Abstract
The effect of proposal appearance on technical evaluation scoring was examined experimentally. Two mock proposals were prepared—one from the A Corporation and the other from the B Corporation. Each proposal was prepared in two versions—a “nice” appearing version (stylized “logoed” pages, offset two-color printing, heavy paper stock, plastic 19-ring spiral binding), and a “poor” appearing version (single-spaced typed pages, xerox reproduction, cheap transparent plastic cover, staple binding.) The proposals were scored against a set of eight evaluation questions by twenty-eight experienced government evaluators in a 2 × 2 factorial design experiment. No statistically significant effects of appearance on evaluation scoring were detected. A general model is presented that describes impression in terms of proposal appearance versus proposal thought content. The experiment is interpreted in terms of this model, and “real-world” applications of the model are discussed.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.