypt (being thelargest Arab country by population) has 10% Christian na-tionals which amounts to nearly 10 Million people (2016 es-timate) [3] [cia.gov]. So not only islamophobia is a false fearon the grounds of logic, but also on the basis of numbers.
Research Agendas and FundingEstablishing connections and research agendas with Arabresearchers is made more challenging by issues of: i) anexhausted economy, ii) lack of research funding, iii) otheradministrative and managerial problems including corrup-tion at some countries, and iv) unfocused research agendasat others. Although different research funds in EU are at-tracting outstanding candidates from all around the world,still, there is a specific focus on targeting and financiallysupporting ‘refugees’. For example, the Volkswagen Foun-dation has recently been offering grants for additional fundsfor refugee scholars to integrate them into their different re-search projects [8]. Yet, thousands of young researchers(that are not refugees) in developing Arab countries areonly lacking the required funds to be able to achieve andcontribute greatly to our different research agendas.
Even with no lack of funding (as the case in Arab gulf states)another challenge exists around the Arab’s misconceptionabout HCI to be limited to UI and UX design. InteractionDesign is still focused on the technical aspects of web andmobile applications and their interface development withinundergraduate HCI education in most Arab universities. Un-like funding that is a major obstacle, this later challenge isa much manageable one that we can (as the HCI commu-nity) work together to bridge this gap and present the exten-sive potentials of this multi-disciplinary field using differentmeans of digital technology and research the applied chal-lenges in ubiquitous computing to serve all types of people.
REFERENCES1. 2016. Arab HCI. (2016). https://arabhci.org/
2. 2016. Syrian Refugees. (2016).http://syrianrefugees.eu/ (Retrieved21-April-2017).
3. 2017. CIA Factbook. (2017). https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/
4. 2017. Scopus - Analyze search results. (2017).https://www.scopus.com/term/analyzer.uri
5. Konstantin Aal, Marios Mouratidis, Anne Weibert, andVolker Wulf. 2016. Challenges of CI Initiatives in aPolitical Unstable Situation - Case Study of a ComputerClub in a Refugee Camp. In Group’16. Sanibel Island,FL, USA, 409–412. DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2957276.2996281
6. Bey2ollak. 2010. (2010).https://desktop.bey2ollak.com/
7. Reem Talhouk, Sandra Mesmar, Anja Thieme,Madeline Balaam, Patrick Olivier, Chaza Akik, and HalaGhattas. 2016. Syrian Refugees and Digital Health inLebanon: Opportunities for Improving Antenatal Health.Proceedings of the 2016 CHI Conference on HumanFactors in Computing Systems (2016), 331–342. DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2858036.2858331
8. VolkswagenStiftung. 2017. Additional Funding forRefugee Scholars and Scientists: VolkswagenStiftung.(2017). https://www.volkswagenstiftung.de/en/funding/for-grant-recipients/
additional-funding-and-training-opportunities/
additional-funding-refugee-scholarsscientists.
html (Retrieved 21-April-2017).
9. Ying Xu, Carleen Maitland, and Brian Tomaszewski.2015. Promoting Participatory Community Building inRefugee Camps with Mapping Technology.Proceedings of the 7th International Conference onInformation and Communication Technologies andDevelopment (ACM ICTD2015) (2015), 4. DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2737856.2737883
Marital Matchmaking Technologies In Saudi Arabia
Abstract Websites and applications that match and connect individuals for romantic purposes are commonly used in the Western world. However, there have not been many previous investigations focusing on cultural factors that affect the adoption of similar technologies in religiously conservative non-Western cultures. In my research, I aim to examine the socio-technical and cultural factors that influence the perceptions and use of matchmaking technologies in Saudi Arabia. This work serves as a foundation for future work exploring this understudied population and guides the design of culturally-sensitive technologies. In this position paper, I provide a summary of my current work and goals I aim to achieve with my future work. Followed by that is my early findings that shed some light on how the design of matchmaking technologies can be more inclusive. I conclude with my goals of attending this workshop.
Author Keywords Culture in Computing; Saudi Arabia; Islam; Muslims; Social Computing; Matchmaking; Social Media; Arab Studies.
ACM Classification Keywords H.5.m. Information interfaces and presentation (e.g., HCI): Miscellaneous
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Adel Al-Dawood
College of Science and Engineering
University of Minnesota
Minneapolis, MN 55414, USA
Introduction Even though there are many applications and websites geared to finding a romantic partner or spouse, most of them have not penetrated the Saudi population despite the fact that technology is heavily used [7,10]. In a religiously conservative cultural context like Saudi Arabia, it is obvious why services with a dating premise are not popular, but even those that are geared toward Muslims have not succeeded. This usually is caused by the following factors: gender segregation, family dynamics, and trust and privacy issues. In the following I explicate these factors.
Gender Segregation in Saudi Arabia Males and females who are not mahrams–unmarriageable kin (e.g., mothers, sisters, and aunts)–are not permitted to mix or be together alone [2] for non-professional purposes. Most public spaces are designed with gender segregation in mind [1,2]. This general rule influences what is considered appropriate and dictates the public and the private sphere. Occasionally, unrelated males and females can mix for professional purposes, such as, conducting a business or seeing a doctor of the opposite gender. However, even within these interactions certain norms are enacted and no physical contact takes place. As a result, gender-segregation is one of the primary societal aspects that influences the conduct of marriage, as males and females have limited opportunities to meet before they are officially engaged[3]. Dating, thus, is also forbidden.
