Addictive platform features and digital addiction: Evidence from Germany

In order to capture users' attention and increase the amount of time they spend using digital devices and services, companies integrate features such as personalised recommendations, autoplay, infinite scrolling and push notifications. These features exploit psychological biases to foster frequent and prolonged usage, which can lead to problematic behaviours. This study uses an online survey to examine how consumers rate attention-grabbing, addiction-promoting designs on three types of platform, and the relationship between these designs and the addictive use of services. The study also examines users' self-regulation tactics and their perceptions of the impact of these designs on related addictions - in this case, shopping addiction. Most respondents report no noticeable effects of addictive designs on their usage time or purchasing behaviour. The average perceived impact is nearly neutral. However, when considering only the non-neutral responses, the perceived effects of the individual designs vary considerably. Usage time is more often perceived as prolonged, while shopping activity is perceived as decreased rather than increased. The strength of these effects also varies between different types of platform. Notably, a stronger perception of the effects of the designs correlates positively with higher values on the addiction scale in both domains. This suggests that these features may contribute to addiction development.