THE EFFECT OF ONLINE CONSUMER REVIEWS ON ATTITUDE AND PURCHASE INTENTION - THE ROLE OF MESSAGE CHARACTERISTICS

摘要

Data indicated that message sidedness has a persuasive effect on attitude towards the review and product, perceived source credibility, and purchase intention. That is, the positive review has the greatest impact on attitude toward the review, followed by the unbiased review and negative-only review. This aligns with previous research indicating that consumers perceive positive messages to be more persuasive than negative. Similarly, the positive-only review had the greatest persuasive effect on consumer's attitude toward product and purchase intention, followed by unbiased and negative-only reviews. This finding is supported by previous studies that found the impact of positive WOM is greater than negative WOM on consumer's purchase probability. Additionally, participants perceive higher reviewer credibility when reading unbiased and positive-only reviews, compared to negative-only reviews. Overall, both the positive-only and unbiased reviews have a greater effect on consumer's attitude and purchase intention than negative-only reviews, which contradict research suggesting a negative WOM message has a stronger impact on brand evaluation. The study also identified an interaction between review sidedness and review type for message persuasion. Here, data suggest the positive online consumer review with benefit-centric information has the greatest positive effect on consumer's product attitudes and purchase intentions.