IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/grdene/v32y2023i2d10.1007_s10726-023-09814-4.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Facing Reciprocity: How Photos and Avatars Promote Interaction in Micro-communities

Author

Listed:
  • Timm Teubner

    (Technical University of Berlin)

  • Sonia Camacho

    (Universidad de los Andes)

Abstract

Online platforms facilitate the formation of micro-communities on the Internet by enabling exchange between locally dispersed individuals. Since all interactions are mediated through the online platform, user representation plays a critical role for such communities. Grounded in Social Exchange Theory, we report results of a behavioral experiment on the role of user profile photos and avatars for the emergence of network structures over time. While overall network value increases slightly, the underlying structures of exchange shift systematically from many weak ties to fewer but significantly stronger reciprocal exchange relations. Interestingly, despite representing users in a highly abstracted way, avatars yield outcomes comparable to those when using actual photographs. We discuss theoretical and practical implications of how online platforms can leverage social cues such as profile photos and avatars to manage and support micro-communities.

Suggested Citation

  • Timm Teubner & Sonia Camacho, 2023. "Facing Reciprocity: How Photos and Avatars Promote Interaction in Micro-communities," Group Decision and Negotiation, Springer, vol. 32(2), pages 435-467, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:grdene:v:32:y:2023:i:2:d:10.1007_s10726-023-09814-4
    DOI: 10.1007/s10726-023-09814-4
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10726-023-09814-4
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10726-023-09814-4?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hee-Woong Kim & Atreyi Kankanhalli & So-Hyun Lee, 2018. "Examining Gifting Through Social Network Services: A Social Exchange Theory Perspective," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 29(4), pages 805-828, December.
    2. Ben Greiner, 2015. "Subject pool recruitment procedures: organizing experiments with ORSEE," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 1(1), pages 114-125, July.
    3. Messinger, Paul R. & Ge, Xin & Smirnov, Kristen & Stroulia, Eleni & Lyons, Kelly, 2019. "Reflections of the extended self: Visual self-representation in avatar-mediated environments," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 100(C), pages 531-546.
    4. Gary E. Bolton & Elena Katok & Axel Ockenfels, 2004. "How Effective Are Electronic Reputation Mechanisms? An Experimental Investigation," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 50(11), pages 1587-1602, November.
    5. Berninghaus, Siegfried K. & Güth, Werner & Vogt, Bodo, 2008. "Spontaneous evolution of social exchange--An experimental study," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 976-997, June.
    6. Gary Bolton & Ben Greiner & Axel Ockenfels, 2013. "Engineering Trust: Reciprocity in the Production of Reputation Information," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 59(2), pages 265-285, January.
    7. Charles A. Holt & Susan K. Laury, 2002. "Risk Aversion and Incentive Effects," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(5), pages 1644-1655, December.
    8. Akerlof, George A & Yellen, Janet L, 1988. "Fairness and Unemployment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 78(2), pages 44-49, May.
    9. Smith, Vernon L, 1976. "Experimental Economics: Induced Value Theory," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 66(2), pages 274-279, May.
    10. Urs Fischbacher, 2007. "z-Tree: Zurich toolbox for ready-made economic experiments," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 10(2), pages 171-178, June.
    11. Gefen, David & Straub, Detmar W., 2004. "Consumer trust in B2C e-Commerce and the importance of social presence: experiments in e-Products and e-Services," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 32(6), pages 407-424, December.
    12. Frederico Finan & Laura Schechter, 2012. "Vote‐Buying and Reciprocity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 80(2), pages 863-881, March.
    13. Jonathon Halbesleben & Jean-Pierre Neveu & Samantha Paustian-Underdahl & Mina Westman, 2014. "Getting to the “COR”: Understanding the Role of Resources in Conservation of Resources Theory," Post-Print hal-02049109, HAL.
    14. Berg Joyce & Dickhaut John & McCabe Kevin, 1995. "Trust, Reciprocity, and Social History," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 10(1), pages 122-142, July.
    15. Ert, Eyal & Fleischer, Aliza & Magen, Nathan, 2016. "Trust and reputation in the sharing economy: The role of personal photos in Airbnb," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 55(C), pages 62-73.
