TY - JOUR
T1 - Examining the influence of online reviews on consumers' decision-making
T2 - A heuristic-systematic model
AU - Zhang, Kem Z.K.
AU - Zhao, Sesia J.
AU - CHEUNG, Christy M K
AU - Lee, Matthew K.O.
N1 - Funding Information:
The work described in this study was supported by grants from National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 71201149 ) and China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (No. 2012M511426 and No. 2014T70601 ). The authors also acknowledge with gratitude the generous support of the Hong Kong Baptist University for the project ( FRG2/13-14/010 ) without which the timely production of the current report/publication would not have been feasible.
PY - 2014/11
Y1 - 2014/11
N2 - Along with the growth of Internet and electronic commerce, online consumer reviews have become an important source of information that assists consumers to make purchase decision. However, theoretical development and empirical testing in this area of research are still limited, which greatly hinder us from understanding the influence of online reviews. Drawing upon the heuristic-systematic model from the literature of dual-process theories, we develop a research model to identify factors that are important to consumers' purchase decision-making. The model is empirically tested with 191 users of an existing online review site. We find that argument quality of online reviews (systematic factor), which is characterized by perceived informativeness and perceived persuasiveness, has a significant effect on consumers' purchase intention. In addition, we find that source credibility and perceived quantity of reviews (heuristic factors) have direct impacts on purchase intention. The two heuristic factors further demonstrate positive influences on argument strength. This result is consistent with the proposition of bias effect in the heuristic-systematic model, which elucidates the interrelationship between heuristic and systematic factors. Based on the findings, we discuss implications for both researchers and practitioners.
AB - Along with the growth of Internet and electronic commerce, online consumer reviews have become an important source of information that assists consumers to make purchase decision. However, theoretical development and empirical testing in this area of research are still limited, which greatly hinder us from understanding the influence of online reviews. Drawing upon the heuristic-systematic model from the literature of dual-process theories, we develop a research model to identify factors that are important to consumers' purchase decision-making. The model is empirically tested with 191 users of an existing online review site. We find that argument quality of online reviews (systematic factor), which is characterized by perceived informativeness and perceived persuasiveness, has a significant effect on consumers' purchase intention. In addition, we find that source credibility and perceived quantity of reviews (heuristic factors) have direct impacts on purchase intention. The two heuristic factors further demonstrate positive influences on argument strength. This result is consistent with the proposition of bias effect in the heuristic-systematic model, which elucidates the interrelationship between heuristic and systematic factors. Based on the findings, we discuss implications for both researchers and practitioners.
KW - Consumer decision-making
KW - Electronic word-of-mouth
KW - Heuristic-systematic model
KW - Online reviews
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85027917531&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.dss.2014.08.005
DO - 10.1016/j.dss.2014.08.005
M3 - Journal article
AN - SCOPUS:85027917531
SN - 0167-9236
VL - 67
SP - 78
EP - 89
JO - Decision Support Systems
JF - Decision Support Systems
ER -