Manipulative Design and Older Adults: Co-Creating Magic Machines to Understand Experiences of Online Manipulation

Manipulative designs --- i.e., dark patterns --- have pervaded online interactions in most sectors from e-commerce to social media, banking, and healthcare. Understanding how individuals experience and cope with online manipulation is essential to support evolved design practices and regulatory measures. Yet studies on populations who may be more vulnerable to online manipulation are scarce. Through a series of ``magic machines'' workshops, we investigated the experiences of older adults (N=31) with online manipulation, their needs, and the strategies they imagine to resist manipulative practices. Our results show that participants tend to attribute manipulation to an ``unknown'' person and do not distinguish platforms from content. Through their machines, they expressed four primary needs to resist manipulation: knowledge, awareness, right to sanctuary, and control. Our study contributes insights into older adults' experiences with online manipulation and brings design challenges for effective countermeasures to manipulation that address the needs of all users.