On the Internet you can be anyone: An experiment on strategic avatar choice in online marketplaces

Autoři

ABRAHAM Diya Elizabeth GREINER Ben STEPHANIDES Marianne

Rok publikování 2023
Druh Článek v odborném periodiku
Časopis / Zdroj JOURNAL OF ECONOMIC BEHAVIOR & ORGANIZATION
Fakulta / Pracoviště MU

Ekonomicko-správní fakulta

Citace
www https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167268122004437
Doi http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jebo.2022.11.033
Klíčová slova Online marketplaces; Market design; Trust and trustworthiness; Avatars; Strategic behavior
Přiložené soubory
Popis In order to decrease social distance and increase trust on their platforms, many online marketplaces allow traders to be represented by profile pictures or avatars. In a laboratory experiment, we investigate whether the presence of seller avatars affects trading behavior in a market. We contrast markets without avatars with markets where avatars truthfully represent traders and markets where avatars can be freely changed at any time and may thus be chosen strategically. At the aggregate level, we find that the presence of truthful avatars increases the trustworthiness of sellers, but that this effect is undone when avatars can be chosen strategically. We do not detect aggregate effects on buyers' trusting choices. Female avatars are more trusted, and correspondingly in the treatment with free avatar choice men are more likely to represent themselves with a female avatar than vice versa.
Související projekty:

Používáte starou verzi internetového prohlížeče. Doporučujeme aktualizovat Váš prohlížeč na nejnovější verzi.