The Hidden Persuaders of the Digital Age

PER HIDDEN PERSUADERS OF THE DIGITAL AGE M O B AX m o b @ax @axbom THE

Take out your phone.

Write a message to someone you care about. Perhaps someone who has not heard from you in a while. Just wanted to say hi. Hope you’re having a great day. Thinking about you. Would love to get together soon. Realized we haven’t talked in a while. Talk this weekend?

When good turns out to be bad m o b x @a

The overall effect of food aid programs is the disruption of local agricultural markets, making it harder for poor countries to develop their own resources and feed themselves in the long run.

Anchoring Loss aversion Decoy effect Sunk coﬆ fallacy Confirmation bias Expectation bias Bandwagon effect

Bias is the tendency to have an opinion, or view, that is often without considering evidence and other information. Biases are a human trait, and can be a weakness. As designers we are not learning about human weaknesses so that we may exploit them. Our job is to remedy them.

The private social network for your neighborhood. My boyfriend just saw two suspicious AfricanAmerican men in a car. They drove their car up the street, made a U-turn, and parked.” Imagine having to realize that the platform you built to bring communities closer is in fact creating great divides within them.

“I’m a person of color so it really cut deep. We hated the idea that something we built would be viewed as racist… I hadn’t seen it in my own neighborhood’s Nextdoor and so didn’t realize it was an issue for us. Once I got past that, I was powered by the challenge to do something about it.” Nirav Tolia, CEO of Nextdoor

How NextDoor managed negative impact ✓ Listening ✓ Assuming ownership ✓ Transparency ✓ Positive friction ✓ Leadership buy-in

OUTCOME

IMPACT

Whenever I’m asked to autograph a copy of “Nudge,” the book I wrote with Cass Sunstein, the Harvard law professor, I sign it, “Nudge for good.” Unfortunately, that is meant as a plea, not an expectation. – Richard A Thaler

“UX is about putting people firﬆ”

The fallacy of frictionless m o b x @a

A B “Thanks for giving me a break buddy!”

LOW HIGH BRAINPOWER

profit LOW HIGH BRAINPOWER buyer uses reptilian brain

76 work days http://techland.time.com/2012/03/06/youd-need-76-work-days-to-read-all-your-privacy-policies-each-year/

Liﬆening for negative impact m o b x @a

Impact represents an intended or unintended significant change that affects people on an individual or societal level. input output outcome impact investments and resources product/service provided immediate achievements medium/long-term consequences measured rarely measured cultural economic environmental health / well-being political scientific social technological Impact represents an intended or unintended significant change that affects people and/or the planet.

Impact represents an intended or unintended significant change that affects people on an individual or societal level. input output outcome impact investments and resources product/service provided immediate achievements medium/long-term consequences measured rarely measured cultural economic environmental health / well-being political scientific social technological In finance, we have developed shared fundamentals, which include risk, return, liquidity, volatility… to manage financial goals. For impact, there is a shared underﬆanding that impact refers to material effects experienced by people and planet, both positive and negative and include 5 dimensions: what, how much, who, contribution and risk.

Hungry? INPUT OUTPUT OUTCOME IMPACT Inveﬆ in Own Eat Weight gain chocolate chocolate chocolate Acne Soon hungry again ✓ Hunger corrected Addiction

Lots on your mind? PUSH NOTIFICATIONS INPUT OUTPUT OUTCOME IMPACT Communicate Notifications Notifications sent Stress/Anxiety need built User reminded False positives People act Lower work performance on the notification Concentration lapses Diminishing truﬆ

Notifications LOOK OVER HERE! Your go-to design choice for interrupting human relationships and disrupting concentration.

Online behavioral therapy. Notifications to psychologiﬆs. WHAT Induced stress HOW MUCH WHO A lot Overworked psychologists CONTRIBUTION RISK Big Patient harm The Impact Management Project is the voice of over 700 practitioners from across geographies and disciplines.

Peak Notification Hey friend! I just wanted to take a slice out of your life. Bye!

Peak Asshole Allow notifications? YES NO

A B

A higher conversion rate is not equivalent to “better for the person”.

Ask a psychiatriﬆ

Buying milk online 6 for 70kr

LOW HIGH BRAINPOWER

Impact represents an intended or unintended significant change that affects people on an individual or societal level. input output outcome impact investments and resources product/service provided immediate achievements medium/long-term consequences measured rarely measured cultural economic environmental health / well-being political scientific social technological The beﬆ way to adopt an ethical mindset is to include impact risk assessment in your work.

Why designers fail PER M O B AX

“Life is a Long Journey between Human Being and Being Human. Let’s take at least one step each day to cover the distance.” — Drishti Bablani It would appear… that designers are also human beings.

Confirmation bias Choice-supportive bias Framing “This works really well. Yes, I understand completely.” “I believe you.”

4 out of 20 users could not find the search function on the website. 16 out of 20 users found the search function on the website.

