Bachelor’s Thesis – Management in The
Digital Age
What Makes People Write Negative Online Reviews? Examination of
neuroticism and motivation to vent negative feelings when writing
negative eWOM in the hospitality industry.
July 10, 2020
Word Count: 7,050
(excluding references & appendices)
Supervisor:
Dr. Daphne M. Dekker
Author:
Statement of Originality
This document is written by student Katarina Holecova who declares to take full responsibility for the contents of this document.
I declare that the text and the work presented in this document are original and that no sources other than those mentioned in the text and its references have been used in creating it.
The Faculty of Economics and Business is responsible solely for the supervision of completion of the work, not for the contents.
Abstract
Although the number of online reviews and electronic word of mouth (eWOM) is continuously growing, fewer people are producing eWOM than there are consuming it. Since negative eWOM has a significant impact on businesses and their future, especially those in the hospitality and service sector, it is of utmost importance to comprehend what influences eWOM producers to write negative online reviews. We hypothesize that individuals that are highly motivated to vent their negative feelings have a higher intention of writing negative eWOM. Secondly, we also propose that the personality trait neuroticism will further strengthen the relationship, such that highly neurotic individuals have a stronger motivation to vent negative feelings, and thus have a higher intention to write negative eWOM. These hypotheses are tested with a survey sample of 199 respondents. The first hypothesis found support, whereas the second one did not, which suggests a main effect where the motivation to vent negative feelings positively impacts the intention to write negative eWOM. On the other hand, the personality trait neuroticism does not impact the relationship between venting and intention to write negative eWOM in any way. Interestingly, a second main effect was discovered in which the intention to write negative eWOM is greater when individuals score high on neuroticism. Thus, the findings suggest that the motivation to vent negative feelings is a strong predictor of the intention to write negative eWOM irrespective of whether an individual is highly neurotic or not.
Table of Contents
I. INTRODUCTION
5
A. Theoretical Framework 7
i. Negative e-WOM 7
ii. Motivation to generate negative eWOM – Venting negative feelings 8
iii. Intention to write a negative review 9
iv. Relation between motivation to vent negative feelings and intention to write a negative eWOM 9
v. Personality trait – Neuroticism 10
vi. Neuroticism as a moderator between venting and intention of writing negative eWOM 11
II. METHODOLOGY
12
i. Design and Procedure 12
ii. Measures 13
iii. Sample 13
iv. Analytical Plan 14
III. RESULTS
14
i. Descriptives and Correlations 14
ii. Assumption Check 15
iii. Hypothesis Testing 15
IV. DISCUSSION
16
i. Implications for Research 17
ii. Practical Implications 18
iii. Strengths, Limitations, and Future Research 19
V. CONCLUSION
19
VI. REFERENCES
20
VII. APPENDICES
24
Appendix A – Scenario Analysis – negative experience 24
Appendix B – Survey Item Motivation to Vent 24
Appendix C – Survey Item Neuroticism 25
Appendix D – Gender 26
Appendix E – Demographics 27
Appendix F – Age 28
Appendix G – Normality Test 28
Appendix H – Linearity Test 29
Appendix I – Test for Independence of Observations 29
Appendix J – Outlier Analysis 30
Appendix K – Multicollinearity Test 31
Appendix L – Test for Heteroscedasticity 31
Appendix M – Regression Testing 32
Appendix N – Moderation Output 33
I.
Introduction
Often, when individuals are in the process of deciding to go on a vacation, they tend to search for information that answers questions, namely; Which flight should I take? Which hotel should I stay at? Or what monuments should I explore? To find such information, people in many cases tend to ask their friends or family or consult the Internet as to what they should or should not do and what is recommended. This type of behavior points to the fact that people want or require others’ viewpoints and advice when making decisions (Sparks & Browning, 2010).
Asking friends and family is a source of information that constitutes what is known as traditional word of mouth (WOM). Arndt (1967) defined WOM as a “person-to-person communication between a perceived non-commercial communicator and a receiver concerning a brand, product, or a service.” As is well-known, WOM has substantial power in influencing consumer purchasing and decision-making behaviors (Hennig-Thurau, Gwinner, Walsh & Gremler, 2004; Sparks & Browning, 2010). This power is particularly present in situations that deal with intangible products or services, such as in the hospitality sector (Huete-Alcocer, 2017).
The introduction of the Internet resulted in the establishment of the first online review systems, websites, and platforms, which triggered the inception of a new phenomenon known as electronic word of mouth, or eWOM. Based on a meta-analysis, eWOM can be defined as “consumer-generated, consumption-related communication that employs digital tools and is directed primarily to other consumers,” (Babić Rosario, de Valck & Sotgiu, 2020). Although Manner & Lane (2017) state that orthodox WOM is still the most utilized way of recommending a product or service, eWOM is trusted more by consumers (Rodgers & Wang, 2011). This is because eWOM aids in decreasing uncertainty risk inherent in services (Hu & Kim, 2018), which is why an enormous number of potential customers peruse online hotel reviews, and around 80% of them decide based on the information provided (Vermeulen & Seegers, 2009). Additionally, eWOM has auxiliary characteristics that provide benefits to individuals that traditional WOM lacks; it is easily accessible, available to most worldwide, has the option of anonymity, and remains online for long periods of time (Manner & Lane, 2017; Hennig-Thurau et al., 2004; Nam, Baker, Ahmad, & Goo, 2020).
