Information dissemination via electronic word-of-mouth: Good news travels fast, bad news travels faster!

Unlocking luxury purchase intentions in China: A study of consumer attitude, perceived value, and the moderating effect of perceived enjoyment

This research aims to provide a picture of the elements influencing customers' intentions to purchase luxury products online using social exchange theory (SET). Second, we determined whether perceived enjoyment moderates the relationship between perceived value, consumer attitude, and intention to purchase luxury products. Data were collected from 389 participants through an online survey. Structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to analyze the data. The results showed that eWOM, perceived value, and consumer attitudes significantly affected luxury purchase intention. Moreover, perceived enjoyment moderates the relationship between perceived value, consumer attitude, and purchase intention. This study is designed to help practitioners and researchers understand why young Chinese consumers are interested in purchasing luxury goods online. Luxury brand companies can improve their marketing strategies by developing strategies aligned with the mindset of digital native Generation Z.

Exploring the impact of sentiment on multi-dimensional information dissemination using COVID-19 data in China

The outbreak of information epidemic in crisis events, with the channel effect of social media, has brought severe challenges to global public health. Combining information, users and environment, understanding how emotional information spreads on social media plays a vital role in public opinion governance and affective comfort, preventing mass incidents and stabilizing the network order. Therefore, from the perspective of the information ecology and elaboration likelihood model (ELM), this study conducted a comparative analysis based on two large-scale datasets related to COVID-19 to explore the influence mechanism of sentiment on the forwarding volume, spreading depth and network influence of information dissemination. Based on machine learning and social network methods, topics, sentiments, and network variables are extracted from large-scale text data, and the dissemination characteristics and evolution rules of online public opinions in crisis events are further analyzed. The results show that negative sentiment positively affects the volume, depth, and influence compared with positive sentiment. In addition, information characteristics such as richness, authority, and topic influence moderate the relationship between sentiment and information dissemination. Therefore, the research can build a more comprehensive connection between the emotional reaction of network users and information dissemination and analyze the internal characteristics and evolution trend of online public opinion. Then it can help sentiment management and information release strategy when emergencies occur.

A cultural evolutionary model of the interaction between parental beliefs and behaviors, with applications to vaccine hesitancy

Health perceptions and health-related behaviors can change at the population level as cultures evolve. In the last decade, despite the proven efficacy of vaccines, the developed world has seen a resurgence of vaccine-preventable diseases (VPDs) such as measles, pertussis, and polio. Vaccine hesitancy, an individual attitude influenced by historical, political, and socio-cultural forces, is believed to be a primary factor responsible for decreasing vaccine coverage, thereby increasing the risk and occurrence of VPD outbreaks. Behavior change models have been increasingly employed to understand disease dynamics and intervention effectiveness. However, since health behaviors are culturally influenced, it is valuable to examine them within a cultural evolution context. Here, using a mathematical modeling framework, we explore the effects of cultural evolution on vaccine hesitancy and vaccination behavior. With this model, we shed light on facets of cultural evolution (vertical transmission, community influences, homophily, etc.) that promote the spread of vaccine hesitancy, ultimately affecting levels of vaccination coverage and VPD outbreak risk in a population. In addition, we present our model as a generalizable framework for exploring cultural evolution when humans' beliefs influence, but do not strictly dictate, their behaviors. This model offers a means of exploring how parents' potentially conflicting beliefs and cultural traits could affect their children's health and fitness. We show that vaccine confidence and vaccine-conferred benefits can both be driving forces of vaccine coverage. We also demonstrate that an assortative preference among vaccine-hesitant individuals can lead to increased vaccine hesitancy and lower vaccine coverage.

The bittersweet smell of success: Malicious online responses to others achievements

A prominent recurring theme in social comparison is the concept that individuals are not indifferent to the results that others achieve, and typically seek pleasure while avoiding pain. However, in some cases they behave atypically-counter to this principle. The purpose of this research is to investigate one atypical response, namely gluckschmerz-a negative response to information about others' success (feeling bad at others' fortunes). To advance objectives, a mixed-mode of two studies were conducted using a combination of primary and secondary analyzes, and qualitative and quantitative methods. Findings reveal that this aversive feeling encourages consumers to share online "positive" information with others but using negative malicious word-of-mouth narratives. They provide compelling evidence supporting the theory that some of the positive commercial information conveyed through electronic media triggers negative word-of mouth in the form of online firestorms driven by the discordant atypical sentiment of gluckschmerz.