Family Dynamics and Values Muslims are required to sustain a good relationship with their parents, siblings, and extended relatives. Obeying and being kind to one’s parents is an Islamic obligation. The importance of these values have generated a society that is highly collectivist in nature [4,8]. This makes it
important that spouses get along with their in-laws to preserve a good relationship between the families. These values are very prevalent in the region and dictate familial relationships. Therefore, the opinion of family members and relatives on who one marries is respected and considered.
Trust and Privacy with technology Traditional matchmaking, or arranged marriage, is considered the most common way for finding a life partner [5,6]. Males rely on the guidance of their female mahram to find and recommend suitable females for marriage. Females, on the other hand, are on the receiving side, as they await to be recommended or seen by other females who are looking for potential brides. On the other hand, finding a spouse through technology raises trust and privacy concerns. Parents usually complain that they “don’t know” the potential spouse and not sure if they can trust them. Potential spouses might hesitate to be honest as it may violate their privacy, especially for an intimate topic like marriage. Also, using technology to find a partner online is usually associated with unacceptable behavior in Saudi. This causes a complicated situation to introduce technology to the process.
Permissibility of Using Technology for Marriage The general guideline for using technology is that it is beneficial to Islam and to oneself. Otherwise, it is considered to be a waste of time and may lead to immorality [9]. The general guidelines for cyber dating, as mentioned by Wheeler [9], are that:
1) You have the intention to marry and communicate to know each other better;
2) It is done in a respectful and moral way; 3) Your parents are informed; 4) You do not delay marriage more than needed.
It is worth noting that the older generation who still controls the marriage process prefer traditional methods versus modern ones (i.e. using technology.) This is slowly changing with the recent trend of using social media to evaluate potential spouses in Saudi.
Research Statement I recently graduated with a Masters in Computer Science from the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities and plan to start my PhD the upcoming academic year. My work lies at the intersection of social computing, human-computer interaction, and value sensitive design. Within these fields, my current research project investigates using technology to find a spouse within the Saudi culture. Even though Saudi Arabia is ranked seventh in number of social media accounts per-capita in the world [10], it has the lowest number of users on Muslima.com within Muslim countries, which is one of the biggest Muslim matrimonial websites. In general, my research reflects my strong passion for designing and evaluating collaborative, social, and inclusive technologies. In my master thesis, I investigated Saudis perceptions about using technology to find a spouse to understand what challenges they face and what gap they expect technology to fill. Through 18 in-depth interviews with 9 men and 9 women between 18 and 50 from different marital backgrounds (i.e. single, married and divorced), I was intrigued at how participants were excited about using technology to find a spouse, but worried about appropriating it with culture norms and expectations. Some participants mentioned experiences of their own or of their friends’ finding a spouse through technology and succeeding. This means there is a lot of promise for technology to play a role in the marriage process. With the youth of today being the parents of tomorrow, it is more likely for them to accept the use of technology for
marriage. Even then, they would still to want to preserve their values. Finding a balance between utilizing technology and preserving Saudi values presents a unique challenge. I hope my work will advocate for culturally-inclusive design by applying qualitative, quantitative, visual and human-computer interaction methods that help in understanding the implications of emerging technologies used by people in different contexts.
Early findings After interviewing Saudis from different backgrounds, I realized how much this understudied topic is essential. I summarize my findings in the following points:
1) While Saudis would like to have more control on who they marry, they still do seek approval of their family. This is an ongoing struggle they go through and they hope technology can improve their chances of choosing their partner. The realize it would still be a struggle for their parents to approve of an untraditional method, but with time and experience they believe it is attainable;
2) Social media and current matchmaking websites seem to be a medium that participants found useful. Nevertheless, they believed they were not the most appropriate for finding a spouse. They hope for a technology that is sensitive to the Saudi culture that can enhance traditional methods and not necessarily replace them.
3) Privacy is an issue that Saudis worry about [1]. While they might find technology useful when finding a spouse, they wouldn’t want others to unnecessarily know about it. Also, some info
they relay to potential spouse might be something they don’t want anyone expect their spouse to know about. An example given by a participant is sexual lifestyle, which is rarely talked about as it is considered taboo;
4) Like privacy, trust plays a big role. Beside risks of being blackmailed or exploited, trust allows users to take the process seriously. As many can misuse technology, having a trust factor can make users and their families feel at ease. Having a third party like the government to monitor users and regulate them is a suggestion many participants bring up.
Conclusion To summarize, the use of technology to find a spouse in Saudi is promising. Although introducing technology to the process might face rejection initially, participants believe it would eventually be successful if designed properly. Culture and customs guide the design of technology, but technology can also help reform customs and culture. I hope my contextually grounded study–that explores how finding a life partner through technology is understood by Saudis–will help design an inclusive technology to find a spouse in Saudi. Lastly, I hope this enriches the literature of value sensitive design principles that will guide designers and policy makers going forward.
My goals of attending the workshop are as follows:
1) Through my experience, I seek to enrich the workshop conversation regarding cross-cultural matchmaking technologies research by providing the insights I gained from my study.
2) I will discuss my experience of ethical concerns I faced when conducting research on matchmaking in a conservative culture.
3) Lastly, I aim to gain insights from discussing my work with people with a similar background, which will help me approach my research better.
References 1. Norah Abokhodair and Sarah Vieweg. 2016. Privacy &
Social Media in the Context of the Arab Gulf. In Proceedings of the 2016 ACM Conference on Designing Interactive Systems, 672–683.
2. Hashem Abdullah Almakrami. 2015. Online Self- Disclosure Across Cultures: A Study of Facebook Use in Saudi Arabia and Australia. Queensland University of Technology.
