To target crowding at locations, decision support systems (DSS) increasingly feature crowding information (CI) to indicate how much of a location's available capacity is occupied. Yet, little is known about how and why the timeliness of such CI (e.g., “updated just now”) influences users' selections of differently crowded locations and the effectiveness of location recommendations. Addressing this knowledge gap is, however, important to understand how to design DSS interfaces that prevent (over)crowding and improve related DSS reuse intentions. Drawing on construal level theory, we applied a mixed-methods approach comprising a quantitative and a complementary qualitative study. First, we conducted an online experiment in which 171 participants selected between differently crowded bars. The quantitative data provides evidence that high (vs. low) timeliness of CI leads users to select less crowded bars and raises users' DSS reuse intentions. Yet, the effect of high (vs. low) timeliness of CI on location selection is unexpectedly cancelled out when location recommendations are displayed. In subsequent qualitative interviews with DSS users we find that even though high (vs. low) timeliness of CI affords more conscious elaboration on CI's costs and benefits and increased trusting beliefs, present (vs. absent) location recommendations decrease one's cognitive effort and are more influential than timeliness of CI with regard to the actual location selection. Furthermore, high (vs. low) timeliness of CI enhances positive user perceptions, explaining the increased DSS reuse intentions. Overall, we provide novel insights on the role of timeliness of information for DSS to influence crowding behavior.

为了针对位置的拥挤，决策支持系统 (DSS) 越来越多地具有拥挤信息 (CI)，以指示一个位置的可用容量有多少被占用。然而，关于这种CI的及时性（例如，“刚刚更新”）如何以及为什么影响用户对不同拥挤位置的选择以及位置推荐的有效性知之甚少。然而，解决这一知识差距对于了解如何设计防止（过度）拥挤和改善相关 DSS 重用意图的 DSS 接口非常重要。借鉴解释水平理论，我们应用了一种混合方法，包括定量研究和补充定性研究。首先，我们进行了一项在线实验，其中 171 名参与者在不同拥挤的酒吧之间进行选择。定量数据提供了证据表明高（相对于 低）CI的及时性导致用户选择不那么拥挤的酒吧，并提高了用户的DSS重用意图。然而，当显示位置推荐时，CI 的高（与低）及时性对位置选择的影响意外地被抵消了。在随后对 DSS 用户的定性访谈中，我们发现，即使 CI 的高（与低）及时性提供了对 CI 成本和收益的更多有意识的阐述并增加了信任信念，但存在（与不存在）位置建议会减少一个人的认知努力，并且更多在实际选址方面，比 CI 的及时性更有影响力。此外，CI 的高（与低）及时性增强了积极的用户感知，解释了 DSS 重用意图的增加。全面的，