Deceptive Patterns as a Sociotechnical Phenomenon: Review, Catalog, and Discussion

Abstract

Background: Deceptive patterns are interface design strategies aimed at misleading users or favoring specific interests, compromising user experiences and ethical privacy principles. These patterns involve exploit different issues of the interaction between humans and technology, revealing gaps in the scientific literature regarding their understanding and working mechanisms. Purpose: This research characterizes deceptive patterns as a sociotechnical phenomenon, integrating human and technical dimensions while offering a self-explainable interactive catalog to raise awareness among users and designers. Methods: To characterize deceptive patterns as a sociotechnical phenomenon, a systematic literature review in Computer Science was conducted, and the Semiotic Framework was applied to analyze and organize the sociotechnical aspects of identified patterns in an integrated manner. An exploratory evaluation of the interactive catalog was conducted, combining heuristic evaluation and focus group. Results: The research identified multiple deceptive patterns in scientific literature. Analysis revealed that existing studies frequently addressed specific aspects of patterns, such as typologies or effects, and do not focus on sociotechnical issues. The exploratory evaluation suggested that the self-explainable catalog is useful and easy to use, with potential to inform users and promote awareness regarding the deceptive patterns existence and functioning. Conclusion: The study contributes to an informed understanding of deceptive patterns, highlighting the need for an approach that integrates human and technical dimensions. The self-explainable catalog is a promising tool to inform and promote awareness about the topic. By exposing the risks and mechanisms of these patterns, the research seeks to promote awareness among users and designers towards ethical interface design practices.