Moderate rating bias in interpersonal recommendations

However, extant research offers limited insight into whether such recommendations are received as intended. This research uncovers a “Moderate Rating Bias,” where tourists systematically overestimate close others’ likelihood of accepting their moderately rated recommendations (e.g., 3 out of 5).

We show that this bias stems from asymmetric evaluations of such recommendations: recommenders focus on shared preferences, interpreting moderate ratings through a social lens, while recipients emphasize their unique preferences, viewing them more objectively. This bias diminishes when ratings clearly indicate positive (e.g., 5 out of 5) or negative (e.g., 1 out of 5) experiential quality or when moderate ratings reflect divergent performance across experiential dimensions (e.g., “excellent food, poor service”).