The online environment has allowed consumers to voice their own experiences and opinions, resulting in many people becoming so-called prosumers – producers and consumers – (Toffler, 1970). The information provided by individuals acts as a source of knowledge for current and potential consumers as well as for firms, which gather the consumer intelligence to enhance their future customer value, and to expand or maintain their current customer base (Yoo & Gretzel 2011; Sigala, 2009).
Although eWOM provides multiple benefits to companies, it can also become a threat if not managed properly. It has been found that negative eWOM has a highly harmful effect on businesses, with 82% of individuals who observe a negative review stated a lower probability of visiting said business (Murphy, 2019). Thus, it is important that firms handle negative reviews in order to maintain the highest number of existing and potential customers, their brand reputation, consumer loyalty/trust, and also to collect consumer intelligence and learn what could be improved upon.
Despite the continuous growth of online reviews (Murphy, 2019) and the trust associated with them, there still exists a large chasm between the number of people who create content and people who consume it (Yoo & Gretzel, 2008). This means that fewer people are producing negative eWOM, yet a much more significant percentage is impacted by it. Hu & Kim (2018) stated that “eWOM is an integrative process initiated by a service/product experience (Dellarocas, Gao & Narayan, 2010), triggered by a customer’s motivation to write a review, and eventually realized on online platforms (Yang, 2017)”. Since negative eWOM has such an impact on consumers and businesses, it is of utmost importance to understand what motivates these so-called prosumers to write negative online reviews.
Prior research has pointed to the fact that individuals create negative eWOM when they feel anger, disappointment, or remorse (Nam, Baker, Ahmad, & Goo, 2020). Hence, it is plausible to believe that most individuals write negative eWOM to get such feelings out of their system in order to feel better psychologically. The motivation to vent is seen as a technique used to decrease one’s anxiety (Nyer 1997; Richins, 1984). This means that a negative online review is written with the motive to get such adverse emotions off their chest, also known as catharsis. Since venting negative feelings relates to the psychological aspect of an individual, it may potentially be relevant to explore an individual’s personality traits as a factor that could possibly predict or affect a prosumer’s behavior in the intention to create negative eWOM.
There exists one personality trait that serves as a predictor of emotionally negative experiences – neuroticism (Mooradian & Olver, 1994). As was mentioned before, prosumers create negative eWOM when they experience adverse emotions, and the motive behind it is often the need to vent such feelings. It is thus deemed fitting that the personality trait neuroticism could, in part, predict a part of that said relationship. Interestingly enough, neuroticism is a trait that has been understudied, along with all personality traits (Hu & Kim, 2018), and the research that does exist contains inconsistent findings.
Thus, this paper aims to fill the gaps and find solutions to the inconsistencies in current research about whether the motivation to vent negative feelings impacts the intention to write a negative eWOM, and also, whether neuroticism has an impact on venting and intention to create a negative eWOM. This goal is in line with the recommendation to revisit the relationship between neuroticism, need to vent
negative feelings, and the intention to write negative reviews, as stated by Anastasiei & Dospinescu (2018). Thus, given the existing empirical data and research, it is plausible to investigate the inquiry:
To what extent does the personality trait neuroticism moderate the relationship between the motivation to vent negative feelings and the intention to write negative eWOM in the hospitality context?
This research has implications for both scientists and managers. For researchers, this study will provide more accurate and consistent data into one specific personality trait (neuroticism), one motivation (to vent negative feelings), and their relationship with the intention to provide negative eWOM. Furthermore, for managers and marketers in the hospitality and service industry, this research will aid in understanding whether personality and the need to vent play a role in creating negative eWOM, which will help managers and marketers understand the reasoning behind the creation of negative eWOM, as well as the personality trait that an individual may possess. It may help save a firm’s brand image, future revenue, and its potential and current customers by selecting appropriate response methods.
This paper continues with a literature review that focuses on available research on negative eWOM, venting negative feelings, intention to write and neuroticism and the relationships between one another. Based on the literature, hypotheses are formulated. Further, the methods section explains the survey utilized, data collection, and the quantitative methods used. The results section will provide a rough look at the data, whereas the discussion will analyze the data at a theoretical level and compare it to extant literature along with its theoretical implications. Prior to concluding, the limitations and directions for future research will be examined.
A. Theoretical Framework
i. Negative e-WOM
According to Rodgers &Wangs (2011), there are three types of comments that can be generated – positive, neutral, or negative. Most research has focused on positive and negative eWOM (Ismagilova, Dwivedi, Slade & Williams, 2017). Positive comments deal with product endorsements and testimonials, meanwhile, negative comments deal with complaints and consumer dissatisfaction with a product or experience (Anastasiei & Dospinescu, 2018; Nadarajan, Bojei & Khalid, 2017). All types of eWOM are able to impact brand image, trust, product attitude, and purchasing behavior (Rodgers & Wang, 2011), yet negative comments can most severely harm the company (Ismagilova, 2017).
