Diverse Participation and Newcomer Risk Perception in Open Source Software Communities

Open source software (OSS) represents a critical form of global digital infrastructure, and yet its contributor base is worryingly homogeneous. OSS is notorious for its gender rep-resentation problem - only 10 % of OSS contributors are women, compared to 27 % at the broader industry level. Furthermore, OSS contributors are skewing older, as fewer younger contrib-utors are getting involved. While the OSS literature documents the barriers to participation of cis gender women well, a more holistic understanding of OSS participation is lacking, as are the perspectives of other underrepresented groups. My proposal aims to develop a deeper understanding of how younger and underrepresented potential contributors are being introduced to OSS in varied educational settings and which characteristics may predict their likelihood of future OSS participation or avoidance. My goal for this proposal is to understand how we can encourage more OSS participation amongst younger potential contributors, especially the sustained participation of underrepresented ones.