Digital Gender Inclusion: Qualitative Research Guide

Evidano is an AI-powered qualitative data analysis platform that helps researchers analyze interviews, open-ended surveys, and documents. According to the PLOS One study protocol by Shahil-Feroz et al. (published 20 August 2026), gender-based digital exclusion in Pakistan is driven by family gatekeeping, sociocultural and religious restrictions, safety concerns, and patriarchal norms (PLOS One). This post translates that protocol into practical, AI-enabled qualitative research steps for researchers and NGOs working on digital gender inclusion, showing where automated transcription, translation, thematic analysis, and co-design synthesis can shorten the path from field notes to actionable policy recommendations.

Key Takeaways

According to the PLOS One study protocol by Shahil-Feroz et al. (published 20 August 2026), gender-based digital exclusion in Pakistan reflects "deeply entrenched sociocultural barriers" and requires household- and community-level co-design with gatekeepers to create sustainable change (PLOS One).

The PLOS One protocol (published 20 August 2026) plans a three-phase community-based participatory research project starting February 2026 with participant recruitment scheduled August–November 2026.
The PLOS One authors cite the GSMA Mobile Gender Gap Report 2024 showing women in Pakistan are 38% less likely than men to own a mobile phone or access mobile internet (GSMA, 2024).
The PLOS One protocol will collect approximately 36–45 participants for FGDs and interviews, and the two-year project is funded with a SSHRC grant of $70, 626 awarded in the 2025 competition.

What happened and how the study works

Answer: The PLOS One paper is a study protocol that lays out a participatory qualitative study to probe why marginalized women in Azam Basti, Karachi, are excluded from digital access and to co-design solutions with community gatekeepers (PLOS One).

The PLOS One protocol by Shahil-Feroz et al. (published 20 August 2026) describes a three-phase design: Phase 1 forms a Community Advisory Committee, Phase 2 runs focus group discussions and 4–5 in-depth interviews per participant group (target total 36–45 participants), and Phase 3 hosts three co-design workshops to generate community-informed strategies.

The PLOS One authors state the project will use photo-elicitation, role-playing, and Braun and Clarke's reflexive thematic analysis, with transcripts created in Urdu and translated to English for NVivo coding (PLOS One).

The PLOS One protocol explicitly frames digital inclusion using the United Nations definition: "equitable, meaningful, and safe access to use, lead, and design of digital technologies, services, and associated opportunities for everyone, everywhere, " attributed to the United Nations in the protocol.

Findings snapshot

Date	Metric	Value / Detail	Implication
20 August 2026	Study protocol publication	PLOS One	Protocol documents CBPR steps and analytic plan for co-designed digital inclusion strategies
2024	Mobile gender gap (GSMA)	GSMA Mobile Gender Gap Report 2024: women 38% less likely than men to own/access mobile internet	Quantifies national-scale access inequality to inform local qualitative inquiry
Feb 2026–Jan 2028	Project timeline	Two-year project starting Feb 2026; recruitment Aug–Nov 2026; data collection complete by Apr 2027	Provides schedule for stakeholder engagement and for producing results (late 2027 onward)
2025 competition	Funding	SSHRC Insight Development Grant of $70, 626	Enables the three-phase CBPR approach and community compensation
Phase 2 (planned)	Sample size	Approximately 36–45 participants across FGDs and interviews	Sufficient for reflexive thematic saturation in focused CBPR setting

Implications for qualitative researchers and program designers

Answer: The PLOS One protocol implies that qualitative researchers should design studies that engage household gatekeepers and use participatory co-design, not only individual-level digital literacy training (PLOS One).

The PLOS One authors argue that interventions targeting only access or literacy are insufficient because "deeply entrenched sociocultural barriers" shape technology use, so researchers should embed family and community leaders into data collection and solution design.

For program designers the PLOS One protocol suggests budgeting for multi-stakeholder workshops, culturally appropriate arts-based knowledge translation (videos, infographics, voice messages), and sustained engagement beyond the research window to address norm change.

How Evidano helps researchers translate CBPR data into actions

Problem: multi-language audio and translation burden

Solution: Use automated transcription and translation to accelerate turnarounds while preserving cultural terms.

