Leveraging Publicly Available Data on VR Headsets for Gender-Responsive Standards Development

Sharing data practices is a primary goal for standards development organizations that are signatories of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe's (UNECE) Declaration for Gender-Responsive Standards and Standards Development. This article presents a data-driven approach to selecting an existing voluntary consensus standard to evaluate for gender responsiveness, and leverages public data to identify potential opportunities for improving its safety impact. The authors found that UL 8400, the Standard for Safety for Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, and Mixed Reality Technology Equipment was a suitable candidate for the initiative, and they highlight potential safety issues through an analysis of incident data and primary research articles.