Makes a lot of sense.
Facebook’s refresh button has links to another highly addictive activity that people just love. Yes, gambling.
It’s used as a way to keep you on the app longer, and therefore, Facebook can get even more money from advertising and other such things.
According to Adam Alter, an addictive technologies expert, the pull down and refresh button has links to slot machines, and was created on a similar idea to the addictive machines.
In an interview with VICE, Alter revealed the scary origins of the feature and showed how it subliminally works to keep you refreshing.
“You pull the lever to win a prize,” Alter said.
“Which is an intermittent action linked to a variable reward. Variable meaning you might win, or you might not. In the same way you refresh your Facebook updates to see if you’ve won. Or you swipe right on Tinder to see if you’ve won.”
According to Alter, the anticipation is central to you enjoying your experience on the app.
“The delay, and the expectation, is part of the psychological experience – ‘What am I going to get this time?’ ‘Will there be a notification and something new this time?’ The app doesn’t actually need to ‘load’. It could tell instantly if there’s a new notification – but that would not give us those few moments of anticipation that we all crave.”
How many times have you gone online to check something quickly on a social media site, only to find yourself still on the app an hour later?
It’s all part of a design according to Nir Eyal, the author of Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products, it’s all part of what the designers intended.
“The technologies we use have turned into compulsions, if not full-fledged addictions,” Eyal wrote.
“It’s the impulse to check a message notification. It’s the pull to visit YouTube, Facebook, or Twitter for just a few minutes, only to find yourself still tapping and scrolling an hour later.”
