People with disabilities who are highly affected by online microaggressions

People with disabilities who are highly affected by online microaggressions

Personally, people with disabilities often experience microaggressions – comments or subtle insults based on stereotypes. New types of microaggressions are also playing out online, according to new Cornell research.

The study finds that these constant online insults add up. Microaggressions affect self-esteem and change the way people with disabilities use social media. And because of their subtlety, microaggressions can be difficult for algorithms to detect, the authors warn.

“This paper brings a new perspective on how social interactions shape what equal access means online and in the digital world,” said Sharon Heung, a doctoral candidate in information science. Heung presented the study, “Nothing Micro about It: Examining Ableist Microaggressions on Social Media,” on Oct. 26 at ASSETS 2022, the Association for Computing Machinery SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility.

When microaggressions occur in live environments, they are often short-lived and have few viewers. "When they take place on social media platforms, they do so in front of a large audience - the scale is completely different and then they live on for people to see forever," said co-author Aditya Vashistha, an assistant professor of information science at Cornell's Ann S. Bowers College of Computer Science and Information Science.

Additionally, social media platforms can increase microaggressions and potentially spread misinformation. “We are very concerned about how it shapes the way broader audiences think about disability and disabled people,” said co-author Megh Marathe, assistant professor of media, information, bioethics and social justice at Michigan State University.

Heung and co-author Mahika Phutane, a doctoral student in computer science, interviewed 20 volunteers who said they had various disabilities and were active on social media platforms. Participants were asked to describe subtle discrimination and microaggressions they had experienced and the impact they had on their lives.

Condescending comments like "You're so inspiring" were the most common, along with infantilizing posts like "Oh, you live alone?" People also asked inappropriate questions about users' personal lives and made assumptions about what the person might do or wear because of their disability. Some users have been told that they are lying about their disability or that they don't have one, especially if the disability was invisible, such as: B. a mental illness.

The researchers categorized the reactions into 12 types of microaggressions. Most fit into categories previously recognized in offline interactions, but two were unique to social media. The first was “ghosting,” or ignoring posts. The second concerned platforms that were not accessible to people with disabilities. For example, some users said they felt unwelcome when people didn't add alt text to photos or used text colors they couldn't recognize. One person with dwarfism said her posts were constantly being removed because she kept being labeled as a minor.

After experiencing a microaggression, users had to decide how to respond. Whether they ignored the comment, reported it, or tried to educate the other person, participants said it took an emotional toll. Many took breaks from social media or limited the information they shared online.

“Addressing this problem is really difficult,” Phutane said. "Social media strives to drive engagement. If they educate the perpetrator, that original post will be promoted more and more."

Participants suggested that platforms should automatically detect and delete microaggressions or a bot could pop up with disability information.

Most social media platforms already have moderation tools in place – but reporting systems are sometimes flawed, opaque, and can misidentify harassment. And microaggressions can be difficult for automated systems to detect. Unlike hate speech, where algorithms can search for specific words, microaggressions are more nuanced and context-dependent.

Once the extent and types of microaggressions experienced by people from marginalized groups are better understood, researchers say tools can be developed to limit the burden of dealing with them. These issues are critical to address, particularly given the potential expansion of virtual reality and the metaverse.

We need to be particularly vigilant and aware of how these real-world interactions translate to online settings. It’s not just interactions on social media – we will also see more interactions in virtual spaces.”

Shiri Azenkot, co-author, associate professor of information science at the Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute at Cornell Tech and Cornell Bowers CIS

This work was supported in part by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship and the University of California President's Postdoctoral Fellowship.

Source:

Cornell University

Reference:

Heung, S., et al. (2022) Nothing Micro About It: Examining ableist microaggressions on social media. ASSETS '22: Proceedings of the 24th International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility. doi.org/10.1145/3517428.3544801.

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