A Systematic Review of User Experiments Measuring the Effects of Dark Patterns

TL;DR

This systematic review analyzes experimental studies on dark patterns, revealing they significantly influence user behavior with limited success of interventions and minimal variation across personal characteristics.

Contribution

It synthesizes recent empirical evidence on dark patterns' effects, highlighting their broad impact and the limited effectiveness of mitigation strategies.

Findings

Dark patterns significantly alter user behavior.

External interventions are mostly ineffective in reducing effects.

Effects of dark patterns are consistent across different user demographics.

Abstract

Deceptive/Manipulative Patterns (DMP) are interface designs, also known as ``dark patterns,'' that manipulate user behavior. While considerable attention has been paid to their ethical and legal implications, empirical evidence about their real-world effects remains diffuse. This review synthesizes up-to-date experimental studies, focusing on works that quantify how (or whether) DMPs influence users. We also aggregate findings on interventions aimed at reducing DMP effects. Our synthesis highlights the experimental agreement that DMPs do significantly alter user behavior (with large variance in effect size) and that external interventions have been mostly unsuccessful in mitigating their effects. Lastly, we show that significant correlations between DMP effects and personal characteristics (e.g., age or political affiliation) are uncommon, indicating DMPs similarly affected nearly all populations tested. By summarizing the experimental evidence, we clarify the effects of DMPs, highlight gaps and tensions in the existing experimental literature, and help inform ongoing research and policy directions.