For individuals, Nadarajan et al. (2017) found that an intensely written negative eWOM has a higher chance of impacting one’s behavior than a profoundly written positive eWOM. This is in line with Pan & Chiou (2011), who state that negative eWOM is seen as more beneficial and reliable when
individuals make decisions. Also, it is said that the impact of negative eWOM on an individual is stronger for experience goods (e.g. services) than for search goods (e.g. products) (Nam, Baker, Ahmad & Goo, 2018). Thus, consumers in the hospitality sector are more likely to trust negative eWOM than positive ones. For companies, negative eWOM can be viewed as market intelligence that can be utilized to better understand their consumers’ wants as well as make improved strategic decisions in the future (Nyer, 2000). Numerous firms understand the substantial influence negative eWOM has on brand reputation and its customers; hence they try to leverage such negative reviews through employing web care teams, who deal with disgruntled customers to manage the spread of negative eWOM (Verhagen, Nauta & Feldberg, 2013) and maintain their brand image. As can be seen, consumers are less attentive to positive than negative reviews, and businesses are more harmed by negative reviews than positive ones, thus, this research centers its attention on negative eWOM.
ii. Motivation to generate negative eWOM – Venting negative feelings
One is said to be motivated, according to Ryan & Deci (2000), when an individual is “moved to do something.” Motivated people are characterized as being full of energy and are focused on attaining an end or goal. Motivation, according to Self-Determination Theory, can be divided into intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, where intrinsic motivation is “doing something because it is inherently interesting or enjoyable” (Ryan & Deci, 2000), and extrinsic motivation is “doing something because it leads to a separable outcome.” (Ryan & Deci, 2000). This research does not look at external factors that affect motivation; hence, the focus of this study is on intrinsic motivation.
According to Hu & Kim (2018), since the motivation to write a review is dependent on the experience, which can be either positive or negative, it is justifiable to infer that there are differing motivations for positive and negative eWOM. Hennig-Thurau et al. (2004) were the first to describe eight underlying motivations, to write positive and negative eWOM; venting negative feelings, platform assistance, concern for other consumers, self-enhancement, social benefits, economic incentives, helping the company, and advice seeking. Hu & Kim (2018) later discovered that multiple of the above-mentioned motivations overlap among each other in the hospitality context. Thus, they provided categories in which the motivations for writing positive eWOM include; self-enhancement and enjoyment, altruism (positive), and economic incentives (positive), whereas negative motivations include; altruism (negative), economic incentives (negative), and venting negative feelings.
As this study focuses on negative eWOM, negative altruism motivates an individual to write negative eWOM because they wish to warn others from experiencing the same or similar negative event, while also providing the company with information, through constructive feedback or criticism, so the firm can improve in the future (Hu & Kim, 2018). Adverse economic incentives may include receiving monetary or non-monetary benefits for writing negative online reviews on a platform or directly to the
hotel (Hu & Kim, 2018). In their study, Hu & Kim (2018) found that venting and economic incentives were significant for negative eWOM, while altruism was insignificant. Furthermore, adverse economic incentives are unrelated to this study since they deal with extrinsic motivation, while this study explores intrinsic motivation. Additionally, many third-party websites, such as TripAdvisor, do not provide any economic incentives (TripAdvisor, 2018). Hence, this research will focus solely on the motivation to vent negative feelings.
The motivation to vent negative feelings occurs when an individual experiences an unfavorable occurrence, which brings forth emotions such as dissatisfaction, disappointment, and vexation (Yoo & Gretzel, 2008). Such emotions create a mental or emotional strain which often times result in pursuing routes to reduce such negative feelings (i.e., catharsis) to bring one’s psychological equilibrium back to a balance. For this reason, individuals engage in negative eWOM (Hu & Kim, 2018). According to Yoo & Gretzel (2008), services related to the tourism context have a higher probability of experiencing discontent due to its nature of high expectancy, high risk, high interaction with customers, and high price conscientiousness. As such, venting negative feelings is viewed as an imperative motivation when producing negative eWOM.
iii. Intention to write a negative review
The intention to do something can be defined as anything an individual wishes to or decides to willingly carry out (Cambridge Dictionary, 2020; Picazo-Vela et al., 2010). This means that the greater the intention, the higher the likelihood of action. On the other hand, likelihood can be defined as the probability of something occurring (Cambridge Dictionary, 2020). Hence, this paper will explore an individual’s intention to write negative eWOM, or in other words, the probability an individual wishes to or decides to carry out the action of creating negative eWOM. This will allow precise observation and testing as to whether a negative experience triggers the motivation to vent negative feelings and whether the motivation does have an effect on the intention of writing negative eWOM.
iv. Relation between motivation to vent negative feelings and intention to write a negative
eWOM
According to Ajzen (1991), “intentions are assumed to capture motivational factors that influence a behavior,” which means that the intention or actual behavior can be strengthened by a specific motivation. For this reason, it is imperative to explore extant research about the relationship between the motivation to vent negative feelings and the intention to write negative eWOM.