Evidano is an AI-powered qualitative data analysis platform that helps researchers analyze interviews, open-ended surveys, and documents; Evidano offers transcription with custom dictionary and PII redaction and translation with a custom dictionary to keep Urdu or Sindhi terms intact on export (Evidano Speech-to-Text, Evidano Translation).

Problem: thematic synthesis across small, participatory samples

Solution: Combine reflexive thematic analysis with AI-assisted coding to speed initial code generation and then refine codes with community advisory confirmation.

Evidano provides thematic and cross-segment analyses and visualizations (co-occurrence networks, hierarchical codes) so teams can present validated themes back to advisory committees for iterative co-analysis (Evidano Features).

Problem: messy co-design artifacts (images, role-play notes, voice messages)

Solution: Ingest multi-modal data (transcripts, photos, workshop notes) and run content-frequency analysis to quantify idea adoption across gatekeeper groups.

Evidano supports website/social scraping and AI chat over your documents so you can query co-design outputs and export stakeholder-ready evidence summaries for policy briefs and community dissemination (Evidano AI Chatbot).

Problem: ethical handling of sensitive group data

Solution: Use platforms with enterprise-grade data security and role-based access when managing CAB-reviewed transcripts and consented recordings.

Evidano stores encrypted data and does not use customer data to train third-party models; see Evidano Data Security for details.

FAQ: digital gender inclusion

What is "digital gender inclusion" in the context of Pakistan?

Answer: Digital gender inclusion means equitable, meaningful, and safe access to digital technologies for women, as defined by the United Nations and cited in the PLOS One protocol.

The PLOS One protocol (published 20 August 2026) frames digital gender inclusion around not only device ownership but also autonomy, safety, and the capacity to participate in design and leadership of digital services (PLOS One).

How large is the mobile access gap for women in Pakistan?

Answer: According to the GSMA Mobile Gender Gap Report 2024, women in Pakistan were 38% less likely than men to own a mobile phone or access mobile internet (GSMA, 2024).

The PLOS One protocol cites that statistic to justify local qualitative investigation into the social and household dynamics that numeric surveys cannot fully explain (PLOS One).

Why use community advisory committees and gatekeepers in this research?

Answer: The PLOS One authors say engaging family gatekeepers and a Community Advisory Committee improves cultural relevance, recruitment, and validation of findings in participatory research (PLOS One).

The protocol plans CAC meetings quarterly and uses the CAC to co-develop FGD guides, photo prompts, and to review analysis, which the authors expect will increase uptake and sustainability of co-designed solutions.

Can AI tools replace community validation and co-design?

Answer: No, the PLOS One protocol argues that community co-design and gatekeeper engagement are essential and AI should augment, not replace, participatory processes (PLOS One).

AI-enabled workflows can shorten transcription and analytic cycles so researchers have more time for community dialogue and iterative workshop facilitation.

What quotes from the protocol summarize its intent?

Answer: Two concise quotes capture the protocol: the United Nations definition of digital inclusion and the authors' emphasis on sociocultural barriers.

The protocol cites the United Nations definition: "equitable, meaningful, and safe access to use, lead, and design of digital technologies, services, and associated opportunities for everyone, everywhere" (United Nations, cited in PLOS One).

The protocol also warns that marginalized women's exclusion stems from "deeply entrenched sociocultural barriers" (Shahil-Feroz et al., PLOS One, 20 August 2026).

Conclusion & Next Steps

The PLOS One protocol by Shahil-Feroz et al. (published 20 August 2026) provides a clear, participatory roadmap for studying and addressing gender-based digital exclusion in Azam Basti, Karachi (PLOS One).

AI-enabled qualitative workflows can reduce transcription and coding time, freeing researchers to do the community engagement and co-design work the protocol prioritizes.

If you are running similar CBPR projects, consider combining automated transcription, translation, thematic synthesis, and visual exports to speed policy-ready outputs.

Get started with an AI workflow for qualitative research, Try Evidano for free.

Topics

digital gender inclusion
gender-based digital exclusion
qualitative research Pakistan
AI-enabled qualitative analysis
co-design workshops

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