From Heroes to Scoundrels: Exploring the effects of online campaigns celebrating frontline workers on COVID-19 outcomes

This paper examines the effects of online campaigns celebrating frontline workers on COVID-19 outcomes regarding new cases, deaths, and vaccinations, using the United Kingdom as a case study. We implement text and sentiment analysis on Twitter data and feed the result into random regression forests and cointegration analysis. Our combined machine learning and econometric approach shows very weak effects of both the volume and the sentiment of Twitter discussions on new cases, deaths, and vaccinations. On the other hand, established relationships (such as between stringency measures and cases/deaths and between vaccinations and deaths) are confirmed. On the contrary, we find adverse lagged effects from negative sentiment to vaccinations and from new cases to negative sentiment posts. As we assess the knowledge acquired from the COVID-19 crisis, our findings can be used by policy makers, particularly in public health, and prepare for the next pandemic.

Research on the co-evolution of competitive public opinion and intervention strategy based on Markov process

Under Omni-media environment, Online Social Networks (OSN) have gradually become the most momentous platform for information propagation. Considering the interaction and coexistence of both positive and negative public opinion information (referred to as public opinion), it is of great significance for social development and economic stability to understand the co-evolution process of competitive public opinion and compress the spreading space of negative public opinion. Allowing for this point, this paper constructed a two-stage spreading model of competitive public opinion combing with the actual case of public opinion propagation, analysed the main factors influencing the co-evolution process, such as netizens’ intimacy, network literacy, and so on, and redefined netizens’ state transition probability matrix with the help of Markov process. Then, the effectiveness of the spreading model was verified and the propagation rule of public opinion was discussed in open and closed OSN through simulation experiments. Finally, the intervention strategies were proposed and optimised with the limitation of cost. The results show that the propagation of public opinion mainly depends on netizens’ behaviour with low literacy and presents difference characteristics in two types of OSN. During the intervention process of public opinion propagation, there exists an effective intervention interval and the best intervention strategy varies with the change of network topology. Our research provided a cornerstone for further understanding of the co-evolution process of competitive public opinion and the research conclusions also provided a certain decision-making reference for enterprises, governments and other regulators to reasonably respond to the propagation of public opinion.

Quality perception of accounting firm customers

Purpose

This study aims to verify the dimensions of perceived quality of services which influence the satisfaction of accounting firm clients and verifies whether customer satisfaction influences loyalty and word-of-mouth recommendations.

Design/methodology/approach

A model is proposed and tested using a survey of 292 accounting firm clients; structural equation modeling and partial least squares are used for data analysis.

Findings

The constructs of internal policies, personal relationships and trust influence the satisfaction of accounting firm clients which directly influences word-of-mouth recommendations and customer loyalty; however, the constructs of physical aspects and problem solving have no influence on satisfaction.

Research limitations/implications

The main contribution to the accounting field is an identification of the aspects in which firms should invest to deliver quality to clients. The development of internal policies, personal relationships and trust can lead to more satisfied clients, resulting in loyalty and word-of-mouth recommendations. These are novel results within the literature and can guide accounting firms toward better performance.

Originality/value

This study is justified by the fact that accounting firms must adapt to the new environment and the new requirements of the accounting field and look for solutions that follow the progress of financial and managerial accounting, primarily with regard to service quality, satisfaction, loyalty and word-of-mouth recommendations. We also introduce a new scale to reveal novelties which cannot be observed using traditional service quality scales. This is another important contribution to the quality of accounting services.

High achievers, Schadenfreude and Gluckschmerz in New Zealanders and Chinese

The willingness to support (or denigrate) high-profile individuals online was examined across cultures using the Tall Poppy Scale. A sample of 106 Chinese and 164 New Zealand Europeans answered an online questionnaire addressing their preference for high achievers to be rewarded or fail. Participants were asked whether they would vote to support reality TV contestants, and offered further information (about success or failure) on a debrief page. The Favour Reward scale predicted willingness to vote and support others. The Favour Fall subscale tended to predict time spent viewing achievement-related information on a debrief page. The Chinese sample did not prefer reward of high achievers, instead favoring their fall, but spent less time per click on the debrief page, suggesting they disliked recognizing individual achievement.