3. Tamara Alsheikh, Jennifer A. Rode, and Siân E. Lindley. 2011. (Whose) value-sensitive design: a study of long-distance relationships in an Arabic cultural context. In Proceedings of the ACM 2011 conference on Computer supported cooperative work, 75–84. Retrieved April 28, 2016 from http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1958836
4. Tamara Alsheikh, Jennifer A. Rode, and Siân E. Lindley. 2011. (Whose) value-sensitive design: a study of long-distance relationships in an Arabic cultural context. In Proceedings of the ACM 2011 conference on Computer supported cooperative work, 75–84. Retrieved April 28, 2016 from http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1958836
5. Aya Batrawy. Saudi women’s changing attitudes toward marriage | The National. Retrieved September 19, 2016 from http://www.thenational.ae/world/middle-east/saudi-womens-changing-attitudes-toward-marriage
6. Just Landed. Marriage & Divorce. Just Landed. Retrieved September 19, 2016 from https://www.justlanded.com/english/Saudi-Arabia/Saudi-Arabia-Guide/Legal-System/Marriage-Divorce
7. B. B. C. News. #BBCtrending: Why Twitter is so big in Saudi Arabia. BBC News. Retrieved August 18, 2016 from http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-25864558
8. Norah Abokhodair, Sarah Vieweg, and Adam Hodges. 2017. Photo Sharing in the Arab Gulf: Expressing the Collective and Autonomous Selves. In Proceedings of the ACM 2017 conference on Computer supported cooperative work(CSCW’17), 696–711.
9. Deborah Wheeler. 2002. Islam, community, and the Internet: New possibilities in the digital age. Interface: The Journal of Education, Community and Values 2, 2. Retrieved April 19, 2016 from http://commons.pacificu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1010&context=inter02
10. 2015. Saudi social media users ranked 7th in world. Arab News. Retrieved May 3, 2017 from http://www.arabnews.com/saudi-arabia/news/835236
Designing for Resilience with Unaccompanied Migrant Youth from the Arab World
Abstract Unaccompanied boys and girls fleeing Syria are at particular risk of mental health issues. A recent research project focuses on how technologies can be used to deliver existing evidence-based strategies around resilience and positive coping strategies for this high-risk user group. In order to design for migrant youth’s context, they should be included in the design process. However, methodologies such as participatory design have evolved in Western societies and also the way to deal with mental health in the Middle East differs from the Western societies. Thus, the question is how the design methods can be modified that the developed results will support the Arab migrant youth and fit into their context.
Author Keywords Unaccompanied migrant youth; mental health; participatory design; Arab technology user.
ACM Classification Keywords D.2.10 Design: Methodologies;
Introduction TEAM (Technology Enabled Mental Health for Young People) is a 4-year Innovation Training Network (ITN),
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Franziska Tachtler Vienna University of Technology Vienna, Austria [email protected]
funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie actions initiative [2]. The aim of the TEAM research program is to develop new technologies that support assessment, prevention and treatment of mental health difficulties in young people.
As part of the TEAM project, my individual PhD project focuses on exploring potential frameworks and sets of design implications for technology developments to support resilience in high risk groups. The specific focus lies on how to implement evidence-based prevention strategies that fit into the unaccompanied migrant youth’s life worlds. Due to the current events, there are a high number of unaccompanied boys and girls from Syria in Vienna where the research will take place. When developing a design solution, it is important to gain an in-depth understanding of the user’s lived experience and needs. Thus, an ethnographic study of the unaccompanied migrant’s contexts and including the migrant youth from Syria in the design process will be essential.
In variety of projects, I have applied ethnographic and participatory design methods. I have used data collection methods from workshops to ‘Cultural Probes’ [1] to gain an understanding about participants’ lived experiences such as escaping and suffering from torture, and about personal emotions such as fear and loneliness. However, participatory design has evolved in Western societies [3]. Besides, it might be problematic that design products impart the societal value system of its creators [3].
In addition, the research project is about a sensitive issue namely mental health. It has shown that dealing
with mental health in the Middle East differ from the Western societies. One challenge is the stigma and ignorance of mental illness [4]. In addition, the model used to treat patient was developed by a primarily Anglo-Saxon population [4]. There is a positive impact of family in the Middle East society which functions as a social support and strengthens resilience [4]. Thus, the loss of family of unaccompanied migrant youth increases the risk of mental illness. Thus, it is important to design technology-enabled support for migrant youth from Syria that meets their needs. As part of the workshop Designing for the Arab World, I would like to participate in the discussion about challenges when using design methods in order to design for Arab technology users and how they should be modified. I would like to apply the results to my research project and afterwards share my findings with the community.
References 1. Bill Gaver, Tony Dunne, and Elena Pacenti. 1999.
Design: Cultural probes. interactions 6, 1 (January 1999), 21-29. DOI=http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/291224.291235
2. TEAM (Technology Enabled Mental Health). 2017. Retrieved May 5, 2017 from http://www.team-itn.ucd.ie/
3. Heike Winschiers. 2006. The challenges of Participatory Design in an Intercultural Context: Designing for Usability in Namibia. PDC Vol 02: 73-76.
4. Mohammed Yahia. 2012. Dealing with mental illness in the Middle East. Retrieved May 5, 2017 from http://www.natureasia.com/en/nmiddleeast/article/10.1038/nmiddleeast.2012.103.
From Europe to Egypt: Designing, Implementing and Evaluating Interactive Systems in-the-Wild
Abstract
Designing, implementing and evaluating interactive
design that is validated in a European context, may
deliver different results when being studied in an Arab
context, especially when evaluated in-the-wild. In this
position paper, we discuss our expectations of two
studies that were already conducted in a European
context, and will be repeated in an Egyptian context.
We reflect on the potential impact of the findings on the
design, evaluation methods and initial findings.