Hennig-Thurau and colleagues (2004) discovered that the motivation to vent negative feelings had no effect on the number of reviews in their study. Similarly, it was found that the relationship between venting and intention to provide negative eWOM was insignificant (Rensink, 2013) or not
strong enough (Yoo & Gretzel, 2008). On the other hand, research in the restaurant industry found that writing online reviews is seen as a method for communicating and sharing one’s vexation about an experience with others (Dixit, Badgaiyan, & Khare, 2019). Also, Yoo & Gretzel (2011) discovered that the motivation to vent negative feelings had, to a certain extent, a significant effect on the intention to write negative eWOM. Most importantly, Hu & Kim (2018) found that the motivation to vent had the highest impact on writing negative eWOM, making it the strongest predictor in the hotel service context. There is a sparse quantity of studies from which there are contradicting findings, but based on the available research, it is inferred that;
Hypothesis 1: If an individual has a high motivation to vent negative feelings, then the intention to
create negative eWOM will also be high.
v. Personality trait – Neuroticism
Personality traits are said to be a manifestation of an individual’s particular way of behaving, thinking, and feeling (Diener & Lucas, 2020). Five personality traits, also known as the Big Five, exist; openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism (Goldberg, 1990; Costa & McCrae, 1992). An individual who is said to be open is one that enjoys gaining new knowledge or experiences, is able to deal with high uncertainty inherent in novel situations, is very inquisitive, open-minded and clever (Rensink, 2013; Wang, Jackson, Zhang & Su, 2012; Yoo & Gretzel, 2011). Rensink (2013), Wang et al. (2012) and Yoo & Gretzel (2011) characterize conscientious individuals as being orderly, efficient, dependable, focused, and ambitious. Extraversion is characterized by being outgoing, amicable, easy to talk to and make friends (Rensink, 2013; Wang et al., 2012; Yoo & Gretzel, 2011). Agreeable individuals are considerate, provide support, cooperate with others, and are overall more selfless individuals (Rensink, 2013; Wang et al., 2012; Yoo & Gretzel, 2011). Lastly, Neuroticism is characterized by individuals who are negative, fearful, lack confidence, anxious, and unstable (Rensink, 2013; Wang et al., 2012; Yoo & Gretzel, 2011).
Neuroticism can potentially be seen as a very reactive personality trait to negative experiences, due to the fact that neurotic individuals are said to be pessimistic and anxious. Thus, an adverse situation will be interpreted much more strongly, on an emotional level, by an individual who scores high on neuroticism than someone who scores low, making them want to vent their feelings. For this reason, neuroticism is an intriguing personality trait to explore further.
The personality trait neuroticism has been studied in terms of an individual’s online behavior, and the findings are distinctly contrasting. Highly neurotic individuals were found to experience higher tendencies of addiction to their smartphones, thus spending longer periods of time messaging (SMS) (Ehrenberg, Juckes, White & Walsh, 2008) and on social media (Correa, Hinsley & Zúñiga, 2010). This
could be explained by the finding that people that score high in neuroticism browse the Internet to decrease their perceived loneliness (Amichai-Hamburger & Ben-Artzi, 2003). On the contrary, according to Tuten & Bosnjak (2001), neurotic individuals spend less time on the Internet, similar to Yoo & Gretzel (2011), who found that neuroticism increases barriers to online review production. The inconsistent findings imply that the impact of neuroticism on the motivation to vent negative feelings and intention to write negative eWOM is unclear and requires further investigation.
vi. Neuroticism as a moderator between venting and intention of writing negative eWOM
A growing number of studies point towards the importance of personality traits as a predictor that may explain a large component of the intention to write eWOM (Yoo & Gretzel, 2011; Hu & Kim, 2018). According to Yoo & Gretzel (2011), “personality traits are considered to be enduring, which means they result in stable and cross-situational individual differences.” This points to the fact that prosumer’s personality does not change in accordance with changes in the environment, which makes it a highly appropriate variable as a moderator for eWOM creation.
Personality has been shown to affect the relationship between motivation to vent negative feelings and intention to write reviews by some means. In a small literature review, Rensink (2013) uncovered that neurotic individuals produce negative eWOM in order to vent their adverse feelings, which is explained by the fact that these individuals are overall more negative, dejected, and anxious. In opposition, Picazo-Vela, Chou, Melcher & Pearson (2010) found that neuroticism has a negative impact on the intention to write eWOM. As such, it is of interest to explore extant literature on how exactly neuroticism impacts the relationship between venting negative feelings and the intention to write a negative online review.
Present literature, for example, Rensink (2013), states that neuroticism had a significant moderating effect on venting negative feelings and intention to write negative eWOM. Additionally, Manner & Lane (2018) also discovered that venting affects negative eWOM creation for individuals scoring high on neuroticism. Along the same lines, Anastasiei & Dospinsecu (2018) further reinforce the belief that individuals who had a negative experience and score high in neuroticism have a tendency to produce negative eWOM in order to vent their feelings. Hence, based on the above-mentioned literature, it is plausible to infer that;
Hypothesis 2: An individual that scores high on neuroticism, will positively moderate the relationship
Overall, there are two main research objectives: (1) to inspect the relationship between venting negative feelings and the intention to write negative eWOM, and (2) to examine whether neuroticism moderates the relationship between the motivation to vent negative feelings and the intention to write negative eWOM in the hospitality context.
