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receives high usability scores some people may not find the system socially acceptable, based on
the moral value of privacy.
Sixth, Value Sensitive Design identifies and takes seriously two classes of stakeholders: direct
and indirect. Direct stakeholders refer to parties—individuals or organizations—who interact
directly with the computer system or its output. Indirect stakeholders refer to all other parties who
are affected by the use of the system. Often, indirect stakeholders are ignored in the design process.
For example, computerized medical records systems have often been designed with many of the
direct stakeholders in mind (e.g., insurance companies, hospitals, doctors, and nurses), but with too
little regard for the values, such as the value of privacy, of a rather important group of indirect
stakeholders: the patients.
Seventh, Value Sensitive Design is an interactional theory: Values are viewed neither as inscribed
into technology (an endogenous theory), nor as simply transmitted by social forces (an exogenous
theory). Rather, the interactional position holds that although the features or properties that people
design into technologies more readily support certain values and hinder others, the technology's
actual use depends on the goals of the people interacting with it. A screwdriver, after all, is well
suited for turning screws, and is also amenable for use as a poker, pry bar, nail set, cutting device,
and tool to dig up weeds, but functions poorly as a ladle, pillow, or wheel. Similarly, an online cal-
endar system that displays individuals' scheduled events in detail readily supports accountability
within an organization, but makes privacy difficult. Moreover, through human interaction, technol-
ogy itself changes over time. On occasion, such changes (as emphasized in the exogenous position)
can mean the societal rejection of a technology, or that its acceptance is delayed. But more often
it entails an iterative process whereby technologies are first invented and then redesigned based on
user interactions, which then are reintroduced to users so that further interactions can occur and
further redesigns can be implemented. Typical software updates (e.g., of word processors, browsers,
and operating systems) epitomize this iterative process.
Eighth, Value Sensitive Design builds on the psychological proposition that certain values are
universally held, although how such values play out in a particular culture at a particular point in
time can vary considerably (Friedman, 1997b; Kahn, 1999; Turiel, 1998, 2002). For example, even
while living in an igloo, Inuits have conventions that ensure some forms of privacy; yet privacy is
not maintained by separated rooms, as it is in most Western cultures. Generally, the more concretely
(act-based) one conceptualizes a value, the more one will be led to recognizing cultural variation;
conversely, the more abstractly one conceptualizes a value, the more one will be led to recognizing
universals. Value Sensitive Design seeks to work on both levels, the concrete and abstract, depend-
ing on the design problem at hand. Note that this is an empirical proposition, based on a large
amount of psychological and anthropological data, not a philosophical one. We also make this claim
only for certain values, not all—there are clearly some values that are culture-specific.
The three case studies presented in “Value Sensitive Design's Constellation of Features,” ear-
lier in this chapter, illustrate the different features in this constellation. For example, UrbanSim
illustrates the goal of being proactive and influencing the design of the technology early in and
throughout the design process (Feature 1), and also involves enlarging the arena in which values
arise to include urban planning and democratic participation in public decision making (Feature
2). The cookies work is a good illustration of Value Sensitive Design's tripartite methodology
(Feature 3): conceptual, technical, and empirical investigations, applied iteratively and integra-
tively, were essential to the success of the project. Each of the three projects brings out a different
set of human values (Feature 4): among others, informed consent for the cookies' work; physical
and psychological well-being and privacy in public spaces for Room with a View; and fairness,
accountability, and democracy for UrbanSim, as well as the whole range of different, sometimes
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