Accounting for rater credibility when evaluating AEC subcontractors

Martin Ekstrom, Hans Bjornsson and Clifford Nass

Construction Management and Economics, 2003, vol. 21, issue 2, 197-208

Abstract: In consumer electronic markets, rating mechanisms are important facilitators of trust between market participants. This paper investigates whether source credibility theory can support the evaluation of bidders in architecture/engineering/construction (AEC) electronic market places. In contrast to consumer electronic marketplaces, the raters in AEC communities are skilled and connected, necessitating a reputation mechanism to account for the relationship between the user and the rater. To solve this problem, TrustBuilder, a prototype rating tool, facilitates information sharing between peer industry practitioners by calculating a weighted rating based on source credibility theory. An experiment shows that AEC industry practitioners who evaluate bidding subcontractors trusted the information provided by TrustBuilder significantly more than information from a standard unweighted rating tool.

Keywords: Reputation Mechanism; Electronic Commerce; Source Credibility; Bidding; Trust; Construction (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2003
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DOI: 10.1080/0144619032000049656

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