II.
Methodology
i. Design and Procedure
This study was conducted using a cross-sectional, within-subjects, survey design through Qualtrics, which was offered in both English and Slovak. To maintain the quality of the research and the main idea being tested in the questionnaire, back-translation was utilized prior to administering the survey to participants. As presented by Tyupa (2011), the survey followed the translation process of (1) forward translation, which consisted of one of the researchers translating the survey from English to Slovak, (2) back-translation, which comprised of an individual independent from the study translating the Slovak survey back into English – without seeing the first version of the English survey, (3) back-translations review and discussion, where the individual and researcher discussed the two versions of the English translation and adjusted the Slovak translations to best reflect what was being measured, and lastly (4) the survey was finalized and the quality of the questionnaire was maintained.Participants were gathered through personal contacts of two Bachelor students from the University of Amsterdam.
The survey consisted of 13 questions and utilized scenario analysis to capture the intention to create negative eWOM. The participants were asked to imagine themselves in the hotel service experience presented to them (See Appendix A). The experience was created with the motive to induce adverse emotions hence, the experience was based on topics from negative TripAdvisor reviews (TripAdvisor, 2020) as well as peoples’ worst experiences in hotels (Mobal, 2013). Following the imaginary experience, respondents were asked to answer – on a 5-point Likert scale where 1= extremely
positive and 5= extremely negative – the control question, “How would you rate this experience?”. Next,
participants were asked multiple questions about their intention to write a negative review, their
motivation behind writing a review, personality items, and control variables. These measures will be further elaborated on in the following section.
ii. Measures
Motivation to vent negative feelings. The motivation to vent negative feelings was measured
using an 8-item scale adapted from Hennig-Thurau et al. (2004) and Yoo & Gretzel (2011). The two scales were examined for any overlapping items, but none were observed, thus the two scales were merged into one. Example items include “I like to get anger off my chest” and “To express my feelings about a negative experience I had”, which was answered on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1=
strongly agree to 5= strongly disagree (See Appendix B). This 8-item scale is deemed excellent as the
Cronbach’s Alpha is .826, and there were no possibilities for scale improvement.
Neuroticism. The personality trait neuroticism was measured using a 12-item scale developed
by Costa & McCrae (1992). Example items include “I often feel inferior to others” and “I often get angry at the way people treat me” (See Appendix C). The items “I am seldom sad or depressed”, “I am not a worrier”, “I rarely feel lonely or blue”, and “I rarely feel fearful or anxious” required recoding because of its opposite question statement. Items were answered on a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 1= strongly agree to 5= strongly disagree. This 12-item scale is seen as excellent since there were no possibilities for scale improvement, and Cronbach’s Alpha is equal to .851, which is deemed excellent.
Intention to write negative eWOM. Intention was measured using one item that being “How
likely are you to write an online negative review about this experience on a site like TripAdvisor?”, which could be answered using a 5-Point Likert scale ranging from 1=extremely likely to 5= extremely
unlikely.
Control variables. Three control variables were part of this research and were kept constant
throughout the analyses. Control variables include age, and gender, and the question; “Have you ever written an online review for a hotel before?”, to which participants could answer 1= yes, only positive
ones, 2= yes, only negative ones, 3= yes, both positive and negative and 4 = No I have never written any reviews. These variables were controlled in order to rule out any possible effect they may have on
any of the three above-mentioned variables. Additionally, a question regarding one’s nationality was included.
iii. Sample
In total, 248 responses were collected throughout three weeks by convenience sampling. The data required cleaning as 43 of the responses were incomplete, resulting in a new total of 205 completed
responses. This yields a response rate of 83.7%. Furthermore, since the focus of this research was on negative eWOM, participants that selected a response to “How would you rate this experience” as extremely positive, slightly positive, and neither positive nor negative were excluded. The remaining 199 responses were further analyzed.
The final sample was composed of 67.8% females and 32.2% males. The respondents were from various nationalities, yet most were from Slovakia (36.9%), Finland (16.9%), and the Netherlands (15.9%) (See Appendix E). From the sample, 74.9% were aged between 18 and 24, and 10.6% were between the ages of 25 and 34, and 6.5% were between 45 to 54 (See Appendix F). Furthermore, out of the 199 responses, 47.2% have never written any hotel reviews online, while 30.7% have written both positive and negative ones, and lastly, 20.6% have written only positive hotel reviews online.
iv. Analytical Plan
The statistical program SPSS developed by IBM was used to analyze the data. Initially, the data was inspected for correlations to observe the relationships that exist between the measured and controlled variables. To examine hypothesis 1, which states that the motivation to vent negative feelings is positively related to intention to write negative eWOM, linear regression was applied after checking all assumptions, with motivation to vent negative feelings as the independent variable (IV) and intention to write a negative online review as the dependent variable (DV). For hypothesis 2, the interaction effect between intention to write negative eWOM and neuroticism, PROCESS macro of Hayes (2018) Model 1 was used with the motivation to vent as the IV, neuroticism as the moderating variable and intention to write negative eWOM as the DV.