    16. Sheen S. Levine & Robert Kurzban, 2006. "Explaining clustering in social networks: towards an evolutionary theory of cascading benefits," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(2-3), pages 173-187.
    17. Werner Güth & M. Vittoria Levati & Georg von Wangenheim, 2010. "Mutual interdependence versus repeated interaction: An experiment studying voluntary social exchange," Rationality and Society, , vol. 22(2), pages 131-158, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Roman Hoffmann & Bernhard Kittel & Mattias Larsen, 2021. "Information exchange in laboratory markets: competition, transfer costs, and the emergence of reputation," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 24(1), pages 118-142, March.
    2. Hoyer, B. & van Straaten, D., 2022. "Anonymity and self-expression in online rating systems—An experimental analysis," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 98(C).
    3. Abraham, Martin & Grimm, Veronika & Neeß, Christina & Seebauer, Michael, 2016. "Reputation formation in economic transactions," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 121(C), pages 1-14.
    4. Vanessa Hilleringmann, 2018. "The Influence of Bribery and Relative Reciprocity on a Physician's Prescription Decision - An Experiment," Working Papers CIE 114, Paderborn University, CIE Center for International Economics.
    5. Britta Hoyer & Dirk van Straaten, 2021. "Anonymity and Self-Expression in Online Rating Systems - An Experimental Analysis," Working Papers Dissertations 70, Paderborn University, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics.
    6. Zakaria Babutsidze & Nobuyuki Hanaki & Adam Zylbersztejn, 2021. "Nonverbal content and trust: An experiment on digital communication," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 59(4), pages 1517-1532, October.
    7. Fehr, Dietmar & Sutter, Matthias, 2019. "Gossip and the efficiency of interactions," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 448-460.
    8. Keser, Claudia & Späth, Maximilian, 2021. "The value of bad ratings: An experiment on the impact of distortions in reputation systems," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 95(C).
    9. Masiliūnas, Aidas & Nax, Heinrich H., 2020. "Framing and repeated competition," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 604-619.
    10. Abraham, Diya & Greiner, Ben & Stephanides, Marianne, 2023. "On the Internet you can be anyone: An experiment on strategic avatar choice in online marketplaces," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 206(C), pages 251-261.
    11. Blumkin, Tomer & Pinhas, Haim & Zultan, Ro’i, 2020. "Wage Subsidies and Fair Wages," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).
    12. Kocher, Martin G. & Martinsson, Peter & Matzat, Dominik & Wollbrant, Conny, 2015. "The role of beliefs, trust, and risk in contributions to a public good," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 236-244.
    13. Armin Falk & Anke Becker & Thomas Dohmen & David Huffman & Uwe Sunde, 2023. "The Preference Survey Module: A Validated Instrument for Measuring Risk, Time, and Social Preferences," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(4), pages 1935-1950, April.
    14. Tobias Cagala & Ulrich Glogowsky & Veronika Grimm & Johannes Rincke, 2019. "Public Goods Provision with Rent-extracting Administrators," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 129(620), pages 1593-1617.
    15. Brosig-Koch, Jeannette & Heinrich, Timo, 2018. "The role of communication content and reputation in the choice of transaction partners," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 49-66.
    16. Volker Benndorf & Claudia Moellers & Hans-Theo Normann, 2017. "Experienced vs. inexperienced participants in the lab: do they behave differently?," Journal of the Economic Science Association, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 3(1), pages 12-25, July.
    17. Ruohuang Jiao & Wojtek Przepiorka & Vincent Buskens, 2024. "Building a reputation for trustworthiness: Experimental evidence on the role of the feedback rate," Rationality and Society, , vol. 36(3), pages 312-344, August.
    18. Auerbach, Jan U. & Fonseca, Miguel A., 2020. "Preordered service in contract enforcement," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 130-149.
    19. Zakaria Babutsidze & Nobuyuki Hanaki & Adam Zylbersztejn, 2020. "Nonverbal content and swift trust: An experiment on digital communication," Working Papers 2008, Groupe d'Analyse et de Théorie Economique Lyon St-Étienne (GATE Lyon St-Étienne), Université de Lyon.
    20. Fabian Kleine & Manfred Königstein & Balázs Rozsnyói, 2018. "Voluntary Leadership and Asymmetric Endowments in the Investment Game," Games, MDPI, vol. 9(3), pages 1-21, July.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:grdene:v:32:y:2023:i:2:d:10.1007_s10726-023-09814-4. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.