Diapers and Dads I Design and Gender Roles

The product design process almost always includes early on an analysis of the target user group. Designers pore over focus group data, interviews, surveys and observation to determine the needs of their market. In this crucial step determinations are made that will shape everything from form to function to marketing of a product. It is also in this phase that the seed of exclusionary and prejudicial design is planted. Too many industries rely on stereotype and exclusion as a focus of their design strategy beginning with this early critical step in the design process.

For example, today Products for babies are still synonymous with products for women; this entirely excludes loving and committed fathers. I would argue that the constant bombardment of images equating parenting with mothering actually causes fathers to feel unnecessary and therefore to be less committed. These products are laden with centuries of history and meaning since the beginning of industrialization when women were obligated to be the primary caregiver of their children. This history burdens every user and potential user. Today, men who opt to be stay at home dads are considered emasculated and they are excluded from the supportive information and industry which claims to support babies but is really only geared to mothers. The designers and marketers of the baby product industry are partially responsible for shaping generations of men who feel their only responsibility or connection to their families is to earn the money to pay for material marketed to their wives.

The Huggies website has dozens of photos of babies and mothers but not one image of a father. There are pages entitled “mom-to-mom tips,” and “I’m pregnant” but not a man to be found. The Johnson’s website has one page about fathering. Babies‘r’us has a “Mom’s favorites” category but no “dad’s favorites.” What’s going on? Our society bemoans the uninvolved role of fathers every day, but each of these companies marketing alienates fathers and further embeds the perception that a father is a breadwinner while a mother is the one who truly connects with baby. One outraged dad expressed this feeling eloquently on his Blog “Daddy Brain.” He is outraged that his commitment goes unrecognized by the companies his income supports. Working mothers are undoubtedly burdened by the insistence on historic gender roles designed into these products as well.

Not only the target audience and marketing designs of products, but also the forms of the designs themselves perpetuate this unfair gender bias. Diaper bags are almost exclusively designed for women. On diaperbags.com there are 636 designer diaper bags for women and only 106 “Daddy Diaper Bags.” Evenflo products use very similar curvy forms to women’s cosmetics and shampoo packaging and utilize pastel color palettes, typically associated with femininity (the problem of boy and girl colors is another issue for another day). These products form language and color shout out to dads “this is not for you.” Companies don’t design based on focus group data from fathers, nor do they use gender neutral packaging and color concepts.

According to USA Today “Many fathers hold the misconception that small children do not need their influence and that they can just step in when the kids are older.” It seems only natural that men would feel their role in caring for a baby is obsolete when baby care products are designed exclusively for women. The exclusion by design of men from parenting is a tragedy which research shows is detrimental to our children and society in every way. In this instance designers could positively shape family structures and parent child relationships merely by broadening their definitions of their target groups and designing with greater sensitivity to the ever-changing definitions of family.