How your phone is designed to grab your attention

Are you finding it hard to put down your phone? When you feel your phone buzz, can you resist the urge to check it? It may not be obvious, but every feature, colour and sound on your smartphone has been optimised by teams of designers and psychologists to keep you coming back for more. Find out about some of the most common persuasive design strategies.

Dark patterns are design tricks used to provoke or manipulate people into buying something, signing up for something or giving away more personal data than they ever intended. Based on human psychology, common design tricks may include the use of particular colours, placement of buttons, unclear text or incomplete information.