WeAreDevelopers Logo WeAreDevelopers
Sign in
For You LIVE
World Congress 2025 • Aug 20, 2025 • Session details

The irresistible UX: the psychology of brainwaves and clickbait

Dora Makszy

Where is the line between an irresistible interface and unethical manipulation? Learn how to leverage human psychology to design frictionless experiences that build trust, not dependencies.

Pause
Mute Enter Fullscreen
#1 about 5 min

Speaker background and core experience design abbreviations

Understanding product trios and key design acronyms improves cross-functional collaboration.

#2 about 2 min

Understanding user needs and targeting emotional connections

Transitioning from quantitative data to qualitative user insights builds relatable products.

#3 about 3 min

Aligning product flows with natural human decision making

Reducing cognitive overhead and supporting predictive processing leads to instinctive interactions.

#4 about 3 min

Analyzing brain activity during problem solving and product design

Combining neuroscience with design research reveals how the brain is fully activated during ideation.

#5 about 4 min

Leveraging dopamine and confirmation bias for user retention

Understanding fear of missing out and selective attention helps explain repeating user behaviors.

#6 about 3 min

Grouping elements and minimizing choices for faster decision making

Applying similarity laws and prioritizing focus over feature overload speeds up product flows.

#7 about 5 min

Recognizing the boundary between emotional delight and manipulative patterns

Relying too heavily on urgency and hidden costs degrades user trust and crosses into manipulation.

#8 about 3 min

Prioritizing transparency and trust while protecting vulnerable user groups

Ensuring clear opt-out paths and simple interfaces prevents accidental harm and builds lasting confidence.

#9 about 2 min

Balancing frictionless value delivery with ethical user engagement

Delivering concrete value with minimal friction builds healthy habits without creating manipulative dependencies.

Matching moments

2:11 min

The shift from predictable UX to adaptive AI experiences

Madalena Costa Madalena Costa · Europe 2026 Virtual

3:51 min

Integrating ethical responsibility into core UX goals

Marcy Charollois · WWC 2023

5:20 min

Designing positive UX friction and transparency

Perf + AI

3:02 min

Navigating design trends and subjective aesthetic choices

Chris Heilmann Chris Heilmann +14 · LIVE

4:19 min

Analyzing dark patterns and user psychology in digital kiosks

Chris Heilmann +2 · LIVE

4:09 min

Implementing calm digital spaces for neurodivergent users

Chris Heilmann +2 · LIVE

More from World Congress 2025

GenAI Security: Navigating the Unseen Iceberg thumbnail
24:33
10 months ago

GenAI Security: Navigating the Unseen Iceberg

Maish Saidel-Keesing

Behind the Code: How Women Are Powering the Future of AI thumbnail
30:28
12 months ago

Behind the Code: How Women Are Powering the Future of AI

Alexandra Wudel, Laura Moritz, Madalina Florean

The AI Hype Filter: What’s Real, What’s Investable, What’s Noise? thumbnail
28:12
12 months ago

The AI Hype Filter: What’s Real, What’s Investable, What’s Noise?

Justus Lumpe, Konstantin Vinogradov, Nils Eiteneyer, Stephan Wirris

AI in Leadership: How Technology is Reshaping Executive Roles thumbnail
28:19
12 months ago

AI in Leadership: How Technology is Reshaping Executive Roles

Bernd Datler, Jasmin Kaiser, Jeff Hausmann, Sonja Alvarez

The AI-Ready Stack: Rethinking the Engineering Org of the Future thumbnail
28:09
12 months ago

The AI-Ready Stack: Rethinking the Engineering Org of the Future

Alex Laubscher, Jan Oberhauser, Keno Dreßel, Mirko Novakovic

AI Sovereignty: What Does It Take? thumbnail
29:13
12 months ago

AI Sovereignty: What Does It Take?

Boris Hecker, Clemens Wasner, Robin Hermann, Sonja Alvarez

Upcoming sessions on this topic

Open session

World Congress 2026 North America

Proactive AI That Doesn’t Annoy Users: Building Context-Aware Notification Systems

Raju Dandigam Dandigam

Engineering Manager at Navan

Raju Dandigam Dandigam
Open session

World Congress 2026 North America

Your Brain Is Lying to You: Cognitive Biases in Development

Kate Astrid

Senior Product Engineer

Kate Astrid
Open session

World Congress 2026 North America

Building AI Products That Preserve Choice

Ajit Varma

Head of Firefox at Mozilla

Ajit Varma
Open session

World Congress 2026 North America

Beyond the Code: Human-AI Synergies in Product Development

Ajita Kanchivakam Ananth

Staff Technical Program Manager at Google

Ajita Kanchivakam Ananth
Open session

World Congress 2026 North America

Engineering the Pivot: How Creative Strategy Solves the Hard Problems of AI Accuracy and Scale

Shruti Tiwari

AI/ML product manager, Dell

Shruti Tiwari
Open session

World Congress 2026 North America

The Agentic Engineering Loop

Kevin Lin

Member of Technical Staff at OpenAI

Kevin Lin

Related videos

UX is a fullstack job! thumbnail
27:01
WWC 2024 • almost 2 years ago

UX is a fullstack job!

Marcel Bagemihl, Miriam Becker

The retention flywheel: designing products people don’t want to leave thumbnail
21:50
WWC 2025 • 12 months ago

The retention flywheel: designing products people don’t want to leave

Madalena Costa

UX in the Dev Cycle: Moving from Handoff to Handshake thumbnail
26:13
WWC 2025 • 12 months ago

UX in the Dev Cycle: Moving from Handoff to Handshake

Malte Breitzmann, Saskia Henatsch

The age of agency: When products start to think and act thumbnail
24:21
Europe 2026 Virtual • about 1 month ago

The age of agency: When products start to think and act

Madalena Costa

Designing the intelligence layer: The future of products beyond interfaces thumbnail
24:21
Europe 2026 Virtual • about 1 month ago

Designing the intelligence layer: The future of products beyond interfaces

Madalena Costa

Insight into AI-Driven Design thumbnail
14:29
WWC 2024 • almost 2 years ago

Insight into AI-Driven Design

Madalena Costa

Related articles

From learning to earning

Jobs that call for the skills explored in this talk.