What do Airbnb Users Care about Before, during and after the COVID-19? An Analysis of Online Reviews

Qian Liu, Paolo Mengoni*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Chapter in book/report/conference proceedingConference proceedingpeer-review

1 Citation (Scopus)

Abstract

In this paper, we aim to explore the impact of the COVID-19 (Coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic on the global tourism industry and the changes in users' online reviews of listings on the Airbnb platform in this context. As a result of the outbreak, countries have introduced travel restriction policies to limit the movement of people and control the spread of the epidemic, which has dealt a severe blow to the global tourism industry. We want to provide an in-depth study of the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic on the tourism industry, as well as to explore the changes in the focus and attention of users on the travel experience. This is informative for tourism industry practitioners and policy makers to help better understand market demand and develop more rational policies. We selected online reviews on the Airbnb platform to explore the industry impact of the epidemic. Through topic modeling and sentiment analysis, this paper investigates the changes in users' discussion focus and attention level before, during and after the epidemic, and explores the reasons for them. The results show that the number of non-local visitors plummeted during the epidemic, while visitors paid more attention to topics related to environmental hygiene and personal health. In addition, this paper finds that user reviews have a very clear positive bias. From the triple perspective of platform, hosts, and users, this paper explores the reasons behind the phenomenon.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationProceedings - 2023 22nd IEEE/WIC International Conference on Web Intelligence and Intelligent Agent Technology, WI-IAT 2023
PublisherIEEE
Pages409-414
Number of pages6
Edition1st
ISBN (Electronic)9798350309188
ISBN (Print)9798350309195
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 26 Oct 2023
Event22nd IEEE/WIC International Conference on Web Intelligence and Intelligent Agent Technology, WI-IAT 2023 - Hybrid, Venice, Italy
Duration: 26 Oct 202329 Oct 2023

Publication series

NameProceedings - 2023 22nd IEEE/WIC International Conference on Web Intelligence and Intelligent Agent Technology, WI-IAT 2023

Conference

Conference22nd IEEE/WIC International Conference on Web Intelligence and Intelligent Agent Technology, WI-IAT 2023
Country/TerritoryItaly
CityHybrid, Venice
Period26/10/2329/10/23

Scopus Subject Areas

  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Computer Networks and Communications
  • Computer Science Applications

User-Defined Keywords

  • Natural Language Processing
  • Sentiment Analysis
  • Topic Modeling

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