Microsoft Word 2007 ichrie conference Proceedings Final-Final 06-06-07. doc

 
2007 Annual International CHRIE Conference & Exposition 
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The persuasion model of elaboration likelihood (ELM; Petty & Cacioppo, 1986) and heuristic-systematic 
model (HSM; Chaiken, Liberman, & Eagly, 1989) offer an explanation of the mechanism underlying such source 
credibility effects: source credibility serves as a heuristic cue for the consumers’ information processing, informing 
an individual of how much weight to give the information (e.g., Hovland & Weiss, 1951; Kiesler & Mathog, 1968; 
Petty, Cacioppo, & Goldman, 1981). Following this line of theorizing, we propose that the salience of the cues for 
source credibility may affect the persuasive power of the online traveler reviewss. Unlike the traditional “word of 
mouth”, the source of the online traveler reviewss is not readily identifiable, even when it is, the credibility of such a 
source can only be judged through cues (For example, personally identifying details such as name, location of 
residence, dates of hotel stay and the date reviews was posted). While in many studies source credibility is 
manipulated (ie, expert source or trustworthiness source), we posit that the source credibility of “word of mouse” 
can only be inferred based on the cues present in the information context. Hence, we propose: 
H1
: Exposed to non-diagnostic traveler reviews, consumers’ perceived salience of the cues in the information 
context is positively related to the perceived source credibility.