My Eyes Don't Consent! Exploring Visual Attention in Cookie Consent Interfaces

Abstract

Each cookie consent interface has a different design variant, featuring various levels of information details, which makes the interaction highly challenging. This study aimed to explore how users' visual attention differs across different variants of cookie consent interfaces. To conduct the study, we designed an experiment testing three cookie consent variants, representing good, suboptimal, and bad design practices. Study results showed that none of the participants read the text on the interfaces. Most participants admitted skipping over the text about the cookie notice and did not carefully consider the options related to cookie consent. Notably, the bad design variant proved to be statistically significantly the most challenging for participants to make decisions, as evidenced by the highest total duration of fixation and number of fixations. However, participants spent a longer average fixation duration when the interface included both poor and decent design practices. Study results highlight the impact of interface design, banner location, content, and options presented on visual attention, indicating the necessity of establishing design guidelines to facilitate users in navigating cookie consent interfaces easily.

My Eyes Don't Consent! Exploring Visual Attention in Cookie Consent Interfaces