Over the past decade, there has been a rise in the number of people working on crowdsourcing platforms. Although those who work on crowdworking platforms (i.e., crowdworkers) value having autonomy over scheduling their own time, research suggests that they do not benefit from the temporal flexibility to choose when and for how long to work. Therefore, in this thesis, we aim to understand what limits the temporal flexibility of crowdworkers, and how this aspect impacts the workers. Our ultimate goal is to inform the design of future crowdsourcing platforms.

To achieve the aim of this thesis, we employ Value Sensitive Design (VSD) as our theory and design framework. Using the lens of VSD and a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods, we show that crowdworkers’ temporal flexibility is limited by three different types of time constraints: (i) worker-imposed time constraints, (ii) client-imposed time constraints, and (iii) platform-imposed time constraints. These time constraints limit: (a) the temporal working preferences of workers, (b) the time workers have to make decisions, and (c) the work pace and work schedules of workers. Ultimately, we confirm that the existing features of crowdsourcing platforms do not fully support flexible temporal arrangements for workers; instead, these platforms favour clients’ flexibility to workers’ detriment.

In this thesis, we make three contributions to HCI and CSCW. The contributions are to the knowledge, practice, and design of crowdsourcing platforms. Firstly, we provide empirical evidence to show how time constraints impact crowdworkers. Secondly, we provide a conceptual framework of time constraints within crowdsourcing platforms. Finally, we provide a series of design goals that embody temporal flexibility as a value of central interest for crowdworkers.