Author Keywords
Arab context; HCI; evaluation; in-the-wild; Egypt.
ACM Classification Keywords
H.5.m. Information interfaces and presentation (e.g.,
HCI): Miscellaneous
Introduction
Today, HCI research is increasingly evaluated in in-the-
wild environments, in which the surrounding context
plays an important role in the perception and
experience of public interactive systems [11]. Most of
these in-the-wild deployments are evaluated in, and
validated for, Western contexts. However, Europe and
the United States only represent part of the world. For
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Eslam Nofal
Research[x]Design,
Department of Architecture,
KU Leuven, Belgium
Department of Architecture,
Assiut University, Egypt
Sandy Claes
Research[x]Design,
Department of Architecture,
KU Leuven, Belgium
Andrew Vande Moere
Research[x]Design, Department of
Architecture, KU Leuven, Belgium
instance, 508 million citizens live in Europe. Arab
countries are inhibited by 422 million persons, and thus
represent almost as many potential users as Europe. As
such, in-the-wild evaluations of public interactive
systems should also be executed in Arab contexts.
Here, by the term ‘context’, we denote the sets of
circumstances that are involved in the HCI evaluation
process. We categorize these factors into three main
categories:
User characteristics: habitual patterns of
behavior, personality and emotion (e.g. ability
to work, time-value, patience, etc.)
Socio-cultural factors: lifestyle measurements
of both financial viability and social standing
(e.g. education, religion, income, etc.)
Built environment features: places and spaces
that created or modified by people (e.g. the
aesthetics of buildings, public spaces,
transportation systems, etc.)
No two contexts are the same; not within one country,
one city or even one neighborhood. Yet we argue that
evaluating design that is validated in a European
context, may deliver different results when being
studied in an Arab context, especially when evaluated
in-the-wild. In this paper, we discuss our expectations
of the repeating of two studies that were already
conducted in a European context into an Egyptian
context, and reflect on the potential impact on the
design, evaluation methods and findings.
Case Studies
Currently, we are preparing the design of two previous
studies [8] that have been conducted in a European, in-
the-wild context, in order to replicate [8] them in a
Egyptian in-the-wild context. In particular, the first
study is situated in the semi-public environment of an
entrance hall at a university campus in Berlin [7] and
Cairo. The second study is located inside a public
museum in Brussels [10] and might be repeated in
another museum in Cairo. The interactive systems of
both studies were set-up in these real world
environments for several days, and were investigated
through observations by a researcher present and video
logging, and semi-structured interviews with
participants. We believe that when we keep the same
design and methodology, thus only change the context
of deployment, our previous findings will be
predominantly influenced by the contextual
circumstances, including user characteristics, socio-
cultural factors, and built environment features.
Discussion
We are aware it is rather difficult to compare findings of
two in-the-wild studies with identical design, yet we
believe general tendencies can emerge from these
deployments, as discussed in the following.
User characteristics
Perception of time. For HCI evaluation studies, time
is considered as a challenging aspect [10, 13],
especially when evaluating in-the-wild [7]. There are
recently many endeavors that tackle this challenge by
developing novel practices, allowing understanding user
requirements in a shortened timeframe. As a matter of
fact, time is considered as a cultural concept, our
perception of time is influenced by our cultural
orientation. Perception of time changes from culture to
culture just as languages and behaviors do. Time
restrictions of participants are often problematic in-the-
wild e.g. when interviewing [3]. However, we believe it
is not such a challenge when we evaluate in in-the-wild
Arab countries. For Arab people, time is more flexible
and unlimited [13]. As such, we believe we can capture
more and richer qualitative results.
Technology experience. Although there is a new
'digital native' generation emerging in Arab countries,
technological problems due to basic infrastructure and
governments' policies and regulations still exist [6].
This may cause the participant to focus on the
experience with technology rather than the overall
experience.
Socio-Cultural Factors
Social interaction. The complex values and beliefs
that are present in the Arab world provide a rich setting
to examine the hypothesized influence of socio-cultural
factors on HCI in-the-wild evaluation. For instance,
Arabs generally tend to interact as committed members
of a group, rather than as independent individuals [2].
Accordingly, we expect less individual participation in
our studies in Egypt compared to group ones, which
might lead up to more collaboration and social
interaction among participants.
Attitudes and behaviors. When the design is not
involved in religious taboos or political repression,
Arabs tend to express themselves spontaneously and
freely in several situations, particularly in those related
to human emotions and the arts [2]. They openly
express their likes and dislikes, joy and sadness, etc.
As such, we believe that behavioral evaluation
methods, such as eye-tracking and observations, would
be more effective in the Arab context. On the other
hand, instead of low-context communication in Western
culture, communication in Arab culture seems to embed
the meaning more in the context, as high-context
person tend to talk around the point and expect his
listener to know what (s)he means [15]. Consequently,
for attitudinal evaluation methods such as focus groups
and interview, the interviewer must understand the
contextual cues in order to understand the full meaning
of the message.
Female participation rate. Women are not eager to
be photographed in public because as they are afraid
that a photo will be misused, which brings disrespect to
her and her family [1]. As such, when there are video
recordings for evaluation purposes or photographs used
as designed representations, e.g. [13], we expect the
female participation rate will be lower in an Arab
context.
Social presence. Also social presence is an influential
factor in evaluating HCI [9]. We assume that when we
repeat our museum study [10] in Egypt, people would
be more involved because it communicates information
about an ‘Egyptian’ built heritage. In such a social
context, a collective value can be shared among the
participants, which is a unifying concept in designing
artifacts and HCI evaluation [4].