What makes an online help-seeking message go far during the COVID-19 crisis in mainland China? A multilevel regression analysis

Various studies have explored the underlying mechanisms that enhance the overall reach of a support-seeking message on social media networks. However, little attention has been paid to an under-examined structural feature of help-seeking message diffusion, information diffusion depth, and how support-seeking messages can traverse vertically into social media networks to reach other users who are not directly connected to the help-seeker. Using the multilevel regression to analyze 705 help-seeking posts regarding COVID-19 on Sina Weibo, we examined sender, content, and environmental factors to investigate what makes help-seeking messages traverse deeply into social media networks. Results suggested that bandwagon cues, anger, instrumental appeal, and intermediate self-disclosure facilitate the diffusion depth of help-seeking messages. However, the effects of these factors were moderated by the epidemic severity. Implications of the findings on support-seeking behavior and narrative strategies on social media were also discussed.

The "100,000+ Clicks" Dream Comes True: A Study on the Click-and-Read Behavior of WeChat Tweets From the Perspective of Emotional Expression

An in-depth and refined empirical study on the emotional expression of information and the information processing mechanism of audiences is carried out to provide enterprises and other organizations with insights and references as regard to the effective utilization of WeChat Tweets for information dissemination and marketing purposes. Based on 1,465 actual tweets from two different types of WeChat public accounts (knowledge communication and information releasing), this paper applies the limited attention capacity model and the signaling theory to analyze the influence of emotional presence, emotional complexity, emotional intensity, and emotional polarity of tweet titles on the click-and-read behavior of the audience. The results show that for WeChat public accounts serving the purpose of knowledge communication, emotional presence and emotional complexity of tweet titles, as well as the emotional intensity of positive tweet titles, has no significant effect on the click-and-read behaviors of the audience. Besides, the emotional intensity of negative tweet titles has a significant negative impact on the audience’s click-and-read behaviors. While for WeChat public accounts serving the purpose of information releasing, tweet titles with emotional presence and lower level of emotional complexity are more likely to trigger click-and-read behaviors of audiences; emotional intensity of negative tweet titles has no significant effect on the click-and-read behaviors of audiences, and emotional intensity of positive tweet titles has a significant negative impact on the audience’s click-and-read behaviors. Thus, this study further analyzes the influence of emotional factors, such as emotional existence, emotional complexity, emotional intensity, and emotional polarity of tweet titles on the click-and-read behavior of consumers and further explores the emotional information processing mechanism of WeChat tweet readers.

Understanding the landscape and propagation of COVID-19 misinformation and its correction on Sina Weibo

The prevalence of health misinformation on social media could significantly influence individuals' health behaviors. To examine the prevalent topics, propagation, and correction of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) misinformation, automated content analyses were conducted for posts on Sina Weibo, which is China's largest microblogging site. In total, 177,816 posts related to COVID-19 misinformation during the COVID-19 outbreak in China were analyzed. The structural topic modeling identified 23 valid topics regarding COVID-19 misinformation and its correction, which were further categorized into three general themes. Sentiment analysis was conducted to generate positive and negative sentiment scores for each post. The zero-inflated Poisson model indicated that only the negative sentiment was a significant predictor of the number of comments (β = 0.003, p < 0.001) but not reposts. Furthermore, users are more prone to repost and comment on information regarding prevention/treatment (e.g., traditional Chinese medicine preventing COVID) as well as potential threats of COVID-19 (e.g., COVID-19 was defined as an epidemic by World Health Organization). Health education and promotion implications are discussed.

News-Induced Dynamic Networks for Market Signaling: Understanding the Impact of News on Firm Equity Value

Public news provides rich information about firm operations and market dynamics. Learning about firm interactions from news is commonly done by human investors but has not been realized by automatic methods, leading to a research opportunity in market signaling via dynamic firm relations. This study proposes a new text-mining approach to extract cobenefit/counter-benefit networks based on firms’ mutual or conflicting interests in business events. It reveals that the extracted dynamic networks provide additional value in predicting firm equity value over current adopted supply chain and coindustry networks, after controlling for market activities and other traditional indicators from news, such as volume, sentiment, and comentions. In practice, such cobenefit/counter-benefit networks provide good buy and sell signals, which enrich known indicators and support more complex trading strategies in investment and portfolio management. The analysis and visualization of the extracted cobenefit/counter-benefit networks are also useful in understanding the structure of the economy and assessing firm/industry changes in a timelier fashion.

