Title :
Female game developers wanted Low pay, long hours, inflexible work environments
Author :
Sweetser, Penelope ; Wyeth, Peta ; McMahon, Nick ; Johnson, D.
Author_Institution :
Comput.-Human Interaction, Queensland Univ. of Technol., Brisbane, QLD, Australia
Abstract :
Almost half of all game players are now women. However, women only represent a small proportion of game developers. There is a lack of previous research to suggest why women don´t pursue careers in games and how we can attract more women to the industry. In this paper, we investigate the issues and barriers that prevent women from entering the games industry, as well as the solutions and steps that can be taken to attract more women to the industry. We draw on the lessons learned by the information technology industry and report on a program of events that was conducted at the Queensland University of Technology in 2011. These events provided some insight into the issues surrounding the lack of women in the games industry, as well as some initial steps that we can take as an industry to attract and support more female developers.
Keywords :
computer games; Queensland University of Technology; female game developers; game players; games industry; inflexible work environments; information technology industry; long hours; low pay; Computers; Educational institutions; Employee welfare; Engineering profession; Games; Industries; careers; games industry; gender; information technology; women;
Conference_Titel :
Games Innovation Conference (IGIC), 2013 IEEE International
Conference_Location :
Vancouver, BC
Print_ISBN :
978-1-4799-1244-5
DOI :
10.1109/IGIC.2013.6659142