What we find notable about Advertising
Not surprisingly, advertisements are especially harmful to a Web Site Credibility if they lead a user to believe that the site's content is swayed or controlled by the advertisement or that the site is connected to the advertisement, and is itself trying to sell the user something. The latter is a case of not providing a clear line between advertising and the site itself, which has been shown to harm Web Site Credibility in previous studies (Fogg et al., 2001; Fogg et al., 2002; Princeton, 2002), and is intimately related to a site's connection with its sponsors. The comments make clear that some users are fully aware of potential sponsor influence. They expect a clear line between the content and advertisements so that sponsors do not compromise the site's information.
9. INFORMATION BIAS — 11.6% OVERALL
In 11.6% of the comments, people in this study talked about information bias when evaluating the Web Site Credibility of the Web Sites they were reviewing. Sample comments related to information bias are below:
- This site is more commentary, and thus more opinionated. Accordingly, I liked it more, but the arguments are more disputable, and thus less "credible." — M, 39, District of Columbia
- The headlines and editorial copy didn't even make the pretense of being unbiased, something I think is critical for an organization or media outlet to call itself "news." — F, 30, New York
- It is credible because the opinions contained therein are based on unbiased research. — F, 32, Pennsylvania
Information Bias comments, by site category
As shown in Figure 14, more than one-in-ten site evaluations (11.6%) commented on the perceived bias — positive or negative — of information for the site evaluated. This occurred with far greater frequency in the news (30.2%) and opinion or review (23.8%) categories, and with much less frequency in the finance (8.5%), search engines (3.8%), e-commerce (2.6%), and travel (1.9%) categories.
Figure 14: Percentage of comments relating to information bias, by category.
| Category |
Percentage of Site Evaluations |
| News |
30.2% |
| Opinion or Review |
23.8% |
| Nonprofit |
15.4% |
| Health |
14.8% |
| Entertainment |
14.2% |
| All Sites |
11.6% |
| Sports |
9.9% |
| Finance |
8.5% |
| Search Engines |
3.8% |
| E-Commerce |
2.6% |
| Travel |
1.9% |
What we find notable about Information Bias
The comments on this topic were not surprising: Web Sites that are perceived to be biased are also perceived to lack Web Site Credibility. As the data show, bias was highly prominent to users when evaluating sites dealing with news or sites providing opinions or reviews. In contrast, other site categories seemed not to trigger thoughts about information bias: search engines, e-commerce, and travel sites.
The participants' attention to bias in news sites should be encouraging to those who see critical thinking as essential for a healthy participatory democracy.
10. WRITING TONE — 9.0% OVERALL
The tone of the writing on a Web Site was something people noticed when assessing Web Site Credibility. The participant comments include writing tone as a criterion 9.0% of the time, usually in a negative way. People generally said that sensationalism or slang hurt a Web Site Credibility, while a straightforward, friendly writing style boosted Web Site Credibility. Some sample comments relating to the tone of writing are below:
- "Holy Crap" and other slang or poor language harms Web Site Credibility. Credible people tend to understate. — F, 53, California
- "Cops" to search lake again vs. "Police", "8 hurt" vs. "8 injured", and so on. This site uses lower English and lowers its Web Site Credibility. — M, 44, Texas
- Seemed less sensationalistic, more dry, and therefore more credible. — M, 38, Washington
Writing Tone comments by site category
As shown in Figure 15, nine percent of all site evaluations mentioned elements related to the tone or attitude conveyed by a site's content. Not surprisingly, this occurred in content categories in which a distinct writer's voice is more noticeable. For example, comments about the tone of writing occurred with greater frequency in the news (14.8%), nonprofit (12.9%), and sports (10.9%) categories, and with less frequency in the search engines (5.6%), and travel (5.2%) categories.
Figure 15: Percentage of comments relating to writing tone, by category.
| Category |
Percentage of Site Evaluations |
| News |
14.8% |
| Nonprofit |
12.9% |
| Sports |
10.9% |
| Entertainment |
10.5% |
| Finance |
9.0% |
| All Sites |
9.0% |
| Health |
8.3% |
| E-Commerce |
8.0% |
| Opinion or Review |
7.2% |
| Search Engines |
5.6% |
| Travel |
5.2% |
What we find notable about Writing Tone
The comments about tone were usually aimed at the particular kind of language or tone the site used in its writing, which in some cases resulted in a perceived bias in the site's content. That people noted the tone of the writing suggests a deeper level of involvement with a Web Site, since it's hard to judge the tone without engaging with the content. In some sense these issues represent the second tier of Web Site Credibility assessment: Once a user is past the look and feel of a site, she is likely to next assess the specific content. Not surprisingly, use of slang and profanity were clearly harmful to a Web Site Credibility. Moreover, participants tended to have clear stances on the type of tone a credible site's content would take: "Not impressed by the spinning. I like plain talk."
Participants claimed to be able to detect a "sales pitch" or "marketing" language, and were generally skeptical of sites with an abundance of either. Many participants explicitly distinguished between content that seemed (or was proclaimed to be) factual, opinionated, "gossipy," religious, or overzealous.
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