ask Crab what is her gender and she will tell you that she doesn't have it. After all, it's just a computer program. But this and many other virtual assistants use female voices. Even, if you notice, the names themselves are women's. In addition to the assistant Microsoftrespectively. 5k4w2
It's true, some of them allow you to change the voice to male and even choose a specific accent. But there is a pattern to the development of these virtual assistants and the big question is: why do they use female voices?
In interview for CNN in 2011, the professor of Communication at Stanford University, Clifford Nass, gave a justification for this choice. “It's a lot easier to find a female voice that everyone likes than a male voice. It is a well-established phenomenon that the human brain is designed to like female voices.. For him, the origin of this predisposition at the moment of birth could be established.
“Babies are more responsive to a female voice than a male voice,” he told her. ABC.
Nass even said that female voices would be more understanding, while the masculine ones would have a touch of authoritarian.
Although it is an argument that uses a scientific basis, there are those who dispute this reason. A 2014 study by the Miami University, entitled “Vocal fry hurts women in the labor market”, demonstrated that female voices are not so well received. In fact, women's vocal tics are criticized more often than men's.
A case of machismo? m1y41
There are those who point to a more cultural motivation, considering the choice of female voices to be a case of machismo. Virtual assistants are created to follow our orders, not the other way around. Given that most s of this technology are middle-aged men – 60% in the case of Alexa -, the message that remains is that women would be subservient to men, as many in fact think.
To Dennis MortensenCEO of x.ai, the fact that they have female voices does not necessarily reflect expected gender roles in the real world. “To present a case for some of my fellow technologists, [research] was done on how we best receive orders from voice-enabled systems. AND it was concluded that we react the best at the orders of a female voice. Some suggest that the tone of voice itself, from an audio technology perspective, is easier to understand.” The AtlanticIn 2016.
However, Kathleen Richardson, author of the book “An Anthropology of Robots and AI: Annihilation Anxiety and Machines”, perceives the machismo in this scenario. As it is men who usually raise these assistants, “this probably reflects how men view women: they are not fully human beings”, opined to the The Atlantic. It would therefore be an extension of female objectification.
What do you think? Is there a cultural root in this choice or is it just scientific basis? Leave your opinion in the comments!
