Premise
Using Twine 2 as a storytelling tool to increase privacy awareness among Gen Z.

Synopsis
As more and more of current society takes place on online social networks, the question raises what the consequences are to our privacy. While this issue has been the subject of discussions recently, there are still real-world effects to our digital presence. During the preliminary research, several privacy-related risks arose, revolving around digital profiles and the inability to opt out of their creation. One target group that is particularly prone to this development is the digitally native generation that is socially and culturally expected to participate in the digital environment. Common solutions to protecting users’ privacy focused on them already having an increased amount of knowledge about digital privacy. This project set out to see a storytelling tool that increases awareness among users.

Substantiation

Privacy risks on online social networks (OSN) are a subject that has been brought to the attention of an increasingly larger group of users. These OSNs are fully integrated into the daily routines of modern-day society. One age group that is particularly prone to sharing personal information is teenagers. They constitute one of the main user groups of OSN and spend a large part of their lives online (Vanderhoven et al., 2016). With teenagers being one of the largest audiences and them also spending a significant amount of time online, it places them in an interesting position; It is challenging for them to opt-out of services to regain their privacy. Teenagers consider their digital lives as important as their real-life lives, it is seen as an extension of their physical being (Pastore, 2022). Gen Z often spends more than eight hours a day online and is thus engaged in digital culture (Pastore, 2022).

Research shows that the use of social media is a threat to the mental well-being of adolescents, partially fueled by privacy concerns among the group (O’Reilly et al., 2018).  Teenagers are one of the vulnerable groups to suffer privacy risks because of their limited capacity for self-regulation and susceptibility to peer pressure (Alemany et al., 2019).

 

Research conducted by Alemany et al. (2019) shows that an effective way to create awareness among teenagers is by using soft-paternalism techniques. Their proposed techniques rely on confronting users with their data in tangible scenarios and showing potential risks in real-time. The shock effect led to an increased sense of privacy awareness among the teen participants.

 

Project

During the project I enrolled in the VR & AR workshops, my assumption was these technologies could provide an immersive world that could be used to gather and project data in a way that would speak to the generation and make them aware of the privacy risks there are exposed to. However, after tinkering around with the aforementioned technologies, I concluded the concept wasn’t feasible in the timeframe that was given, also, there wasn’t a direct benefit to those technologies to get the message across. So, I shifted to work with Twine 2, a storytelling tool that creates non-linear stories as a HTML/CSS/JavaScript. The goal is to gather data from users who engage in the experience and ultimately increase their awareness about privacy risks and issues they may be subjected to base on their own data.

The data is collected by using TikTok’s onboarding and basic usage as an example. The users follow the steps and interaction TikTok provides, and data will be collected along the experience.

 

Iterations

First iteration – Story layout

Using sticky notes, the outline for the prototype was visualized. After the initial outline, this iteration was co-created with a Gen Z (20 y/o, F) that described herself as a high-demanding consumer of digital media, and with a self-proclaimed low privacy awareness.

 

Insights

• Story should be short and snappy.
• Focus on data that’s being gathered before interaction with prototype.
• User had a good idea on what was being gathered, she didn’t have an idea about the implementation of her data profile and how labeling could affect her.

 

Second iteration – Working in Twine

For the second iteration the possible techniques that social media like TikTok gathers from users were investigated. These variables were gathered and projected them at the end of the prototype. Also, the base storyline was laid out during this iteration. The core of this iteration was about users interacting with screenshots of TikTok and stating what they would do in that given situation. This iteration has been tested with three users between (18 and 20 years old, 2M & 1F)

 

Insights

• Implementation of variables are good, but must be collected in the background
• Provide more personalized gathered information
• Provide engagement score

 

Final iteration – Gathering data

For the final iteration, some data gathering has been automatized, a basic outline for categorization has been made to mimic minor estimations TikTok makes on their platform, for example gender, income & interests During this stage The possibilities were investigated for creating a unique visual style that speaks to the target audience. Colors were used to differentiate between data that was voluntarily given, data that was retrieved from simply interacting with the prototype and data that were used as labels and predictions. Variables are updated on the go and prove a more robust prototype. TikTok videos have been embedded within the prototype for a more realistic experience.

Insights & Validation

• Data points and predictions are too brief to be used in a professional research context.
• For a more accurate prototype, more research must be done on the labeling and data gathering of online social networks.
• Users claim to be more aware of their awareness but require more explanation about data gathering and interpreting.
• Users indicate they want more extreme examples.

 

Conclusion

By using Twine as an interactive storytelling tool to replicate a part of the customer journey of TikTok, a small insight was given in the data gathering of this social media and others. Based on the interviews conducted, the prototype and concept are perceived as promising among the target audience. Users state to be more aware of their data privacy directly after interacting with the prototype. There is however a lot of room for improvement. A more defined visual style could help with creating a more coherent and immersive experience, as well as guiding the users more with their privacy risks and rights. Users mention that the implication of data profiles and labeling aren’t clear or are too abstract. The functionalities and predictions currently present in the prototype are mostly based on assumptions and were limited in the coding framework Twine provides. For future applications it would be desirable to gain more insights in the categorizing/labeling of online social media profiles and get access to external APIs for more robust datapoints. It would also be beneficial to investigate the possibilities with combining Twine and JavaScript to retrieve more meta data using web APIs. These points of interests will be taken along for the next iteration.

 

Bibliography

Alemany, J., del Val, E., Alberola, J., & García-Fornes, A. (2019). Enhancing the privacy risk awareness of teenagers in online social networks through soft-paternalism mechanisms. International Journal of Human Computer Studies, 129, 27–40. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhcs.2019.03.008

Hallam, C., & Zanella, G. (2017). Online self-disclosure: The privacy paradox explained as a temporally discounted balance between concerns and rewards. Computers in Human Behavior, 68, 217–227. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2016.11.033

O’Reilly, M., Dogra, N., Whiteman, N., Hughes, J., Eruyar, S., & Reilly, P. (2018). Is social media bad for mental health and wellbeing? Exploring the perspectives of adolescents. Clinical Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 23(4), 601–613. https://doi.org/10.1177/1359104518775154

Pastore, A. (2022). What Does the Metaverse Represent to Digitally Native, Generation Z Consumers? https://wwd.com/business-news/business-features/quynh-mai-metaverse-generation-z-consumers-1235017991/

Vanderhoven, E., Schellens, T., Vanderlinde, R., & Valcke, M. (2016). Developing educational materials about risks on social network sites: a design based research approach. Educational Technology Research and Development, 64(3), 459–480. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11423-015-9415-4