The Co-construction of Credibility in Online Product Reviews

摘要

Reviews of products on Web sites like Epinions.com make explicit the ways in which credible identities are co-constructed. Product reviews reveal not only how reviewers construct credibility for themselves but also how readers of reviews, through their comments about reviews, ratify and contribute to reviewer credibility. I present a framework and analyze examples of reviews of digital cameras to examine how reviewers of a technical product convey credibility and how review readers co-construct reviewers' credibility. The framework and analysis can help identify those reviewers who are likely to influence review Web site users.