Chapter 9 Quiz: Notifications as Triggers — The Architecture of Compulsive Checking

Multiple Choice

Select the best answer for each question.

Question 1. In the Pavlovian conditioning model applied to smartphone notifications, what serves as the conditioned stimulus?

A) The social reward received after opening the app B) The notification sound, vibration, or badge C) The social anxiety of potentially missing a message D) The act of reaching for the phone

Answer: B. The notification signal (sound, vibration, badge) is the conditioned stimulus — the previously neutral signal that has come to predict and trigger anticipation of the social reward (the unconditioned stimulus).

Question 2. Gloria Mark's foundational 2004 research found that after being interrupted during a task, workers took an average of how long to return to the task at full depth?

A) 7 minutes and 45 seconds B) 11 minutes and 30 seconds C) 23 minutes and 15 seconds D) 36 minutes and 8 seconds

Answer: C. Mark's research found a 23-minute-15-second average recovery time to return to deep engagement with the interrupted task.

Question 3. The information gap theory, which explains why vague notification text produces higher click-through rates, was articulated by which researcher?

A) Gloria Mark B) B.F. Skinner C) George Loewenstein D) Richard Thaler

Answer: C. George Loewenstein of Carnegie Mellon articulated information gap theory in a 1994 paper in Psychological Bulletin, proposing that curiosity arises from perceived gaps between what we know and what we want to know.

Question 4. Which reinforcement schedule produces the most durable and extinction-resistant behavior?

A) Fixed ratio reinforcement B) Fixed interval reinforcement C) Variable ratio reinforcement D) Continuous reinforcement

Answer: C. Variable ratio reinforcement — rewards delivered unpredictably after a varying number of responses — produces the most durable behavior. Slot machines and social media notifications both operate on variable ratio schedules.

Question 5. The Zeigarnik effect, which helps explain why badge counts produce closure anxiety, refers to which psychological phenomenon?

A) The tendency to remember positive events better than negative ones B) The tendency to remember uncompleted tasks better than completed ones C) The tendency to underestimate the time required to complete tasks D) The tendency to experience regret after making choices

Answer: B. The Zeigarnik effect, described by Bluma Zeigarnik in 1927, is the phenomenon of remembering uncompleted tasks more readily than completed ones, producing cognitive discomfort until closure is achieved.

Question 6. According to a 2020 Airship study cited in the chapter, approximately how many push notifications does the average American adult receive per day?

A) 12 B) 24 C) 46 D) 78

Answer: C. The 2020 Airship analysis found approximately 46 push notifications per day for the average American adult.

Question 7. What is the primary reason platforms use vague notification text rather than specific notification text?

A) It is technically simpler to generate vague text automatically B) Users have requested more privacy in notifications C) Vague text creates an information gap that drives higher click-through rates D) Specific text raises privacy concerns that increase opt-out rates

Answer: C. Vague text is used because A/B testing consistently shows it produces higher click-through rates than specific text. The information gap theory explains why: the unresolved curiosity compels the user to open the app to find out.

Question 8. What is "anticipatory checking" as described in Chapter 9?

A) The platform checking whether a user is active before sending a notification B) Users checking their phones in response to the anticipated possibility of a notification, rather than an actual one C) The machine learning system predicting when users will check their phones D) Users pre-checking notification settings to manage their attention

Answer: B. Anticipatory checking refers to users self-interrupting to check their devices based on the awareness that a notification might have arrived, even when no actual notification has occurred.

Question 9. When platforms batch notifications rather than delivering them in real-time, one reason is to exploit which neurological mechanism?

A) Habituation reduction through novelty B) Loss aversion triggered by delayed information C) Positive reward prediction error from unexpected abundance D) Social comparison triggered by peer activity summaries

Answer: C. Batched delivery can create a high-magnitude reward event when opened, producing a positive prediction error (more rewards than anticipated), which is more neurologically potent than individual real-time delivery.

Question 10. According to the chapter, what percentage of iOS users typically grant notification permission when asked?

A) Approximately 20% B) Approximately 44% C) Approximately 67% D) Approximately 85%

Answer: B. The chapter states that roughly 44 percent of iOS users grant notification permission when asked — and that this rate increases substantially when the request is timed after a first positive engagement.

Question 11. What is the primary purpose of the "pre-permission prompt" that many apps display before triggering the native iOS notification dialog?

A) To comply with Apple's App Store privacy guidelines B) To give users a preview of what notification types they will receive C) To prime acceptance and conserve the one-shot native dialog for a more receptive moment D) To allow users to customize which types of notifications they want

Answer: C. Pre-permission prompts prime the user to accept and allow the app to test receptivity before triggering the native iOS dialog, which can only be shown once. This conserves the one-shot dialog for moments when acceptance is most likely.

Question 12. Which design element of notification badges most directly exploits the red/urgency color association?