Built environment
Weather conditions. In the European context,
outdoor installations might be seriously influenced by
the rainy weather conditions [3, 12], which limits user
participation and deployment period, and affects the
design requirements of the installation. However in the
Arab context, the climate is mostly dry, rain is very
rare. In contrast, public outdoor installations might be
affected during summer by the relatively high
temperatures.
Crowdedness. In Arab cities, most public spaces such
as streets, transport facilities, and shopping malls, are
relatively crowded. Crowding has universally negative
impacts on individuals [5], which could be challenging
for in-the-wild evaluations of public interactive systems
in Arab cities, particularly in Cairo. However, the
crowded environment might also cause honeypot
effects, describing how people interact with the
systems, which stimulate the others to observe,
approach and engage in an interaction [14].
References 1. Norah Abokhodair and Sarah Vieweg. 2016. Privacy
& Social Media in the Context of the Arab Gulf. In Proceedings of the 2016 ACM Conference on Designing Interactive Systems (DIS '16), pp. 672-683. https://doi.org/10.1145/2901790.2901873
2. Halim Barakat. 1993. The Arab World: Society, Culture, and State. University of California Press, 1993.
3. Sandy Claes, Niels Wouters, Karin Slegers and Andrew Vande Moere. 2015. Controlling in-the-Wild Evaluation Studies of Public Displays. In Proceedings of the 33rd Annual ACM Conference on
Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '15), pp. 81-84. http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2702123.2702353
4. Gilbert Cockton. 2006. Designing worth is worth designing. In Proceedings of the 4th Nordic conference on Human-computer interaction: changing roles (NordiCHI '06), pp. 165-174. http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/1182475.1182493
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7. Kasper Hornbæk, Søren S Sander, Javier Andrés Bargas-Avila and Jakob Grue Simonsen. 2014. Is once enough?: On the extent and content of replications in human-computer interaction. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '14), pp. 3523-3532. http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2556288.2557004
8. Jesper Kjeldskov, Mikael B. Skov, Benedikte S. Als and Rune T. Høegh. 2004. Is it worth the hassle? Exploring the added value of evaluating the usability of context-aware mobile systems in the field. In Mobile Human-Computer Interaction-MobileHCI, pp. 61-73. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-540-28637-0_6
9. Kwan Min Lee and Clifford Nass. 2003. Designing social presence of social actors in human computer interaction. In Proceedings of the SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI '03), pp. 289-296. http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/642611.642662
10. Eslam Nofal, Rabee M. Reffat and Andrew Vande Moere. 2017. Communicating built heritage
information using tangible interaction approach. In Proceedings of the Eleventh International Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction (TEI '17), pp. 689-692. https://doi.org/10.1145/3024969.3025035
11. Yvonne Rogers. 2011. Interaction design gone wild: striving for wild theory. Interactions 18, 4 (2011),
pp. 58-62. http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/1978822.1978834
12. Rob Tieben, Linda de Valk, Pepijn Rijnbout, Tilde Bekker and Ben Schouten. 2014. Shake up the
schoolyard: iterative design research for public playful installations. In Proceedings of the 2014 Conference on Interaction Design and Children (IDC '14), pp. 175-183. http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2593968.2593980
13. Nina Valkanova, Robert Walter, Andrew Vande Moere and Jörg Müller. 2014. Myposition: sparking civic discourse by a public interactive poll visualization. In Proceedings of the 17th ACM conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work & Social Computing (CSCW'14), pp. 1323-1332. http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2531602.2531639
14. Niels Wouters, John Downs, Mitchell Harrop, Travis Cox, Eduardo Oliveira, Sarah Webber, Frank Vetere and Andrew Vande Moere. 2016. Uncovering the honeypot effect: how audiences engage with public interactive systems. In Proceedings of the 2016 ACM Conference on Designing Interactive Systems (DIS '16), pp. 5-16. https://doi.org/10.1145/2901790.2901796
15. Rhonda S Zaharna. 1995. Understanding cultural preferences of Arab communication patterns. Public Relations Review 21, 3 (1995), pp. 241-255. https://doi.org/10.1016/0363-8111(95)90024-1
Social Media for Change in the ArabWorld
Rina R. WehbeCheriton School of ComputerScienceUniversity of Waterloo200 University Avenue WestON, Canada, N2L3G1
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AbstractIt is unfortunate that LGBT++ minorities are still strugglingfor equality. One such area where the battle for humanrights is on going is the Middle East. In this position pa-per, I discuss the the global movement towards tolerance,as well as, the role computer science professionals and so-cial media developers play in e-activism. I particularly focuson how ACM SIG CHI initiatives and groups have potentialto make a difference in the lives of those struggling to beheard, organized, and connected.
Author KeywordsActivism; HCI for Change; ArabHCI
ACM Classification KeywordsH.5.m [Information interfaces and presentation]: Miscella-neous; H.4m [Computers and Society]: Miscellaneous
IntroductionStigma around sexual orientation and human rights killspeople [8]. Stigma leads to blocking critical information, us-ing shame to propagate conformity, and emphasizing thesingular, non-existent perfect ‘normal’ collectivist identity.Internet connections can mediate this by allowing accessto information, and by allowing people to connect over so-cial media. Consequently, Computer Scientists and HumanComputer Interaction researchers serve a greater purpose
and can make a huge impact on the lives of minority groupsand ostracized individuals. The question now becomes:"How do HCI and CS professionals support the individualrights and freedoms of minority groups worldwide?" andmore importantly, "How can we make a difference".