III. Results
i. Descriptives and Correlations
Table 1 comprises of the means, standard deviations and correlations of all main and control variables utilized in this study.
A positive, moderate, and significant correlation was observed between two of the main variables, the intention to write negative eWOM and the motivation to vent negative feelings (r=.329; p<0.01). Another positive, significant, but weak correlation was found between neuroticism and the motivation to vent negative feelings (r=.253; p<0.01), which are also two of the main variables. Furthermore, age and venting were found to be significant but weakly related (r=.283; p<0.01), similarly with age and neuroticism (r=.226; p<0.01). Interestingly, the control variable age has the highest number of significant correlations, all of them being with the three main variables. Overall, it is possible to observe that the only missing correlation between the three main variables is between neuroticism and the intention to write negative eWOM.
ii. Assumption Check
Prior to testing the hypotheses as mentioned above, it is necessary to make sure that the assumptions for linear regression are met. Firstly, the normality of the data was examined using a p-p plot, which provided results that show an approximately normal distribution (See Appendix G). Next, the linearity of the relationship between the IV and DV was tested. The scatter plot, and a comparison of means indicate that both variables have a linear relationship among each other (See Appendix H). The independence of observations provided a Durbin-Watson test value of 1.311, which is closer in value to 2 than 0, so no autocorrelation was found (See Appendix I). Data was also tested for outliers by utilizing standardized z-scores, which show that there are no significant outliers for intention to write negative online reviews and motivation to vent negative feelings, and only two extreme outliers for neuroticism (See Appendix J). The data was also tested without the two extreme outliers, but no different outcomes were observed, hence the outliers were kept in the data set. Multicollinearity was found to have a VIF of 1.068 and a Tolerance of .936, which is within the normal range (VIF<5 and Tolerance >0.2), thus there is no multicollinearity (See Appendix K), similarly with heteroscedasticity (See Appendix L). Altogether, this data sample was appropriate for linear regression.
iii. Hypothesis Testing
In order to test hypothesis 1, whether a high motivation to vent negative feelings positively affects the intention to write negative eWOM, a linear regression analysis was utilized. The first model contained the control variables (age, gender, written review before). The second model, or block, which was consequently added to the first one, contained the IV motivation to vent negative feelings.
The findings indicate that the first model, which only contains the control variables, explains 6.3% of the total variance in the intention to write negative eWOM. On the other hand, in model 2, when the IV motivation to vent negative feelings is added, the percentage of explained variance increases to 14.7% (See Appendix M). Although the percentage of explained variance more than doubled, it does not mean that the IV adds explanatory power, as other variables could artificially inflate
R2. For this reason, it is necessary to consult the adjusted R2, which indicates the corrected value of the
variable adding explanatory power. It was observed that adjusted R2 in the second model increases from
0.049 to 0.129. Thus, it can be inferred that the motivation to vent negative feelings adds explanatory power to the model which is further reinforced by the value of R2 change (R2 change = 0.083). It is also
necessary to look at the F Change values, as they indicate whether the amount of variance explained by the model increased or decreased. The F Change in the data increased, meaning that the quantity of variance explained by the second model significantly increased (F Change = 18.910; p<0.01) Lastly, it is also imperative to observe the predictive value of the IV (Unstandardized B = 0.390; t= 4.349; p<0.001). The output indicated that a one-point increase in the motivation to vent negative feelings significantly increases the intention to produce negative eWOM by 0.390 points. Based on the observed and stated values, it is plausible to conclude that the data supports hypothesis 1.
To test hypothesis 2, whether neuroticism moderates the relationship between the motivation to vent negative feelings and the intention to write negative eWOM, PROCESS macro Model 1 of Hayes (2018) was used. The analyzed results display that the interaction effect is insignificant. To further support the finding, the R2 change is minimal and insignificant (R2 change = .009; p= .1527)
(See Appendix N). The data was plotted on a graph, and no moderation was found, yet two main effects were discovered (See Appendix O). Firstly, the intention to write negative eWOM is always higher when the motivation to vent negative feelings is high– in line with hypothesis 1 – and secondly, the intention to write negative eWOM is always higher when an individual scores high on the personality trait neuroticism. Although main effects were discovered, the data rejects the above-mentioned hypothesis, since there was no significant interaction effect of neuroticism (mod) on the relationship between the motivation to vent negative feelings and the intention to write negative eWOM (DV) (b=0.2369; se=0.1650; t=1.4359; p= 0.1527). The interaction effect, although not significant, yields a positive value of 0.2369.
IV. Discussion
This study aimed to explore whether the personality trait neuroticism impacts the relationship between motivation to vent negative feelings and the intention to write negative eWOM. Two hypotheses were deduced from prior literature and tested, where the first predicted a positive relationship between motivation to vent negative feelings and the intention to create negative eWOM. The second hypothesis predicted that the personality trait neuroticism will positively moderate and thus strengthen the relationship between motivation to vent negative feelings and the intention to write negative eWOM.
