Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Computers in Human Behavior journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/comphumbeh Full length article Battling gender stereotypes: A user study of a code-learning game, “Code Combat,” with middle school children Yeliz Yücel ∗ , Kerem Rızvanoğlu Faculty of Communication, Galatasaray University, İstanbul, Turkey ARTICLE INFO Keywords: User experience (UX) Digital gender divide Gender stereotypes Stereotype threat Games Serious games ABSTRACT. Gender has been consistently controlled as a variable in usability and playability tests. However, there is no consensus on whether and how gender diferences should infuence the design of digital environments. According to some research, digital environments may be unintentionally designed especially for males as a result of the existing gender biases which risks reproducing gender-polarized culture in a computational feld. This study attempts to highlight that females are still being negatively afected by existing gender stereotypes and prescribed gender identities despite relatively equal access and use of computer technology. This qualitative study aims to provide insights about the frst-time user experience in a home environment of 16 middle school children in Turkey (8 males - 8 females), aged between 11 and 14 years, with a code learning game named “Code Combat”. The analysis is supported with complementary quantitative fndings. The present study investigates the participants' conceptualizations and opinions toward coding concept and this specifc coding game. Further, it explores how existing gender stereotypes and gender biased expectations impact their behaviors and attitudes in the context of game experience. Our results indicated that perceived computer competence and perceived coding difculty had important efects on the participants’ performance relatedly with their gender identity. According to our fndings, there are important gender diferences to be found in our 9 constructs, namely; perceived computer competence, perceived coding difculty, identifcation, perceived game difculty, perceived success, level of enjoyment, level of anxiety, the likelihood of playing it another time and the likelihood of trying new features. 1. Introduction Discrimination and societal stereotypes against specifc groups are still afecting a large number of people today and have very complex social roots. Even the concerned groups sometimes may normalize and reproduce the stereotypes against themselves while evaluating it as common sense. Increased use of computers and technology may be defned today as a remedy of long-lived inequalities in society, but it is also true that technology has not afected all groups in a society in the same way. Technology is advancing while leaving some people behind and may perpetuate precisely same inequalities in a digitalized world. It is called “digital divide” which is “a term that has been used to refer to the gap between those who have access to technology and those who do not, between those who have the expertise and training to utilize technology and those who do not” (Cooper & Weaver, 2003, p. 3). The digital divide is not only caused by lack of ownership or use of technology. Further- more, negative/positive stereotypes, narrowly prescribed social roles and norms which have been installed in people's minds throughout their lifespan could feed on this digital divide and maintain their pre- sence in a virtual world maybe even more efciently and sophistically than the real one. A digital divide also exists between men and women in which women cannot access and take advantage of technology as much as men do. The computer is not inherently gendered however it has been constructed socially as a male domain which causes “computer-phobia” among women (Cooper & Kugler, 2009; Turkle, 1986). The use, liking and competence of computer technology are associated with being a male (Brosnan & Davidson, 1996) as a result of the existing gender stereotypes and societal expectations which also put females in a dis- advantaged position in the process. Several studies in the past stated that attitudes toward technology difer signifcantly between males and females in terms of interest, knowledge and competence (Cooper, Wilder, & Mackie, 1985; Bame, Dugger, de Vries, & McBee, 1993; Durndell, Glissov, & Siann, 1997; Comber, Colley, Hargreaves, & Dorn, 1997; Nelson & Cooper, 1997; Young, 2000; Margolis & Fisher, 2001; Hale, 2002; Dickhauser & Stiensmeyer-Pelster, 2002). According to https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2019.05.029 Received 9 May 2018; Received in revised form 15 May 2019; Accepted 22 May 2019 ∗ Corresponding author. Faculty of Communication Galatasaray University, 34349, İstanbul, Turkey. E-mail addresses: lizyucel@gmail.com (Y. Yücel), krizvanoglu@gsu.edu.tr (K. Rızvanoğlu). Computers in Human Behavior 99 (2019) 352–365 Available online 25 May 2019 0747-5632/ © 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. T