Digital nudges interact antagonistically to reduce stopping decision quality
Digital Nudge Effects in Optimal Stopping Games: Antagonistic Interactions in Layered Choice Architectures
Human-Computer Interaction
Summary
This paper studies how different digital nudges—suggestions or cues designed to influence decisions—affect people's choices when deciding the best time to stop searching, like in a hiring scenario. The authors found that one nudge meant to anchor decisions actually made people explore more choices, which was unexpected. Another nudge making certain options stand out had little effect. Most importantly, combining these nudges often worsened decision quality, meaning too many nudges can work against each other. These findings help designers create better digital interfaces that influence decisions ethically and effectively.
What this means in practice
- •For user interface designers: Design interfaces for sequential decisions that avoid combining conflicting nudges that reduce decision quality.
- •For behavioral product managers: Improve digital product nudging strategies by understanding how multiple nudges might counteract each other in choice settings.
Authors
Batisse Manhardt, Ja-Nae Duane
Abstract
Digital nudges have become a prominent area of research in human-centered interaction, yet little is known about how they interact when deployed together. This study examines the individual and combined effects of anchoring, salience, and social proof digital nudges on stopping behavior and outcome quality in a sequential decision task. Using a 2^3 between-subjects factorial design grounded in the secretary problem (N = 181), we find that (1) an anchor nudge significantly increased exploration rather than constraining it (b = 1.207, p = .017); (2) the salience nudge produced the smallest effect of any condition; and (3) combining the anchor and social proof nudges produced the worst outcome quality of any condition ($181.83 vs. $192.21 for anchor-only), with outcome quality declining monotonically as nudge count increased. These findings provide the first controlled evidence for a digital nudge crowding-out effect with direct implications for the ethical design of digital interfaces.