The results lend support to the first hypothesis, which denotes that individuals who are highly motivated to vent their negative feelings have a higher intention to write negative eWOM than
individuals who are not as motivated to vent. On the other hand, the results do not lend any support to the second hypothesis, which signifies that it is irrelevant whether the individual scores high or low on the personality trait neuroticism, because it does not impact the relationship between venting and intention to write negative eWOM. Although the results for the second hypothesis are not significant, when the data was plotted on a graph, two direct effects were discovered. Mainly, an individual who has a high motivation to vent negative feelings always has a higher intention to create negative eWOM, which is in line with hypothesis 1. An additional and fascinating finding is that individuals who score high on the personality trait neuroticism always have a higher intention to produce negative eWOM, which suggests that neuroticism may not be a moderator, but may affect the variable intention in a similar way as does the motivation to vent negative feelings. Thus, although the data did not support the second hypothesis, a new relationship between neuroticism and the intention to a write negative online review was discovered.
i. Implications for Research
The discoveries from this study present reinforcing as well as new advances for current research. In line with the findings of Hu & Kim (2018), it was found that the motivation to vent negative feelings positively predicts the intention or likelihood of writing negative electronic word of mouth. Individuals who experience a strongly adverse occurrence, and have intense negative emotions, often engage in catharsis (Berkowitz, 1970; Alicke, Braun, Glor, Klotz, Magee, Sederhoim & Siegel, 1992) by venting their negative feelings, thus increasing the intention to create negative eWOM. This shows that anger and other adverse emotions can be a powerful motivator in creating and spreading negative eWOM, which is identical to Mangold, Miller, & Brockway’s (1999) finding about traditional WOM. Interestingly, Yoo & Gretzel (2008), discovered that the need to vent negative feelings was not a strong enough reason for individuals to write reviews. However, they later contradicted in their more recent study (Yoo & Gretzel, 2011). Additionally, the findings of this study contradict the observations from Rensink (2013), who did not find any relationship between the two variables yet utilized a similar research model. Overall, based on the available literature on this topic, it is plausible to see that there are varying findings on this topic. This research adds that indeed there is a positive relationship between the motivation to vent negative feelings and the intention to write negative eWOM.
Similarly, mixed findings exist for the moderating relationship. Manner & Lane (2017) stated that there was no relationship among neuroticism and eWOM, whereas in their more recent study the findings contradict their previous ones in that the motivation to vent negative feelings predicts the intention to write eWOM for individuals that are neurotic (Manner & Lane, 2018). Additionally, Picazo-Vela et al. (2010) discovered that neuroticism has a negative effect on the intention to write an online negative review that is significant. On the other hand, Rensink (2013) observed that there is a
statistically significant positive moderating impact of neuroticism on the relationship between venting and intention to write negative eWOM. This research yielded insignificant results on the moderating effect of neuroticism on the relationship between venting and intention to write negative eWOM, yet a direct effect was observed of neuroticism on the intention to write negative eWOM. As such, the direct effect findings point to the fact that neuroticism may only positively affect the intention, without ever having a moderating effect on the relationship between motivation to vent and intention to write negative eWOM. Overall, these findings show how inconsistent the observations are; thus, this phenomenon requires more uniform research.
ii. Practical Implications
This study provides evidence that a high motivation to vent negative feelings increases the intention to write negative eWOM. Thus, managers and marketers should focus on mitigating negative experiences as much as possible in order to prevent too many online negative reviews from being shared. It is crucial to address the negative comments as they have a great impact on future customer behavior online. It has been found that when firms reply to negative comments, they are perceived less negatively than if they ignore the comment (Wang & Chaudhry, 2018). Many service firms, including hotels, have set this as their top priority and employ web care teams (Verhagen et al., 2013), and should teach their employees how to correctly deal with adverse feedback in order to decrease the motivation for individuals to vent, which may prove beneficial in saving ones brand image, and future customer base.
The findings also suggest that neuroticism is not a variable that moderates the relationship between motivation to vent negative feelings and the intention to write negative eWOM. Yet, on the other hand, the study did find a direct effect, where individuals that score high on neuroticism have a higher intention to write negative eWOM irrespective of the fact whether they are highly motivated to vent their feelings or not. This suggests that neuroticism directly impacts the intention to write negative eWOM. As such, marketers and managers should be cognizant of the individuals’ personality characteristics when dealing with a negative experience or issue.
Since neuroticism is a personality factor, it is essential to understand as a manager or marketer that each individual is unique in their ability and way they consume or interpret the environment and experiences around them. A negative experience can be interpreted in multiple way by various people and may also evoke completely different behaviors. Thus, it is important to understand that although the findings show that neurotic individuals have a higher intention to provide negative eWOM, this should not be regarded as a grounded rule, as it will not apply to the entire population.
iii. Strengths, Limitations, and Future Research
The research controlled for other possible variables, yet there are always a few limitations that may have affected the outcome of this research. The survey design and convenience sampling utilized throughout this study allowed for a large sample of data in a short period of time which provided a high response rate. On the other hand, survey designs with convenience sampling have a few setbacks, which may alter the results. Firstly, the geographic spread is quite focused on 3 main countries, with around 36% of respondents being from one country as well as the age spread, since most of the respondents were between the age 18 and 24. Secondly, the survey may have been completed by respondents by randomly selecting one answer without it reflecting their beliefs.
