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How regulating the cost of positive and negative reviews affects the online reviews and their impacts on digital platform performance

Tang, Jing
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=case1594725636278695

Abstract Details

2020, Doctor of Philosophy, Case Western Reserve University, Management.
Policing and regulating online user reviews is now an imperative for digital platforms to shape consumer choice and welfare. Despite 20 years of extensive research of reviews and recommendation systems, our knowledge of the causal effects of positive and negative reviews is scarce. This study addresses some of these problems and takes initial steps to carry out naturalistic experiments on the effects of pricing negative and positive reviews and their effects of review quality and their impact. The perspective draws on past research of online reviews in the IS field, with studies in marketing and psychology that have focused on “negativity bias”, trust, consistency theory, as well as asymmetric impacts of online reviews. It specifically examines how the regulations on the online review systems involving a “books-to-read-for-free” user-generated content (UGC) platform, influence the quality of the negatively and positively valenced reviews and their impacts on business performance. The empirical study is based on rigorous analysis of extensive data sets of both quantitative and qualitative data related to reviews and their effects. I use multilevel negative binomial models to examine the relationships between review valence and user contribution, and use topic modeling techniques and sentiment analysis to detect the change in topics and the degree of sentiment (i.e. positive or negative attitude) based on review content. The results of the first two studies show that the tax-on-negative regulation changed the quantity and content of both negatively- and positively valenced reviews, and increased their influences on user contributions. The third study shows that the differentiated tax-on-review regulation (i.e. more tax on more negative rated reviews) has evidenced a more positive effect of positively valenced reviews on user contribution amount. The proposed framework examines the so far neglected topic of regulating the valence of online reviews. The studies offer an integrated theoretical perspective of the potential effects of regulating online review systems. Empirically, the study offers new insights for regulating negative reviews only, and differentiated regulating other reviews, for online platforms, showing that with an appropriate intervention, the platform can increase its business and user performance.
Kalle Lyytinen, Ph.D. (Committee Chair)
Jagdip Singh, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Youngjin Yoo, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Erman Ayday, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
119 p.
Management

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Tang, J. (2020). How regulating the cost of positive and negative reviews affects the online reviews and their impacts on digital platform performance [Doctoral dissertation, Case Western Reserve University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=case1594725636278695

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Tang, Jing. How regulating the cost of positive and negative reviews affects the online reviews and their impacts on digital platform performance. 2020. Case Western Reserve University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=case1594725636278695.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Tang, Jing. "How regulating the cost of positive and negative reviews affects the online reviews and their impacts on digital platform performance." Doctoral dissertation, Case Western Reserve University, 2020. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=case1594725636278695

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

case1594725636278695
367
© 2020, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by Case Western Reserve University School of Graduate Studies and OhioLINK.