Forcing the user to view the entire disclosure before continuing on a kiosk

Question

For a KIOSK application, the user is required to view the entire disclosure before they are allowed to continue. This is a legal requirement, the legal team also turned down an 'I agree' checkbox. We do not expect the user to fully read and understand the disclosure, we are just legally required to show them the entire passage before allowing them to proceed.

--

I have a couple proposals that I wanted to run by you guys for feedback:

In the examples below the [NEXT] Button will act the same as the [SCROLL DOWN] button and advance the view by 1 PAGE

OPTION 1: The user is limited to a 'NEXT' Button until they reach the last page, when scroll controls are then enabled to allow them to view any previous content as well as the final 'continue' option

OPTION 2: Same as option1, but the scroll options are always availbile

OPTION 3: In this example, there is no alternative [NEXT] button, the user will have to use the scroll controls to continue -- an alternative to this is to only present the [SCROLL DOWN] button until the user reaches the last page

OPTION 4: Display disabled options, with scroll enabled -- options are enabled once bottom of disclosure is reached

---

Im leaning towards option 1 , as it forces the user to get through to the last page quickly what are your thoughts?

Answer 1

I would not do any paging with navigation buttons.

I would disable the continue button until the text box has been scrolled all the way to the end.

The reality is your users are either going to read it or they are not. Adding more buttons or messing with the scroll buttons is not going to make someone read who doesn't want to read. You're just irritating them.

If the requirement is that the user has to have read the agreement and letting them click through doesn't meet that requirement, then the solution I just described is a reasonable design to say that the user has no excuse for not knowing what is in the terms.

Scrolling is a conscious action the user needs to take, and it ensures that the user "saw" everything in the disclosure. Whether they read it or not is on them, not the site, and they can't claim the site didn't make them aware of the terms.

This implementation is common, so the user should be familiar with it. It should also pass the requirement, because short of a multiple choice quiz on the content of the message, a user could click through any of your solutions without reading the material, so you might as well make the experience as simple as it can be.

^{download bmml source – Wireframes created with Balsamiq Mockups}

Answer 2

Often when terms-of-use or license agreements are presented there is a checkbox to the effect of "I have read and agree..." that must be checked before the process can continue. And often one is not forced to scroll all the way through something before indicating agreement.

Unless you feel there's a legal reason to force people to scroll down I wouldn't do it, because it definitely doesn't force people to read it, but it could cause some confusion for those that don't understand they have to scroll all the way down to continue.

I'd have an Agree checkbox always visible at the bottom to the left of the Continue button, and keep the Continue button disabled until the Agree checkbox is checked, and allow people to scroll and read or not.

Answer 3

We have to answer one big question here: Is it actually important for users to understand the full disclosure, or do you want them just to say they did? They're two different answers, because it's unlikely and unreasonable for people to read the full disclosure (and it's often used as a way to force unpopular constraints on a user if they just click though without reading)!

• If you want people to just satisfy legal requirements and say they saw everything, Charles's answer is sufficient.
• If actual understanding of the disclosure is important, you're going to need to repackage the disclosure into something that is easily digestible yet still satisfies legal obligations (e.g. layman's translations, collapsible sections), so users are actually informed rather than glazing over at the sight of boilerplate.

Answer 4

Firstly I'd say you have a legal team who appears from the outside to be protecting themselves more than helping you and your users. That they are forcing on your users constraints that are extremely uncommon makes this a difficult task.

To answer your question depends greatly on your target hardware. If you're looking to deploy on infrared plane touch screens you should consider letting users flick to scroll the text (that allows them to scroll at whatever pace they like).

If you're using a PCT or resistive screen, provide two buttons to scroll the text and accelerate the scroll speed when either is held down for more than a second or so.

You might also consider reducing the point size of the text to reduce the overall height of the text but I suspect that will have negative implications for an older user base.

Regardless of your final outcome, one change you should definitely take is to increase the distance between the "Accept" and "Cancel" buttons: touch screens and fingers are both particularly poor at targeting things (and with an older audience like you mention the effect is exacerbated), and accidentally hitting "Cancel" (and thus forcing the user to scroll the whole message again to accept it) is not going to give your users a very good first interaction with your product.