Many designers express an ethical boundary of not working for tobacco, gambling or even soda companies… …yet have no problem working with solutions that encourage people to submit to a sedentary lifeﬆyle, engage in addictive behavior or pursue short-term rewards.

the anxiety is real the nudges don’t make it easier what is right?

“The design industry is part of the problem. There is an idea that we constantly have to produce new things. The industry is oriented around launches and designing a new one and another new one.” – Florian Idenburg, principal of SO-IL

The problem-solver is part of the problem. Wherever you go, there you are.

The paradox of “a seat at the table”. Inﬆead of focusing on people, designers are focusing on numbers.

The power of you PER M O B AX

Cognitive dissonance The mental discomfort (psychological ﬆress) experienced by a person who simultaneously holds two or more contradictory beliefs, ideas, or values. A consequence of a person’s performing an action that contradicts personal beliefs, ideals, and values; and also occurs when confronted with new information that contradicts said beliefs, ideals, and values.

Raise your hand and take it down when you hear a queﬆion you do not agree with. ✓ I have lied. ✓ I have lied to someone I care about. ✓ When I lie it is often to protect the feelings of the person I am lying to. ✓ I believe I will continue to lie. ✓ I have based design decisions on too little data. ✓ I will continue to design with too little data.

I am a good person? You are a human

Relativism - Absolutism Situation ethics Utilitarianism Kantian ethics Virtue ethics Token absolutism

PERSON 1: “Does my hair look good.” PERSON 2: (lying) “Yes.” PERSON 1: “Awesome; I’ll keep going to this new hairdresser I’ve found then.” Outcome: Everyone feels good in the moment. Impact: Person 1 will keep having bad hair.

I don’t care I want to behave responsibly I want to support activities and businesses that have a positive effect on the world I want to contribute to solutions

You are never juﬆ working on an interface or an information architecture. You are working on a slice of other people’s lives.

Your material and your tools m o b x @a

Richard Lee, New Zealand

Prejudice that causes negative impact is already woven into the fabric of the Internet. If you don’t take a ﬆand and make considered choices for change, minorities and underserved groups will keep being hurt.

The legacy of city planner Robert Moses

We talk a lot about empathy in UX but we rarely talk about how empathy itself is prejudiced. People who are already being hurt are the ones who are moﬆ likely to get hurt by your design.

Gender and sexuality minorities Religious minorities Racial minorities Ethnic minorities Age minorities People with disabilities People in poverty Sufferers of crime

adjective having or showing laziness or negligence. Synonyms: lax, negligent, neglectful, remiss, careless, slapdash, slipshod, lackadaisical, lazy, ineﬃcient, incompetent, inattentive, offhand, casual, disorderly, disorganized;

ASSESSMENT IMPACT Racial profiling Important negative outcome Neutral Important positive outcome What How much Marginal effect Deep effect For few For many Short-term Long-term Slowly Quickly People of color Well-served Underserved Who Adapted from www.impactmanagementproject.com

The Chlamydia Home Teﬆ Kit female male

The Chlamydia Home Teﬆ Kit penis vagina

The Chlamydia Home Teﬆ Kit penis vagina A United Nations fact sheet eﬆimates that up to 1.7 per cent of the population “is born with intersex traits”.

My name is Per and I am a white man. I am a middle-aged, cisgender, privileged, liberal designer with a boatload of prejudice. I am not a person you should truﬆ for answers. I will never get inclusion on my own. No matter who my friends are. I need to work hard to include a diverse mix of people in the design process. And I need to liﬆen for negative impact all the time. I love my job but I need to love people firﬆ.

DickPicLocator

Adding friction m o b x @a

YOUR WEBSITE HOME INFO ABOUT CONTACT WE ARE UNIQUE READ MORE We are extremely unique and different from our competitors by having a website that looks exactly the same. Always. Three. Columns. We could have four columns. But everyone else has three. Feeling creative we added pic of smiling woman here. Yup, the website layout says we can offer only 3 services. Idea stolen, with utmost respect, from Dave Ellis. / novolume.co.uk

You will find the password by reading the welcome information carefully. g in gg lo r fo d or sw as p e th d n fi l il w u In this film yo r ou Y . rs te ac ar ch l al sm 5 , em st sy g in to the bookin l. ai m en io at rm fi n co e th in is e usernam Code of conduct explained whilst giving out one letter of the password every thirty seconds.

“Dana made it hard for people to join, but that was great, because our members were loyal, active and serious.” LOW HIGH BRAINPOWER Kevin Spacey about creating triggerstreet.com, a community for script writers.

LOW HIGH BRAINPOWER LOW HIGH BRAINPOWER We design thinking

Final words Your promise to your profession m o b x @a

Inﬆead of this… ✓ I didn’t know it ✓ I didn’t mean it ✓ I was forced ✓ It wasn’t me ✓ I didn’t understand

…do this. ✓ Listen (for real) ✓ Assume ownership ✓ Be transparent ✓ Use positive friction ✓ Make ethics and impact assessment part of your process

Did you get a reply?

Responsible design is a muscle that needs practice to grow.

Please choose the path of positive impact.

in progress Slides! And a free book preview axbom.com/euroia