Call to Action @CHIThe answer relies on the mutual support and connectionof professionals and researchers worldwide. Initiativesthat spearhead this movement in our own community ofAssociation for Computing Machinery (ACM) Special In-terest Group (SIG) in Computer Human Interaction (CHI)are growing from the inclusion of Asia in the location ro-tation, to the international invited speakers focusing onglobal issues such as Dayo Olopade (CHI 2016 Key NoteSpeaker). Groups such as ArabHCI exist to connect theArab researchers to the greater CHI community. Addition-ally, local chapters of CHI such as NordiCHI, AfriCHI, andother ACM SIG supported international conference allowfor the dissemination of research worldwide. Individual re-search groups have also moved towards the discussion andcreation of civil technology[5]. Furthermore, Diversity Lunchand related initiatives move towards inclusion of minorities,families, attendees of different sexual orientations, and peo-ple of varying levels of ability. As well as, the recognizedneed for inclusion through breastfeeding rooms, and genderneutral washrooms. By strengthening the accessibility ofour community we increase potential for joint collaboration,and we gain momentum needed to tackle larger problems.
LGBT++ InternationalHuman rights in the world can be limited for people of di-verse sexual orientation or members the LGBT++ commu-nity. In countries like Canada, the government has legis-lated a mandatory tolerance. In 1967 Prime Minister PierreTrudeau, father of the current Prime Minister of Canada,
popularized the quote: "There’s no place for the state in thebedrooms of the people", as well as, "what’s done in privatebetween adults doesn’t concern the Criminal Code" [11].Moreover, other individual countries have adopted similarpolicies for the protection of LGBT++ people [13]. It goeswithout saying that no country has perfected equality andthe process of equality requires constant mindful effort.
Unfortunately, the modern and more informed attitude,which emphasizes the rights of the minority population hasnot yet been adapted worldwide. Countries such as UnitedStates of America, UK, China, seem to be making slowprogression[13]. In contrast, Russia[2], Iran, Nigeria, andcountries with similar laws are becoming more hostile [16,13]. LGBT++ rights is also an issue in the Middle East. Theoverall narrative of Middle Eastern countries tend to denythe existence of LGBT++ members. Famously in 2007, thepresident of Iran known for his negligence of human rights,attempted and failed to convince an educated audience thatthere were no ‘gays’ in Iran [15], while simultaneously be-coming an international joke and an embarrassment to hiscountry. Although the flaws of the system are easy to list,there is hope for LGBT++ people in the middle east. Re-cently, a Lebanese judge made a ground breaking rulingin favour of Trans - and therefore human - rights [12]. Theruling brings a guarded exuberance.
e-ActivismThe tread of online activism or e-activism, has been bothpraised and criticized. Supporters may make the argumentthat it has helped humanity overcome nationalism and bet-ter connect as individual global citizens. In the current polit-ical climate efforts for global cooperation, which are not di-rectly political often cannot avoid stating a position. For ex-ample, consider the statement made by The Global GameJam (GGJ) [7]. The GGJ is an event which people around
the world, synchronous make games in 48hours. The GGJis hosted in many different countries worldwide and con-stantly adds new sites yearly. In the year of 2017 has evenboosted about new sites from Tunisia, South African, Iran,Alegria, China, Egypt and is still growing. Due to the currentpolitical climate The GGJ must negotiate politics, causingevents like the GGJ to become politically charged, anti-nationalist [4], thereby culminating into a social movement.In 2017, The GGJ publicly rejected the Trump Administra-tion’s “Muslim ban” to reassure participants that it primar-ily values inclusion [7]. However, not all e-activism andglobal activities have been painted in a positive light. Ac-tress Shailene Woodley encourages fans to do more thanjust Facebook activism [18]. Although e-activism is widelycriticized based on allegations that it is not useful, onlineprotests have been successful in getting results. For exam-ple, form moderators on Reddit.com successfully lobbied fora change to company policy [9]. The social media and dis-cussion site run by the Reddit employees under the largerparent company of Advanced Media, was forced into nego-tiation when 2278 moderators and owners of child forums orsubreddits collectively disabled accounts blocking millionsof users from accessing the content of the site.
e-Activism and the Middle EastOnline activism in the Middle East extends on the protestsin the digital world and brings them to the physical world.Activists in the Middle East have had a heavy reliance onsocial media sites for organization and execution of theirrallies[10]. In Figure 1 we see a clear illustration of the grat-itude shown to Facebook as a contributor to the revolution-ary movement. Logs of daily activity thanking social mediasites like Facebook and Twitter can be reviewed online [1],providing the extended world insight into the necessity offree communication over social media in these regions.
Figure 1: The picture above highlights the thank you notesaddress to Facebook. Attribution of this image: By Al JazeeraEnglish (Spray-painted thank you notes) [CC BY-SA 2.0(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via WikimediaCommons
As useful as social media has been to the groups, it can bedetrimental to the individual. For example, LGBT++ youthusing a social app were prosecuted based on their onlineparticipation [17].
Moving ForwardMoving forward, we should investigate the role social me-dia has played in facilitating change in the Middle East. Weshould leverage work completed by the ACM communityto get a better idea of how to support activist[3], empowerpeople [14], and build communities [6]. To build on thisprogress, innovations in social networking, as well as, se-curity and privacy may be the differentiating factor in thesuccess of activists.
BiographyRina R. Wehbe is a Computer Scientist at the University ofWaterloo, Canada. Her background in B.Sc. Psychology isan asset to her work in HCI. Her research interests includeskill acquisition, errors, and confusion. She also researchesGames for Change.
REFERENCES1. Egypt protests. (????).
2. 2011. Gay rights activists detained in Russia’s Moscow.(2011). http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/05/gay-rights-activists-detained-moscow-170511151213785.html [Date Accessed = May 18th, 2017].
