This document summarizes research on how interface design can help users distinguish between trustworthy and untrustworthy online reviews. A user study examined how interface elements like the number of reviews, helpful votes, and city/country listings impacted assessments of review quality, source expertise, and bias. Results showed users relied more on reviews with more helpful votes and reviews from sources with more total reviews to judge trustworthiness. The study also found high dispositional trust users and low dispositional trust users relied on interface elements differently. The document concludes interface design should provide more direct signals of source bias, evidence of accuracy, and transparency about online community opinions to help users assess review trustworthiness.

1. THE DILEMMA OF TRUST: HOW TO HELP
USERS?
Dara Sherwani
dara.sherwani.1@city.ac.uk
Centre for HCI Design

2. Question: Why MOO.COM?
Answer: “The reviews are good and the website looks fine””

4. MEDIATED TRUST RELATIONSHIP
Trust signals
Trust relationship
User Vendor
Reviews
Reviewer
User Vendor
Trust signals
Mediated trust relationship

5. TRUST & DISTRUST OFFLINE
 Cues (Meyer, 2010)
I did not have sexual relations with that woman…Miss Lewinsky

6. TRUST & DISTRUST OFFLINE
 Cues

7. TRUST & DISTRUST OFFLINE
 Cues

8. MEDIATED TRUST RELATIONSHIP
Reviews
Reviewer
User Vendor
Trust signals
Mediated trust relationship
 Lack of non-verbal cues

9. LITERATURE
 Online reviews: Trust factors
Review quality (Lee et al., 2008)
Source expertise (Kim et al., 2008)
Source bias, or Untruthfulness (Ku et al., 2012)
Perceived helpfulness & accuracy (Liu et al., 2008)

10. LITERATURE
INCREASE
BOOST
MAXIMIZE
DEVELOP
ESTABLISH

11.  How interface design can help users to distinguish between
trustworthy and untrustworthy content (inspired by Riegelsberger et
al., 2005)
1
Influence of
interface design on
trustworthiness
2
Interface design and
trust factors
Design
improvements
RESEARCH AIM
3
Effect of dispositional
trust

12. USER STUDY

13. 0 10 20 30 40 50
Photographic evidence
Number of people who found the review unhelpful
Number of cities
Membership level
Number of helpful votes
City & country
Number of reviews
Number of people who found the review helpful
RESULTS
1. Influence of interface elements on assessing trustworthiness: frequencies of
UI elements
Dido
Kiev, Ukraine
Senior Contributor
47 reviews
Review in 20 cities
29 helpful votes
This hotel is one which does everything well. It is
located in what must be the busiest part of the city,
nearby Bukit Bintang, surrounded by shopping malls,
food outlets, fashion stores and good restaurants.
The staff are polite, accommodating and helpful. The
breakfast buffet is delicious and the rooms are
pleasant and comfortable, with clean furniture and a
desk and small sitting area.,
“Faultless hotel”
Reviewed 5 July 2012
4 people found this review helpful

14. RESULTS
2. Interface elements and trust factors: Review quality & perceived
helpfulness
0 10 20 30 40
Number of helpful votes
Number of reviews
Number of people who found the
review helpful
1
2
3
4
5
Review quality Perceived helpfulness
High
High
Low
Low
Need for signals to judge low
review quality: “This one is bad I
wonder how many unhelpful
votes it could get”

15. RESULTS
2. Interface elements and trust factors: Source expertise
1
2
3
4
5
Perceived accuracy
High
Low
0 10 20 30 40
Number of helpful votes
Number of reviews
Need for photographic evidence
: “If I’d be able to see photos of
the hotel with this review I’d feel
I can depend on this review”

16. RESULTS
0 10 20 30 40 50
With low perceived accuracy
With high source bias
Participants mentioned that they struggled
in assessing trustworthiness when source
bias was rated high : “Nothing there tells
me that these people are real customer”
1
2
3
4
5
Source bias Perceived accuracy
Frequency of city & country
High
Low
High
Low
2. Interface elements and trust factors: Source bias & perceived accuracy

17. RESULTS
3. Effects of dispositional trust
Dividing participants into 2 groups: High & low
-10 10 30 50
Number of helpful
votes
Number of reviews
City & country
Difference between groups: High & low dispositional trust

18. CONTRIBUTIONS: DESIGN
Review
Quality
Perceived
Helpfulness
Source
Expertise
• Transparency of community
opinions signals.
online
community
opinion
reviewer
city &
country
Source
bias
Perceived
accuracy
• Direct signal of source bias.
• Evidence of information accuracy.

19. CONCLUSION
“ There are known unknowns.
That is to say we know there are
some things we do not know.
But there are also unknown
unknowns, the ones we don’t
know we don’t know”
Donald Rumsfeld, 2002

20. THANK YOU!