Why are you telling me this? An examination into negative consumer reviews on the web

(1990) ‘Positioning: The social construction of self’, Journal of the Theory of Social Behavior, 20(1): 43–63.ĭe Fina, A., Schiffrin, D. (2005) ‘Identity and interaction: A sociocultural linguistic approach’, Discourse Studies, 7: 584–614.ĭavies, B. (2007) ‘Are hotels serving quality? An exploratory study of service quality in the Scottish hotel sector’, Tourism Management, 28: 1006–19.īucholz, M. (2010) ‘Constructing identity on Facebook: Report on a pilot study’, SPELL: Swiss Papers in English Language and Literature, 24: 165–87.īriggs, S., Sutherland, J. (2006) Discourse and Identity (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press).īolander, B. Law (eds.) Information and Communication Technologies in Tourism, 2009 (Vienna: Springer), pp. (2009) ‘Complaints on the online environment - the case of Hong Kong hotels’. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.Īu, N., Buhalis, D. These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. There are now millions of user-generated reviews available online about every imaginable product. However, online social media have radically enlarged the scope of firsthand information about goods and services available for consumers’ consideration. In either case, the scope of goods and services covered was restricted either to what could be experienced by a handful of individuals whose job it was to review them (experts), or to what could be experienced by the individuals in one’s immediate social network. Or they could rely on traditional forms of word-of-mouth: assessments of individuals personally known to the consumer, such as family members, friends, or acquaintances.

They could rely on the opinions of a handful of experts, such as professional reviewers or critics, who published their reviews in traditional print formats (e.g., magazines or guidebooks). Before eWOM, consumers had basically two options for gathering information to guide their decision-making. eWOM is a relatively new genre, which has no exact analogue in the offline world (Pollach, 2006). Online consumer reviews are a genre of social media which is referred to by the international marketing community as ‘eWOM,’ or electronic word-of-mouth (Hennig-Thurau et al., 2004). This chapter focuses on identity in TripAdvisor, a user-generated online consumer review site.

Why are you telling me this? An examination into negative consumer reviews on the web