A4 Refereed article in a conference publication
The effect of smiling pictures on perceptions of personas
Authors: Joni Salminen, Soon-gyo Jung, João M. Santos, Bernard J. Jansen
Editors: Stephen N. Spencer
Conference name: Conference on User Modeling, Adaptation and Personalization
Publisher: Association for Computing Machinery, Inc
Publication year: 2019
Book title : 27th Conference on User Modeling, Adaptation and Personalization Adjunct (UMAP’19 Adjunct)
Journal name in source: ACM UMAP 2019 Adjunct - Adjunct Publication of the 27th Conference on User Modeling, Adaptation and Personalization
First page : 75
Last page: 79
ISBN: 978-1-4503-6711-0
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1145/3314183.3324973
We analyze the effect of a smile in personas pictures on persona perceptions, including credibility, likability, similarity, and willingness to use. We conduct an online experiment with 2,400 participants using a 16-item survey and multiple persona profile treatments of which half have a smiling photo and half do not. We find that persona profiles with a smiling photo result in an increase in perceived similarity with, likability of, and willingness to use the personas. In contrast, a smile does not increase the credibility of the personas. Our research has implications for the design of persona profiles and adds to previous findings of persona research that the picture choice influences individuals' persona perceptions in profound ways.