3. Mariam Asad and Christopher A. Le Dantec. 2015.Illegitimate Civic Participation: Supporting CommunityActivists on the Ground. In Proceedings of the 18thACM Conference on Computer Supported CooperativeWork & Social Computing (CSCW ’15). ACM, NewYork, NY, USA, 1694–1703. DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2675133.2675156
4. James Batchelor. 2017. The Global Game Jam is acounter-movement to increased nationalistictendencies. (2017).http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2017-01-19-the-global-game-jam-is-a-counter-movement-to-increased-nationalistic-tendencies.
5. Kirsten Boehner and Carl DiSalvo. 2016. Data, Designand Civics: An Exploratory Study of Civic Tech.Proceedings of the 2016 CHI Conference on HumanFactors in Computing Systems (2016), 2970–2981.DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2858036.2858326
6. Lynn Dombrowski, Ellie Harmon, and Sarah Fox. 2016.Social Justice-Oriented Interaction Design: Outlining
Key Design Strategies and Commitments. InProceedings of the 2016 ACM Conference onDesigning Interactive Systems (DIS ’16). ACM, NewYork, NY, USA, 656–671. DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2901790.2901861
7. Global Game Jam. 2017. The Global Game Jam’sPosition on the US President’s “Muslim Ban” ExecutiveOrder. (2017).
8. Samya Kullab. 2015. Can Lebanon’s new plan endstigma of HIV/AIDS? (2015).http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/12/lebanon-plan-stigma-hivaids-151202083548675.html [DateAccessed = May 18th, 2017].
9. J. Nathan Matias. 2016. Going Dark. Proceedings ofthe 2016 CHI Conference on Human Factors inComputing Systems - CHI ’16 (2016), 1138–1151.DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2858036.2858391
10. Fatma Naib. January 28, 2011. Online activism fuelsEgypt protest. (January 28, 2011). http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2011/01/2011128102253848730.html[Date Accessed = May 18, 2017].
11. CBC Television News. 1967. Trudeau: ‘There’s noplace for the state in the bedrooms of the nation’.(1967). http://www.cbc.ca/archives/entry/omnibus-bill-theres-no-place-for-the-state-in-the-bedrooms-of-the-nation/[Original Date: December 21st, 1967] [Date Accessed:May 18, 2017].
12. Anealla Safdar. 2016. Transgender ruling in Lebanonan ’empowering’ moment. (2016).http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2016/02/transgender-ruling-lebanon-empowering-moment-160206125311413.html [Date Accessed = May 18th, 2017].
13. Emine Saner. Gay rights around the world: the bestand worst countries for equality. (????).https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/30/gay-rights-world-best-worst-countries [Date Accessed =May 18, 2017].
14. Vasillis Vlachokyriakos, Clara Crivellaro, Christopher A.Le Dantec, Eric Gordon, Pete Wright, and PatrickOlivier. 2016. Digital Civics: Citizen Empowerment Withand Through Technology. In Proceedings of the 2016CHI Conference Extended Abstracts on Human Factorsin Computing Systems (CHI EA ’16). ACM, New York,NY, USA, 1096–1099. DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.1145/2851581.2886436
15. ’ Iranian president tells Ivy League audience ’We don’thave any gays in Iran. 2007. (2007).http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-483746/We-dont-gays-Iran-Iranian-president-tells-Ivy-League-audience.html [Date Accessed = May 18th, 2017].
16. Brian Whitaker. Everything you need to know aboutbeing gay in Muslim countries. (????).https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jun/21/gay-lgbt-muslim-countries-middle-east [Date Accessed =May 18th, 2017].
17. Jacob Wirtschafter. 2016. In much of the Middle East,it’s getting more dangerous to be gay. (2016).https://www.pri.org/stories/2016-08-30/much-middle-east-its-getting-more-dangerous-be-gay [DateAccessed = May 18th, 2017].
18. Shailene Woodley. October 20, 2016. ShaileneWoodley: The Truth About My Arrest. (October 20,2016).http://time.com/4538557/shailene-woodley-arrest-pipeline/[Date Accessed = May 18th, 2017].
Accessibility in the Arab World for People with Disability: Issues and Insights
Abstract People with disabilities in the developed countries enjoy a much higher level of accessibility and independence than those in most of the Arab world. Whereas random acts of kindness may appear more obvious in the Arab world, it is due to the lack of accessibility provided for people with disabilities in those regions. But it is the independence that people with disabilities are seeking rather than the need for constant and random care. Where local authorities fail to address accessibility issues and the public awareness is low, we aim to shed light on current accessibility issues, possible reasons and insights.
Author Keywords Authors’ choice; of terms; separated; by semicolons; include commas, within terms only; required.
ACM Classification Keywords H.5.m. Information interfaces and presentation (e.g., HCI): Miscellaneous; See http://acm.org/about/class/1998 for the full list of ACM classifiers. This section is required.
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Mohammad Othman Open Lab, Newcastle University Newcastle, UK [email protected]
Introduction Neglected by the authorities, people with disabilities face many difficulties in their daily life, which leads to exclusion from the society and dependence on constant care. Such exclusion builds social barriers and alienation between people with disabilities and the rest of the society. And on the other hand, it’s evident that constant care affects the self-esteem of people with disabilities, adding physical and psychological pressure on them. Therefore it is important to educate and engage the society to improve the accessibility in order to involve people with disabilities in full circle of social life.
The range of difficulties that people with disabilities face in the Arab world is vast. Minor problems experienced on daily basis include crossing the road, using the stairs, and orientation in the public space, which leads to major problems such as attending studies and work.
In this paper we would like to emphasize number of accessibility issues in the Arab world, particularly in Jordan, and point out possible reasons.
