The DOI matches its Crossref record; 34 of the 34 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Baking Gender Into Social Media Design: How Platforms Shape Categories for Users and Advertisers
Open accessAbstract
In recent years, several popular social media platforms have launched freeform custom gender fields. This decision reconstitutes gender categories beyond an oppressive binary only permitting “males” and “females.” In this work, we uncover many different user-facing gender category design strategies within the social media ecosystem, ranging from custom gender options (on Facebook, Google+, and Pinterest) to the absence of gender fields entirely (on Twitter and LinkedIn). To explore how gender is baked into platform design, this article investigates the 10 most popular English-speaking social media platforms by performing recorded walkthroughs from two different subject positions: (1) a new user registering an account, and (2) a new advertiser creating an ad. We explore several different spaces in social media software where designers commonly program gender—sign-up pages, profile pages, and advertising portals—to consider (1) how gender is made durable through social media design, and (2) the shifting composition of the category of gender within the social media ecosystem more broadly. Through this investigation, we question how these categorizations attribute meaning to gender as they materialize in different software spaces, along with the recursive implications for society. Ultimately, our analysis reveals how social media platforms act as intermediaries within the larger ecosystem of advertising and web analytics companies. We argue that this intermediary role entrusts social media platforms with a considerable degree of control over the generation of broader categorization systems, which can be wielded to shape the perceived needs and desires of both users and advertising clients.
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“LGBTQ+ users face a paradox: social media is crucial for identity formation, community building, and self-expression ( Robards et al. 2019), yet they encounter intensified algorithmic surveillance through content moderation tactics such as shadowbanning, demonetization, and account suspension (Are 2022; Bivens and Haimson 2016; Gillespie 2022).”
From Staring Back at the Surveillance Gaze: The Resistance of LGBTQ+ Users on Social Media (2026) · cites this paper as Bivens and Haimson 2016
In the citing paper
“For LGBTQ+ users, social media has been known to reinforce gender binaries and to conflate queer content as”
From Staring Back at the Surveillance Gaze: The Resistance of LGBTQ+ Users on Social Media (2026) · cites this paper as Bivens and Haimson 2016
Citations
Cites
Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color
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Sorting Things Out: Classification and Its Consequences
Bowker, G. C., & Star, S. L. (1999) · doi:10.7551/mitpress/6352.001.0001 · Cited by 6,188
Butler, J. (2004) · doi:10.4324/9780203499627 · Cited by 5,556
Sorting Things Out: Classification and Its Consequences
(2000) · The Journal of Academic Librarianship · doi:10.1016/s0099-1333(00)00155-5 · Cited by 5,212
The Culture of Connectivity: A Critical History of Social Media
van Dijck, J. (2013) · doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199970773.001.0001 · Cited by 2,688
Gillespie, T. (2010) · New Media & Society · doi:10.1177/1461444809342738 · Cited by 2,522 · cited 3×
“By emphasizing neutrality, platforms can more easily conceal important choices about what can appear on the site and how data are archived, owned, and monetized (Gehl, 2011; Gillespie, 2010).”
BackgroundBardzell, S. (2010) · CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems · doi:10.1145/1753326.1753521 · Cited by 1,139
A Networked self: identity, community, and culture on social network sites
(2011) · Choice Reviews Online · doi:10.5860/choice.48-3694 · Cited by 1,094
Code/Space: Software and Everyday Life
Kitchin, R., & Dodge, M. (2011) · doi:10.7551/mitpress/9780262042482.001.0001 · Cited by 964
Feminist theories of technology
Wajcman, J. (2009) · Cambridge Journal of Economics · doi:10.1093/cje/ben057 · Cited by 829
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- Burgess J., 2015, Paper presented at the ICA Conference
- Butler J., 1999, Gender trouble
- Chun W. H. K., 2013, Race after the Internet, 38
- Stryker S., 2008, Transgender history
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Racism, Hate Speech, and Social Media: A Systematic Review and Critique
Matamoros-Fernández, A., & Farkas, J. (2021) · Television & New Media · doi:10.1177/1527476420982230 · Cited by 514
The Misgendering Machines: Trans/HCI Implications of Automatic Gender Recognition
Keyes, O. (2018) · Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction · doi:10.1145/3274357 · Cited by 505
Algorithmic Experts: Selling Algorithmic Lore on YouTube
Bishop, S. (2020) · Social Media + Society · doi:10.1177/2056305119897323 · Cited by 265
Scheuerman, M. K., Branham, S. M., & Hamidi, F. (2018) · Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction · doi:10.1145/3274424 · Cited by 219
Scheuerman, M. K., Paul, J. M., & Brubaker, J. R. (2019) · Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction · doi:10.1145/3359246 · Cited by 252
Metadata
- Authors
- Bivens, R., & Haimson, O. L.
- Affiliations
- Carleton University (CA)
- University of California, Irvine (US)
- Corresponding author
- Bivens, Rena
- Venue
- Social Media + Society
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2016-10
- Volume
- 2
- Issue
- 4
- ISSN
- 2056-3051 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2530495025
- Cited by
- 240
- References
- 34
- Citations by year
- 2026: 28 · 2025: 25 · 2024: 34 · 2023: 21 · 2022: 49 · 2021: 25 · 2020: 28 · 2019: 11 · 2018: 13 · 2017: 6
- FWCI
- 7.14
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Locations
- Social Media + Society (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
- Carleton University's Institutional Repository (MacOdrum Library, Carleton University) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Funders
- National Science Foundation
- Rural Development Administration
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Artificial Intelligence › Ethics and Social Impacts of AI
- Social Sciences › Gender Studies › Gender, Feminism, and Media
- Social Sciences › Gender Studies › Gender and Feminist Studies
- Keywords
- gender categories, social media design, gender binary, platform design, user registration, advertising, intermediaries, web analytics, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, gender categorization
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