![]() It is a simple device consisting of three stones with a fire underneath and a pot above. Consider the three-stone stove, a traditional cooking mechanism used by 80% of people in the developing world. Three-stone cooking stove, image by Thamizhpparithi Maari (CC BY-SA 3.0)Įven when women are the focus of design, their actual needs are still sometimes ignored. Sometimes, too, these dummies are only tested in passenger seats. Even in places where “female” dummies are brought in to test cars, these figures are often just scaled-down male dummies with the same basic shape. ![]() These tests impact design, and are part of the reason women are far more likely to be injured or die in a car crash. This approach ignores anatomical differences, plus specific individual circumstances like a person being pregnant. The tacit assumption is that the 50th-percentile cis male is the average person, skipping over around half of the population entirely. As a result, fewer women overall seek medical help during heart attacks and even when they do they are often diagnosed poorly by professionals.Ĭar crash test dummies are also generally male, based on an average man, which of course means they feature different sizes and proportions than a typical female. For women, heart attacks often present as fatigue or what feels like indigestion, with chest pain appearing in just around one out of eight cases. For men, chest pain is a common, prominent symptom. Perez explains that heart attacks are more often misdiagnosed in women, in part because of the symptoms we’re all educated about. The vast majority of medical research, for instance, is based on studies of men. Males are often the default subjects of design, which can have a huge impact on big and critical aspects of everyday life. Only by collecting and analyzing data did it become clear that men were the ones being designed around, which isn’t an isolated problem. It was seen as a neutral and obvious choice - a default strategy. Of course, the original plowing plan wasn’t designed to harm women or to help men. Snow removal at Gutevägen in Visby, Sweden image by per egevad (CC BY 2.0) Driving through a few inches, as it turned out, was less dangerous than walking through the snow, particularly if one was pushing something like a baby carriage as well. It had a huge impact, reducing the people admitted to emergency centers, women in particular, and had a corresponding economic impact from lower healthcare costs. In Sweden, the city council looked at the findings and reversed their approach, plowing side roads and sidewalks first. “This work contributes hugely to GDP,” explains Caroline Criado Perez, author of Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men, a book about how women are often left out of design. Aside from health and safety, that labor, when tallied up, was found to be worth almost as much to the economy as paid work. They also walked more, trudging across often-unplowed intersections, sometimes with kids in tow. While men mainly commuted to and from work, women drove all over to run errands and to take care of elderly family members. It is the same sequence played out in many cities around the world.Īs researchers dove into the subject, however, they discovered that male and female driving patterns were markedly different. After all, the town’s approach appeared logical and neutral enough on the surface: plow major roads first, particularly those leading into and out of town, followed by smaller local streets. ![]() Snow plowing patterns seem an unlikely subject of a gender study conducted in a small town in Sweden.
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