Problems and Insights The accessibility challenge begins from home, then getting out, using the road and public transport, as well as public services.
Home Most people in Jordan live in flats of few-story buildings. Buildings and homes are generally not designed with people with disabilities in mind, indoor and outdoor. Buildings equipped with lifts, however, have not addressed the accessibility issue, as there are
always a few steps to take in order to use the lift. From inside, steps are almost everywhere, such as a step to enter the house, a step to the balcony or the washroom. Homes are commonly built with steps between the rooms. We argue this is due to the lack of awareness and responsibility of not only local authorities but also the architects, building contractors and business owners.
Finding the right property to live in is never easy, especially for people with disabilities, there are currently no applications or easy alternatives to identify suitable properties. On the other hand, there is, currently, no way to deliver the voice of people with disabilities to local authorities other than some hardly supported social media campaigns. Furthermore, legislations are vague, builders and homeowners are fully dependent on architects who may lack the knowledge of full legislations that serves accessibility. Moreover, most builders don’t carry the relevant education, thus, they are unaware of building standards and regulations.
Public spaces On the road the challenge is more serious. It begins with sidewalks: unleveled surface, random landscaping, as well as unstandardized and too high curbs, see Figure 1. On the other hand, tactile paving for people with visual impairment is absent with no obvious plans to implement them. Furthermore, Zebra crossings and central pedestrian refuge are rarely implemented, and when implemented they are either badly designed and placed in the wrong location of the road, or totally ignored by road users—This could be due to pedestrians and drivers are generally unaware of the purpose of road markings. Furthermore, cafes and
Figure 1: In Jordan: High curb with steps too (http://www.jo24.net/post.php?id=90618)
restaurants as well as other leisure places are generally not disabled-friendly: lack of designated facilities (e.g. toilets), steps to enter the place, and badly managed space for wheelchair users to move. Here we see a major problem of social exclusion where people with disabilities are not seen as full members of the society in all its aspects as a result of lack of awareness.
At the same time, it is due to the general low level of accessibility that people with disabilities are hardly seen in public places. Thus business owners do not take them into consideration while designing the space. As a result, systems designed to help people with disabilities have to consider the social norm and how to change it when necessary, and the level of education—see Normification [5,6] a study that proposed a mobile app to change social norms and encourage shops owners to shut their doors during operating hours to reduce energy waste.
Public transport Transportation is a major obstacle in Jordan in general, and more specifically for people with disabilities. Buses run with no schedule, taxis cannot be pre-booked, and neither buses nor taxis are suitable for people with disabilities, especially for those on wheelchair. However, the current city infrastructure and the widely implemented public transport system don’t promise any early physical solution. Thus, an app to trip share focused on the need of people with disabilities may solve large part of this obstacle.
Public services In education, people with disabilities most often resort to dedicated schools, as they are well equipped for the needs of people with disabilities. However, this creates
a barrier between students with disabilities and other students. This also creates a society unaware of those with special needs. In countries like Jordan where most, if not all, public schools are not disabled-friendly, it is crucial to enable ways of exchanging experiences between students with disabilities and others to create better public aware of people’s special needs. And, unfortunately, the same applies to work places and local authority buildings.
Related Research and Solutions Large amount of research and solutions to learn from are invested in the developed countries to improve accessibility and well-being. For example, VizWiz [1] and Chorus:View [4] are two research (and mobile Apps) aim to assist people with visual impairment to locate objects they are looking for, and receive answers to on-demand visual queries (e.g. which is the corn tin? Do you see picnic tables across the parking lot? See Figure 2). Whereas, Hara [3] utilized Google Street View, machine learning and crowdsourcing to find curb ramps and locate inaccessible curbs. However, solutions are not always physical and on demand. McNaney et. al. [7] studied the potential use of mobile app and crowdsourcing, and developed Speeching mobile App. Speeching aims to help people with Parkinson’s—who normally suffer speech and voice issues— to manage and control their speech rate, volume and pitch variability, especially in their daily scenarios. For example, a person may use Speeching to practice her speech on how to order food, or ask bus drivers for destination. On the other hand Muriana et. al. [8] used participatory design methods to learn more about people with dementia and how to work with them. And Rajapakse et. al. [9] explored the challenges designer face to design technologies that are
Figure 2: VizWiz: an assistive system for people with visual impairment [1]
customizable to meet the needs of individuals with disability. In entertainment domain, [2] explored how to engage people on wheelchair to play movement-based games that were not available to them before; and [10] introduced chess as a regular training game for children with Dyslexia.
Such research, systems and games are highly important as they raise self-esteem, make people with disability more independent and contribute in breaking social barriers between all members of society.
Conclusion Low level of accessibility for people with disability not only limits their mobility, it contributes towards building social barriers and neglecting an important part of the public. In Jordan and many of the developing Arab countries, jobs are generally carried by skillful people but not necessary with relevant education and awareness about standards and legislations. Thus, work is usually done to meet the majority’s standards, neglecting minorities and people with special needs. As such, there is a wide research gap to fill in, from ethnography to design and technology.
References 1. Jeffrey P Bigham, Samual Samuel White, Tom Yeh,
et al. 2010. VizWiz: Nearly real-time answers to visual questions. Proceedings of the 23nd annual ACM symposium on User interface software and technology - UIST ’10, 333–342. http://doi.org/10.1145/1866029.1866080
2. Kathrin M. Gerling, Regan L. Mandryk, Matthew Miller, Michael R. Kalyn, Max Birk, and Jan D. Smeddinck. 2015. Designing Wheelchair-Based Movement Games. ACM Transactions on Accessible Computing 6, 2, 1–23. http://doi.org/10.1145/2724729
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