網路口碑之片面性效應

Abstract

本研究的主要目的是探究網路口碑的片面性效應。提供了正負兩面意見的網路評論比起只提供一個面向意見的網路評論更能真實地反映產品使用經驗，但同時也更難解讀。過去的研究中尚未就雙面性的網路評論是否比片面的網路評論（僅有正面或負面評價）更有幫助得出一致的結論。因此，本研究從資訊處理的角度，提出消費者對網路評論片面性所做出的歸因（將評論歸因到與產品品質相關或僅受評論者偏好影響的程度）可能作為中介影響網路評論片面性與知覺助益程度之間的關係，且該中介效應被證實顯著。同時，我們猜測產品類型和認知需求的不同將影響消費者在閱讀網路評論時所投入的認知資源，從而干擾他們對該評論的產品歸因程度和知覺助益程度。我們在實驗中同時考慮了正面評論和負面評論。一方面，本研究發現，當雙面性的網路評論是針對搜尋性商品而非經驗性商品的時候，更可能被歸因到是與產品品質高度相關的資訊。另一方面，我們發現認知需求高的個體比起認知需求低的個體，更有可能將雙面性的產品評論歸因到與產品品質高度相關。而在知覺助益程度上的研究結果表明，當雙面性的評論只和正面評論比較的時候，他們對於搜尋性商品而非經驗性商品有更強烈的效應，對認知需求低而非高的個體也有更強烈的效應，這並不完全符合我們的假設。在文中我們也將試圖解釋這一現象。

The main purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of sidedness of electronic WOM on perceived helpfulness. Two-sided online reviews are more truthful than one-sided online reviews to reflect product experience but also harder to process. From the perspective of information processing, we proposed product-related attribution (the extent to attribute a review caused by product quality rather than reviewer’s preference) as a mediator on the effect of review sidedness onto perceived helpfulness and verified a significant mediation effect. Product type and need for cognition were considered as moderator to influence attribution and perceived helpfulness of a review due to different cognitive resources invested in review reading. Positive and negative reviews were all included in our experiments to represent one-sided conditions. On the one hand, two-sided reviews were more likely to generate a higher level of product-related attribution on search goods rather than experience goods. On the other hand, individuals with high need for cognition are more likely to attributed two-sided reviews on product-related factors. As for perceived helpfulness, when only compared two-sided reviews with one-sided positive reviews, review sidedness showed a stronger effect for search goods than experience goods, and also a stronger effect for participants low in need for cognition rather than those high in need for cognition, which did not fully support our hypothesis. We also tried to explain this phenomenon in this paper.