A) The circular shape B) The numerical count C) The red background color D) The position in the corner of the app icon

Answer: C. Red is specifically chosen because it is associated with urgency and required action at a near-physiological level, triggering attentional capture more strongly than other colors would.

True or False

State whether each claim is true or false and provide a brief explanation.

Question 13. Platforms deliver notifications at random times, independent of when individual users are most likely to engage with them.

Answer: False. Platforms use machine learning models trained on individual users' historical engagement data to optimize notification delivery timing for each specific user's vulnerability windows. Delivery is precisely targeted, not random.

Question 14. The "dark pattern" of making notification settings deliberately difficult to navigate is accidental — a side effect of apps having many features rather than an intentional strategy.

Answer: False. The chapter presents evidence that notification settings complexity is a deliberate friction strategy. Making the default (notifications on) easy and the alternative (notifications off) effortful is a documented design pattern, not an accidental consequence of feature richness.

Question 15. The 23-minute attention recovery figure means that after a notification interruption, workers are completely unable to work for 23 minutes.

Answer: False. The 23 minutes is the average time to return to the same depth of engagement with the interrupted task — not total inability to work. Workers can and do resume tasks quickly after interruptions; they just take an average of 23 minutes to return to the focused state they had before the interruption.

Question 16. Variable ratio reinforcement produces less durable behavior than fixed ratio reinforcement because unpredictability is frustrating.

Answer: False. Variable ratio reinforcement produces more durable and extinction-resistant behavior than fixed ratio reinforcement, not less. The unpredictability is precisely what makes it so powerful — the possibility of a reward on the next check keeps the checking behavior active.

Question 17. According to research cited in the chapter, simply being aware that your phone might receive a notification can impair cognitive performance, even if no notification arrives.

Answer: True. A 2015 study found that participants who were aware they might receive a notification during a cognitive task showed measurably reduced performance, even when no notifications arrived. The anticipatory state itself divides attention.

Question 18. Platforms always prefer to deliver notifications in real-time rather than batching them, because real-time delivery is more urgent and therefore more engaging.

Answer: False. Platforms make deliberate choices between real-time and batched delivery depending on the type of notification and the engagement goal. Batching lower-priority notifications can produce higher-magnitude reward events through positive prediction error, making them more engaging than individual real-time delivery would be.

Short Answer

Answer each question in 3-5 sentences.

Question 19. What is the "turning-off problem" described in Chapter 9, and why does it persist despite users' awareness of notification disruption?

Answer: The turning-off problem is the gap between users' expressed preference for fewer notifications and their actual behavior of keeping notifications on. It persists because of several converging forces: FOMO makes turning off notifications feel like a social risk (missing important messages), identity investment in social monitoring makes notifications feel necessary for users who actively manage their online presence, dark patterns make notification settings deliberately difficult to navigate, and platform re-engagement prompts work to restore disabled notifications. The platforms have engineered the exit from the notification system to be psychologically and technically effortful.

Question 20. Explain the difference between the "information delivery" framing and the "interruption mechanism" framing of notifications. Which does the chapter's evidence support, and why?

Answer: The information delivery framing treats notifications as a service — the platform has something useful to tell you, and it delivers that information proactively. The interruption mechanism framing treats notifications as an engagement tool — their primary purpose is to interrupt whatever the user is doing and return their attention to the platform. The chapter's evidence supports the interruption framing because: notification timing is optimized for user vulnerability rather than information readiness; notification text is deliberately vague to maximize click-through rather than to efficiently convey information; and platforms' own internal documentation (such as the Facebook memo describing notifications as "bringing users back to the service") describes the goal as engagement, not information delivery.

Question 21. Describe the role of habituation in the "notification inflation" phenomenon described in the chapter.

Answer: Habituation is the process by which repeated exposure to a stimulus reduces the response it produces. As users receive large volumes of notifications over time, they habituate — the notification signal becomes less novel and less reliably followed by high-value rewards, so the attentional and behavioral response decreases. Platforms respond to habituation by escalating notification frequency, urgency, and personalization to restore the diminished response. This creates an inflationary dynamic: maintaining the same engagement level requires constant escalation, because any given approach to notification design erodes in effectiveness as users habituate to it.

Question 22. In Maya's notification morning, which notification best exemplifies the information gap theory in action, and why?

Answer: The Instagram DM notification — "You have a new message" — best exemplifies information gap theory. It reveals only that a message exists while withholding who sent it, when (though a timestamp was visible), and what it said. This creates a maximal information gap: Maya knows something happened, knows it might be significant (a late-night message from an unknown sender generates a range of imaginative possibilities), and can only resolve the gap by opening the app. The notification exploits the aversive quality of unresolved curiosity. The actual content (a group project coordination message) was mundane, but the information gap produced was sufficient to generate an emotional engagement response and bring her back to the platform.