Location
Hilton Waikoloa Village, Hawaii
Event Website
https://hicss.hawaii.edu/
Start Date
7-1-2025 12:00 AM
End Date
10-1-2025 12:00 AM
Description
As interactions and work moves online, the experience users have with interfaces becomes increasingly more important. In this study, we examined how two types of website malfunction, presentation flaws and delays, affect swift trust impressions of other users. We draw upon signaling theory to theoretically explain how presentation flaws and delays affect users’ swift trusting beliefs and intentions to delegate to other users. We conducted an online experiment (n=514) with a 2x2 factorial design to test our model. The presence of presentation flaws significantly biased swift trust evaluations in the negative direction as predicted. Surprisingly, we found no impact of delays on swift trust impressions, but we did find that delays increase the effect of presentation flaws on swift trust in some conditions. Our results provide guidance for practitioners seeking to keep users engaged with their interface and avoiding inadvertent distrust of other users of the platform.
Recommended Citation
Wells, Taylor and Bullock, Taylor, "Trust is Earned (Unless Your Website is Flawed): How Presentation Flaws and Delays Affect Swift Trust Between Individuals" (2025). Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences 2025 (HICSS-58). 4.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/hicss-58/in/hci/4
Trust is Earned (Unless Your Website is Flawed): How Presentation Flaws and Delays Affect Swift Trust Between Individuals
Hilton Waikoloa Village, Hawaii
As interactions and work moves online, the experience users have with interfaces becomes increasingly more important. In this study, we examined how two types of website malfunction, presentation flaws and delays, affect swift trust impressions of other users. We draw upon signaling theory to theoretically explain how presentation flaws and delays affect users’ swift trusting beliefs and intentions to delegate to other users. We conducted an online experiment (n=514) with a 2x2 factorial design to test our model. The presence of presentation flaws significantly biased swift trust evaluations in the negative direction as predicted. Surprisingly, we found no impact of delays on swift trust impressions, but we did find that delays increase the effect of presentation flaws on swift trust in some conditions. Our results provide guidance for practitioners seeking to keep users engaged with their interface and avoiding inadvertent distrust of other users of the platform.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/hicss-58/in/hci/4