Ethical User Interfaces: Exploring the Effects of Dark Patterns on Facebook
This research addresses the problem of unethical user interfaces on social media, specifically Facebook, for users and society, though it is incremental as it builds on existing concerns in HCI and social sciences.
The study investigated how Facebook's interface features, particularly dark patterns, affect user privacy and well-being, finding through a survey of 116 participants that these features lead to increased privacy concerns, changes in usage behavior, and cases of addiction and mental health issues.
Many researchers have been concerned with whether social media has a negative impact on the well-being of their audience. With the popularity of social networking sites (SNS) steadily increasing, psychological and social sciences have shown great interest in their effects and consequences on humans. In this work, we investigate Facebook using the tools of HCI to find connections between interface features and the concerns raised by these domains. Using an empirical design analysis, we identify interface interferences impacting users' online privacy. Through a subsequent survey (n=116), we find usage behaviour changes due to increased privacy concerns and report individual cases of addiction and mental health issues. These observations are the results of a rapidly changing SNS creating a gap of understanding between users' interactions with the platform and future consequences. We explore how HCI can help close this gap and work towards more ethical user interfaces in the future.