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An Ontology of Dark Patterns Knowledge: Foundations, Definitions, and a Pathway for Shared Knowledge-Building

Colin M. Gray, Cristiana Santos, Nataliia Bielova, Thomas Mildner

TL;DR

This paper proposes a three-level ontology with standardized definitions for 64 synthesized dark pattern types across low-, meso-, and high-level patterns and illustrates how this ontology can support translational research and regulatory action, including transdisciplinary pathways to extend the initial types through new empirical work across application and technology domains.

Abstract

Deceptive and coercive design practices are increasingly used by companies to extract profit, harvest data, and limit consumer choice. Dark patterns represent the most common contemporary amalgamation of these problematic practices, connecting designers, technologists, scholars, regulators, and legal professionals in transdisciplinary dialogue. However, a lack of universally accepted definitions across the academic, legislative and regulatory space has likely limited the impact that scholarship on dark patterns might have in supporting sanctions and evolved design practices. In this paper, we seek to support the development of a shared language of dark patterns, harmonizing ten existing regulatory and academic taxonomies of dark patterns and proposing a three-level ontology with standardized definitions for 65 synthesized dark patterns types across low-, meso-, and high-level patterns. We illustrate how this ontology can support translational research and regulatory action, including pathways to extend our initial types through new empirical work and map across application domains.

An Ontology of Dark Patterns Knowledge: Foundations, Definitions, and a Pathway for Shared Knowledge-Building

TL;DR

This paper proposes a three-level ontology with standardized definitions for 64 synthesized dark pattern types across low-, meso-, and high-level patterns and illustrates how this ontology can support translational research and regulatory action, including transdisciplinary pathways to extend the initial types through new empirical work across application and technology domains.

Abstract

Deceptive and coercive design practices are increasingly used by companies to extract profit, harvest data, and limit consumer choice. Dark patterns represent the most common contemporary amalgamation of these problematic practices, connecting designers, technologists, scholars, regulators, and legal professionals in transdisciplinary dialogue. However, a lack of universally accepted definitions across the academic, legislative and regulatory space has likely limited the impact that scholarship on dark patterns might have in supporting sanctions and evolved design practices. In this paper, we seek to support the development of a shared language of dark patterns, harmonizing ten existing regulatory and academic taxonomies of dark patterns and proposing a three-level ontology with standardized definitions for 65 synthesized dark patterns types across low-, meso-, and high-level patterns. We illustrate how this ontology can support translational research and regulatory action, including pathways to extend our initial types through new empirical work and map across application domains.
Paper Structure (23 sections, 5 figures, 3 tables)

This paper contains 23 sections, 5 figures, 3 tables.

Table of Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. Motivation & Background
  3. Methodology
  4. Data Collection
  5. Data Analysis
  6. Creating the Ontology Framework
  7. Harmonizing Definitions of Dark Patterns Types
  8. Mapping the Evolution of Dark Patterns
  9. Creating a Definitional Structure by Ontology Level
  10. High-Level Patterns
  11. Meso-Level Patterns
  12. Low-Level Patterns
  13. Extending the Ontology Based on Current and Future Scholarship
  14. Dark Patterns In Non-Western Cultural Contexts
  15. Contextual Dark Patterns in Different Screen Modalities
  16. ...and 8 more sections

Figures (5)

  • Figure 1: Our method for creating the ontology, mapping to the steps in Section \ref{['sec:ontologymethod']}.
  • Figure 2: A screenshot of our Miro workspace where we organized and clustered elements of the ten source taxonomies. Columns indicate an entire structure of meso- and low-level patterns underneath a high-level pattern and yellow Post-It notes indicate draft meso-level patterns. The elements are color-coded based on which taxonomy they came from. A full version of this workspace is included as a supplemental material.
  • Figure 3: A visual mapping of the evolution of dark patterns in the academic taxonomies we analyzed from 2018-2021. Each row includes elements of the related taxonomy by year and source, and connecting lines indicate relationships between or reiterations of different patterns over time. Pattern names in gray boxes are high-level patterns, pattern names in white boxes are low-level patterns or otherwise lack hierarchy, and pattern names at the bottom are the final high-level patterns we adopt in our ontology. A full version of this mapping is included as a supplemental material.
  • Figure 4: Our ontology of dark patterns organized by level of pattern. "D" indicates a direct use of the pattern language in the original source(s) and "I" indicates an inferred similarity between different terminology used across two or more pattern types. Sources are indicated by abbreviation and are colored cyan if they are regulatory reports or magenta if they are academic or practitioner sources. "Br" indicates his 2018 patterns and "Br23" indicates his 2023 patterns. Italized pattern names indicate new pattern types introduced in this paper while all other text relies upon the sources indicated. Underlined sources indicate the earliest mention of that pattern or patterns in the sources we analyzed. A full description of the inferred pattern names is included in supplemental material to support future work.
  • Figure 5: Ontology of dark patterns organized by level of pattern, continued.