Ethical Dimensions of App Designs: A Case Study of Photo- and Video-Editing Apps

Abstract

This article presents an ethnographic study on the user experience (UX) design of the photo- and video-editing apps of millennial and Generation Z participants from different cultural groups. The case study calls attention to the implications of rhetorical misrepresentations of reality that photo- and video-editing apps afford and encourages future large-scale studies on the negative psychological and behavioral impacts such apps can have on users’ psychology, behaviors, and well-being. The authors use frameworks in virtue ethics to argue that despite slight variations, photo and video app UX has ethical implications that can negatively impact young adult users. For example, the study suggests that the photo and video app features tend to subvert the traditional Chinese virtues of modesty, honesty, and the middle way and that hyperbolic and playful designs can cause addictive behaviors.