How many times have you lost 30 minutes infinite-scrolling through “You grew up in the 90’s if…” articles, or found yourself clicking deep in a stranger’s wedding album, or—god forbid— realize you’re way more informed about current celebrities than you ever intended to be? I can’t tell you how often I’ve caught myself in this trap, and how guilty I feel when I wind up here. At best I’ve numbed my brain with useless trivia, at worst I’ve squandered an opportunity to work on something that I actually care about.
Arriving here is no accident. These experiences are meticulously designed and strategized to drive up page-views and keep you on a site. A content strategist developed “can’t-miss!” taglines and chose juicy clickable images; an interaction designer made it easy to keep clicking through to the next link. It was good (bad) UX that gets and keeps you there.
Bad UX is user experience and content strategy with ulterior motives, that doesn’t have your best interest in mind. Dark Patterns has excellently defined these patterns in interaction design as “UI anti-pattern.” From “Bait and Switch” to “Trick Questions,” Dark Patterns sheds light on the tricks of bad UX and how they have their basis in psychological manipulation.
In Your App Makes Me Fat, Kathy Sierra (@seriouspony) posits that the more intuitive the user experience, the more cognitive resources users are left with to do other valuable things with their time, and the easier it is to turn our attention away. Unfortunately, when these powers are used for bad the effects can be harmful:
“[I]f it’s “content” designed solely to suck people in (“7 ways to be OMG awesome!!”) for the chance to “convert”, we’re hurting people. If we’re pumping out “content” because frequency, we’re hurting people.”
You shouldn’t be left feeling bad after a web browsing experience. We’re humans designing for other humans, the internet should be an equalizer and a place for enlightenment and productivity.
It’s frustrating to be manipulated. So beat these bad designers at their own game. Don’t let them modify your behavior for the worse, take responsibility for your own behavior. Don’t make it so easy to be distracted. Put up barriers to the distractions that drain your focus and your time.
The first step is identifying your danger zones. This is probably easy. Anything in the category of social media, anything with infinite scrolling. If you need help, try using RescueTime to determine how much time you’re spending where online. That is, if you can handle the truth.
Once you’ve identified these, eliminate the shortcuts. Audit your bookmark bar. Are your time-sucks lined up neatly in a row? Take them away. My main temptation is the various sites that let me scroll infinitely, with eye candy of videos and links interspersed: Facebook, Twitter, Feedly, Tumblr. All the big guys. So I took them off my bookmark bar. I removed Facebook from my phone completely. Don’t make it so easy for yourself to be sucked in.
Employ a self-timer in your workflow and stick to it. I like using a Pomodoro Timer which staggers periods of concentration and short breaks plus the occasional longer break. Also- never underestimate the restorative power of walking outside or stepping away from your screen. Take care of your body to take care of your mind.
When you pull yourself out of a mindless internet hole, know that it’s not your fault. But also know that you have the power to not let it happen again (or as often). Think like a UX Designer and intentionally design the way you use the web so that it works for you, not you for it. The internet is amazing and wonderful and if we are able to take control of our experience, it can be a solely positive force in our lives- for productivity, connecting with people, and broadening our minds. Don’t let it make you dumber or less productive. UX design yourself into web-browsing bliss.
