Decoy Effect In Search Interaction: Understanding User Behavior and Measuring System Vulnerability

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This study examines the decoy effect's underexplored influence on user search interactions and methods for measuring information retrieval (IR) systems' vulnerability to this effect.

• It explores how decoy results alter users' interactions on search engine result pages, focusing on metrics like click-through likelihood, browsing time, and perceived document usefulness.
• By analyzing user interaction logs from multiple datasets, the study demonstrates that decoy results significantly affect users' behavior and perceptions.
• Furthermore, it investigates how different levels of task difficulty and user knowledge modify the decoy effect's impact, finding that easier tasks and lower knowledge levels lead to higher engagement with target documents.