Additionally, the study was conducted cross-sectionally, due to a constrained time span, which means that this study only looks at correlation and is unable to test whether there exists a causal relationship among the variables. Lastly, and most notably, the intention to create negative eWOM variable was measured using only one item. This may raise some concern, as one item scales are not able to be measured for reliability, or many times they are said not to reflect the variable accurately. Yet, according to Sauro (2018), multiple types of research and meta-analyses have concluded that in some cases, the usage of one item can be as powerful in measuring the construct as multiple items.
Hence, future studies should focus on the limitations mentioned above in order to achieve more precise results. Subsequent research should conduct longitudinal or time-series studies, if possible, as well as incorporate follow up interviews to such studies in order to reinforce the findings of the research. Furthermore, it is recommended that research comes to an agreement on measuring the motivation to vent negative feelings, neuroticism, and the intention to write reviews. This is further reinforced by Babić Rosario and colleagues (2020), who state that overall research on eWOM and marketing requires consensus in findings, trends, and measures.
Also, it is recommended further to inspect the creation of the likelihood or intention scale, as a multiple item scale may potentially measure the variable more precisely. Lastly, the three variables – motivation to vent negative feelings, intention to write negative eWOM, and neuroticism – should be further examined in relation to one another. Of interest would be to explore the relationship between neuroticism and the intention to vent negative feelings mediated by the motivation to vent negative feelings.
V.
Conclusion
Antecedent research focused on personality traits and the motivation to write online reviews as well as their impact on the intention to write negative eWOM. However, the specifics, such as neuroticism and the motivation to vent negative feelings, have been severely lacking in research. Hence,
this research aimed to obtain knowledge as to whether individuals who score high on the personality trait neuroticism positively impact the relationship between the motivation to vent negative feelings and the intention to write negative eWOM. Findings suggest that there exists a positive relationship between the motivation to vent negative feelings and the intention to write negative online reviews, yet no association was found for the moderating effect of the personality trait neuroticism. A surprising positive direct effect of neuroticism on the intention to write negative eWOM was discovered. Overall, the motive of engaging in catharsis, or venting is a strong predictor of the intention to write negative eWOM, independent of the individual’s personality trait.
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VII. Appendices
Appendix A – Scenario Analysis – negative experience
On the following page you will be presented with an experience that you should read carefully and imagine yourself in it.
You have just been on a 7-day holiday in Thailand. When you arrived at your pre-booked hotel, EK Resort, you were told that it is overbooked, and you had to move to a different hotel - Katelle Resort - that is close by. You were furious about this as you had made the booking a long time ago in order to specifically get a room at this hotel. The staff seemed to not care and just told you that there is no solution other than going to Katelle Resort. You arrived at the new hotel and your room was dirty. There were pieces of hair on the bed and you even found a dirty pair of underwear under the sheets! The room also did not have the view you wanted, and the outdoor pool area was 1/3 of the size of the one you had originally booked. You wanted the hotel to compensate you in some way, but they informed you that it is not possible, all they did was send someone to clean the room again. In general, the staff was very rude and refused to cooperate or help in any way.
On the following page you will be presented with questions relating to this experience you had.
Appendix B – Survey Item Motivation to Vent
Table 1 – Motivation to vent negative feelings (Hennig-Thurau et al. 2004)
To what extent do you agree with the following statements about the reason why you write an online negative review: Strongly agree Somewhat agree Nether agree nor disagree Somewhat disagree Strongly disagree I like to get anger off my chest
I want to take vengeance (revenge) upon the company
The company harmed me, and now I will harm the company
My contributions help me shake off frustrations about bad purchases
To what extent do you agree with the following statements about the reason why you write an online negative review: I write reviews … Strongly agree Somewhat agree Nether agree nor disagree Somewhat disagree Strongly disagree To express my feelings about a
negative experience I had To vent negative feelings
To help me overcome the negative experience
To warn others
Appendix C – Survey Item Neuroticism
Table 1 – Neuroticism (Costa & McCrae, 1992)
N (r) I am not a worrier
N I often feel inferior to others
N When I’m under a great deal of stress, sometimes I feel like I’m going to pieces N (r) I rarely feel lonely or blue
N I often feel tense and jittery
N Sometimes I feel completely worthless N (r) I rarely feel fearful or anxious
N I often get angry at the way people treat me
N Too often, when things go wrong, I get discouraged and feel like giving up N (r) I am seldom sad or depressed
N I often feel helpless and want someone else to solve my problems N At times I have been so ashamed I just wanted to hide
Appendix D – Gender
Figure 1 - Gender of sampleAppendix E – Demographics
Figure 1 - Demographics of sampleAppendix F – Age
Appendix G – Normality Test
Figure 1 - Age of sampleAppendix H – Linearity Test
Appendix I – Test for Independence of Observations
Figure 1 - Simple scatter plotFigure 2 - ANOVA output of linearity
Appendix J – Outlier Analysis
Figure 1 - Z-scores of Intention to write negative reviewsFigure 2 - Z-scores of motivation to vent negative feelings
Appendix K – Multicollinearity Test
Appendix L – Test for Heteroscedasticity
Figure 1 - Tolerance and VIF for Collinearity
