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Archive / INF Seminars / INF_2025_05_21_IreneZanardi

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	Flirty AI and Feminine Voices: How We Can Deal with Design Choices in AI Systems

Host: Dr. Eleonora Vercesi

Wednesday

21.05

USI Campus EST, Room B1.17

17:00 - 18:00


	Irene Zanardi Università della Svizzera italiana

Abstract: The release of OpenAI’s GPT-4o introduced a highly capable multimodal model that engages users across voice, vision, and text. Among its most debated features was the deployment of a feminized voice that responded with flirtatious tone, giggles, and affective warmth, design choices that blur the boundaries between technical function and emotional interaction. Often dismissed as surface-level interface matters, such decisions reveal deeper ethical implications, highlighting the need for critical engagement with how AI systems shape human experience. Drawing from design activism and human-computer interaction (HCI) theory, we propose a conceptual framework that identifies four distinct roles — Reformer, Change Agent, Citizen, and Rebel — as modes of intervention within AI system development. Each role provides a unique pathway for resisting harmful design norms and promoting more socially responsible computing. Through this lens, we call for a broader, interdisciplinary understanding of human-AI interaction, one that foregrounds the sociotechnical nature of AI and the imperative for collaborative, ethically grounded design practices.

Biography: Irene Zanardi is a PhD student at USI-IDSIA in the LUXIA lab, supervised by Prof. Landoni Monica. Her research investigates how to support children's critical reflection when interacting with generative AI. With a background in Interaction Design from Politecnico di Milano, she focuses on designing interactions that make AI’s role more visible, accountable, and open to questioning.