Every time you shop online, scroll through social media, or check your bank balance, you’re experiencing digital nudging. These subtle design choices in apps and websites influence how we behave, sometimes for our benefit, and sometimes purely to serve a company’s bottom line.

Some nudges are positive, like a savings app that helps you put money aside without even noticing. Others are manipulative, like dark patterns in e-commerce that pressure you into spending more than you intended.

The real question is: when is behavioural design in apps helping us, and when is it tricking us?

1. The helpful side of digital nudging
2. The dark side: When nudges become manipulation
3. The grey zone: Where do we draw the line?
4. How to spot (and outsmart) digital nudges
5. Conclusion: The invisible hand in your pocket

Not all nudges are harmful. Many fintech nudges are designed to improve our financial wellbeing and reduce procrastination.

• Savings apps with round-up features: Buy a coffee for $12, and the app rounds it up to $20, automatically transferring the extra $2 into a savings account. This painless technique has been shown to build savings over time.

These are nudges that support healthy behaviours, whether in money, investing, or personal growth. They show how behavioural economics in apps can be used to help us, not just exploit us.

Not every example of nudging in technology is black or white. Some design choices sit in a grey zone.

The ethical challenge lies in whether these nudges are transparent, reversible, and truly in the user’s interest. Increasingly, behavioural scientists argue for boosting, empowering people with decision-making skills and autonomy, instead of silently steering them. Boosts build long-term competence, while nudges simply adjust the environment.

The good news: once you can spot digital nudges, you can resist the manipulative ones and embrace the helpful ones. Here’s how:

1. Watch out for urgency cues. Countdown clocks and “only X left” messages are often just psychological tricks.

2. Double-check defaults. Don’t assume pre-ticked boxes are right for you; they usually aren’t.

3. Set up your own nudges. Turn off autoplay in streaming apps, use budgeting apps that send positive reminders, and schedule alerts to review your subscriptions.

4. Choose ethical apps. Some fintech tools make a point of transparent design, allowing you to customise or opt out easily.

These steps help you stay in control, turning the tables on behavioural design in apps.

• Heuristics and biases in decision making – This was the first post in the series which shares some behavioural economics research. Specifically, the heurstics and biases that influence our relationship with money. It uses System 1 and System 2 thinking examples from Daniel Kahneman’s New York Times best selling book, Thinking Fast and Slow, to help us be more conscious of the workings of our brain. 

• Mirror, mirror, on the wall, stop telling me I’m wonderful – This post focuses on the impact of overconfidence bias in decision making. It introduces the illusion of knowledge bias and the illusion of control bias to illustrate the difference between confidence and carelessness. It also discusses the better than average effect, the self-serving bias and fundamental attribution error. You’ll learn how to confront some unpalatable truths and get out of any false sense of comfort (if you’re up for the challenge?).

• Why you can’t argue with a vegan – Ballsy title, we know. But if you read the post you’ll (hopefully) understand why. We’ll be discussing confirmation bias. It’s one of those psychological biases that you can see everywhere. We’ll also touch on cognitive dissonance theory. We all struggle with these biases. They’re both humorous and serious. But because of that, it’s useful to know how to avoid confirmation bias when you need to.

• Size does matter… when it comes to framing – This post uses framing effect examples to show how framing bias influences the way we interpret information and make decisions. We discuss glossing, the compromise effect, and how the size of the frame can influence the volatility of your investment portfolio.

• Loss aversion vs risk aversion – Once you understand framing, you’re ready for this post. It introduces an incredibly powerful bias known as loss aversion. It also touches on prospect theory, the disposition effect and impression management.

• Anchors pulling you down? – Anchoring bias is a straightforward behavioural bias that causes us to focus on a certain initial value and then make decisions with reference to it. This posts looks at some examples of this anchoring effect.

• The danger of the default – Default options nudge us to make better decisions. The option of opting out also respects freedom of choice. This post unpacks this notion of libertarian paternalism and the perils of status quo bias.

• Regret, it’s not a nice feeling – Regret influences the decisions we make and pushes us to conform to social norms. Examples of regret avoidance show us how this makes complete sense yet no sense at all.

• When the past influences the future – The Concorde effect is a famous example of sunk cost investment. Too often we invest time, money and energy into something we should’ve just abandoned. This post looks at some examples of how sunk cost fallacy affects our human decision processes.

• What’s mine is more valuable – In this post, you’ll learn why you place extra value on things you own. The endowment effect has implications for our investment portfolio, bonuses and consumer behaviour.

• How to improve self-control – Self-control is an essential life skill. It’s what separates humans from the rest of the animal kingdom. Learn how to improve self-control to achieve your long-term goals.

• Procrastination is the enemy of success – We know procrastination is the enemy of success. But while it looks like laziness, it’s often just mental exhaustion at play. Learn how to overcome procrastination.

• The problem with wanting it now – When you delay instant gratification, you will experience long-term satisfaction. It’s the hyperbolic vs exponential discounting debate. Don’t let present bias win!

• The power of first impressions – The order of information influences your decisions. First impressions matter! It’s all got to do with primacy and recency effects.

• We prefer wrong information to no information – Availability bias and survivorship bias influence our decision-making. We make decisions based on the information available to us.

• Learn to deal with uncertainty – Risk and uncertainty will always surround us. Gambler’s Fallacy, the hot-hand effect, the law of small numbers & ambiguity aversion are just some of the biases that arise because of it.

• Stop stereotyping – Representativeness heuristic refers to the fact that we stereotype. It’s a mental shortcut. But beware of making unfounded comparisons.

• Mental accounting – Money is money! Or is it? Mental accounting says we place different values on different money which leads to irrational decision making.

• Money Illusion– Money illusion is a sneaky bias. It causes us to focus on the amount of money in our hands, rather than it’s purchasing power.

• Hone bias– We invest close to home and in what we know. But this lack of diversification results in missed opportunities. Say hello to ‘home bias’.

• Behavioural bias guide for entrepreneurs – We break down 5 common behavioural biases that could be sabotaging your business, with real-world examples!