[Paper Review] Deception by Design: A Temporal Dark Patterns Audit of McDonald's Self-Ordering Kiosk Flow

Aditya Kumar Purohit, Yuwei Liu+3 more|arXiv (Cornell University)|Mar 3, 2026

Consumer Retail Behavior Studies0 citations

TL;DR

The paper applies the Temporal Analysis of Dark Patterns (TADP) to a German McDonald’s self-ordering kiosk, revealing temporally layered dark patterns across intra-, inter-, and system levels that push users toward upsells under time pressure.

ABSTRACT

Self-ordering kiosks (SOKs) are widely deployed in fast food restaurants, transforming food ordering into digitally mediated, self-navigated interactions. While these systems enhance efficiency and average order value, they also create opportunities for manipulative interface design practices known as dark patterns. This paper presents a structured audit of the McDonald's self-ordering kiosk in Germany using the Temporal Analysis of Dark Patterns (TADP) framework. Through a scenario-based walkthrough simulating a time-pressured user, we reconstructed and analyzed 12 interface steps across intra-page, inter-page, and system levels. We identify recurring high-level strategies implemented through meso-level patterns such as adding steps, false hierarchy, bad defaults, hiding information, and pressured selling, and low-level patterns including visual prominence, confirmshaming, scarcity framing, feedforward ambiguity, emotional sensory manipulation, and partitioned pricing. Our findings demonstrate how these patterns accumulate across the interaction flow and may be amplified by the kiosk's linear task structure and physical context. These findings suggest that hybrid physical--digital consumer interfaces warrant closer scrutiny within emerging regulatory discussions on dark patterns.

Motivation & Objective

• Motivate ethical design by examining how self-ordering kiosks use dark patterns in hybrid physical–digital environments.
• Map temporally layered manipulation along a 12-step kiosk flow using the TADP framework.
• Identify meso- and low-level patterns that accumulate through high-velocity interactions in QSR kiosks.

Proposed method

• Conduct in-situ data collection by direct interaction with a McDonald’s kiosk in Germany.
• Reconstruct the 12-step flow in Omnigraffle with annotations of costs, dependencies, and dark pattern instances.
• Operationalize temporality with a scenario of a time-pressured user choosing first salient/default options.
• Apply the TADP ontology to tag dark patterns at intra-page, inter-page, and system levels.
• Analyze how patterns recur across screens to assess temporal escalation and cumulative effects.

Figure 1 : Intra-page analysis. Across screens A–D of the kiosk flow, annotations highlight social engineering, interface interference, sneaking, and obstruction within early product selection and meal upsell stages.

Experimental results

Research questions

• RQ1 What dark patterns emerge within the 12-step McDonald’s SOK flow in Germany?
• RQ2 How do intrapage, interpage, and system-level patterns accumulate under time pressure?
• RQ3 How do high-level strategies (social engineering, interface interference, obstruction, sneaking) materialize as meso- and low-level patterns?
• RQ4 In what ways does the physical-digital kiosk context amplify these patterns compared to private digital interfaces?
• RQ5 What regulatory and ethical design implications arise for hybrid physical–digital ordering environments?

Key findings

• Recurring high-level strategies: social engineering, interface interference, obstruction, and sneaking across the flow.
• Meso-level patterns include adding steps, false hierarchy, bad defaults, hiding information, pressured selling, and choice overload.
• Low-level patterns include visual prominence, confirmshaming, scarcity framing, feedforward ambiguity, emotional sensory manipulation, and partitioned pricing.
• Temporal escalation shows accumulation of upsell pressure and monetary increases along the 12-step path.
• System-level context (public queue, time pressure, linear task flow) amplifies manipulation beyond individual screens.

Figure 3 : Late-stage dark patterns across Screens I–L, including upsell modals, cancellation prompts, and donation requests. Obstruction, confirmshaming, visual prominence, and scarcity cues increase reversal costs.