Start Date

10-12-2017 12:00 AM

Description

This research investigates the effect of linguistic style (i.e. personal vs. impersonal writing) of online reviews on their perceived helpfulness. Analyzing a sample of 20,997 reviews from amazon.com, we report that reviews written in an impersonal linguistic style are perceived to be more helpful compared with those written in a personal style. Findings also suggest that the effect of the linguistic style on perceived review helpfulness is moderated by review attributes, including valence, extremity and level of affective content, but not by review length. Reviews written in impersonal style are more helpful when the reviews are of moderate opinion, lower valence and higher affective content.

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Dec 10th, 12:00 AM

Linguistic Style and Online Review Helpfulness

This research investigates the effect of linguistic style (i.e. personal vs. impersonal writing) of online reviews on their perceived helpfulness. Analyzing a sample of 20,997 reviews from amazon.com, we report that reviews written in an impersonal linguistic style are perceived to be more helpful compared with those written in a personal style. Findings also suggest that the effect of the linguistic style on perceived review helpfulness is moderated by review attributes, including valence, extremity and level of affective content, but not by review length. Reviews written in impersonal style are more helpful when the reviews are of moderate opinion, lower valence and higher affective content.