E-waste-word of mouth (EW-WOM) generation: a fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fs/QCA)

Purpose

This study aims to examine the asymmetrical relationships among information-sharing desire, moral attitudes, lack of concern, relative advantage, market maven tendency and complexity as the antecedents of E-waste-word of mouth (EW-WOM) generation.

Design/methodology/approach

To obtain a holistic view and the interrelationships between conditions, the configural analysis was conducted to assess the asymmetrical relationships using fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fs/QCA). In addition, construct validity, reliability and symmetrical relationships between antecedent conditions (i.e. exogenous constructs) and outcome conditions (i.e. endogenous constructs) are examined using variance-based structural equation modeling (VB-SEM) technique.

Findings

Results imply that market maven tendency accounts for 86.8% of the sum of the memberships in EW-WOM generation. In total, 11 configurations show sufficiency in constructing EW-WOM generation. The configuration of relativeadvanta*moralattitudes*marketmaventend shows the highest consistency value (0.939684) in producing EW-WOM generation (outcome condition). The ∼relativeadvanta *moralattitudes*complexity*∼lackfconcern with raw coverage of 0.626757 and consistency value of 0.864088 show the most sufficient configuration path in producing the outcome.

Originality/value

Product review and recommendation are easily shared in various communication formats and consumers are prone to disseminate information and their experiences with other market segments. However, the role and phenomena of such viral communication in preventing environmental issues caused by electronic and electrical devices (i.e. E-waste) are not well understood. This study is among a few attempts at understanding consumer's decision-making process to engage in E-waste activities such as the reduction of garbage, recycling, compositing and the reuse of electronic or electrical devices.

Peer review

The peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/OIR-11-2019-0343

Market reactions to the inclusion of people with disabilities

Purpose

This study aims to provide evidence of market reactions to organizations' inclusion of people with disabilities. Cases from financial journals in 1989–2014 were used to analyze the impact of actions taken by organizations to include or discriminate people with disabilities in terms of the companies' stock prices.

Design/methodology/approach

This research is conducted as an event study where the disclosure of information on an organization's actions toward people with disabilities is expected to impact the organization's stock price. The window of the event was set as (−1, +1) days. Stock prices were analyzed to detect abnormal returns during this period.

Findings

Results support the hypotheses that investors value inclusion and reject discrimination. Furthermore, the impact of negative actions is immediate, whereas the impact of positive actions requires at least an additional day to influence the firm's stock price. Some differences among the categories were found; for instance, employment and customer events were significantly more important to a firm's stock price than philanthropic actions. It was observed that philanthropic events produce negative abnormal returns on average.

Originality/value

The event study methodology provides a different perspective to practices in organizations regarding people with disabilities. Moreover, the findings in this research advance the literature by highlighting that organizations should consider policies and practices that include people with disabilities.

The Influence of Opinion Leaders’ eWOM on Online Consumer Decisions: A Study on Social Influence

Opinion leaders and eWOM are becoming two of the most effective ways to launch a brand on social media by creating viral marketing. However, how much influence does an opinion leader’s eWOM (OL eWOM) have on consumer purchasing decisions? This research looks at the role of OL eWOM as well as the effect of its valence and product type on the decision to buy or not buy from a realistic experimental online store design. In total, 300 undergraduate students were randomly assigned to one of five scenarios in a 22 experimental arrangement. Results show that OL eWOM influences consumer online decisions when purchasing experience-type goods and the valence of eWOM is positive. However, if we compare the OL eWOM with a control group, then OL eWOM does not have a significant influence. This research provides novel empirical evidence for the limited influence of OL in modeling shopping behaviors in e-commerce contexts.

The Impact of Social Media on Restaurant Corporations’ Financial Performance

Social media, in the form of online reviews (ORs), has become an essential element for consumers in the restaurant industry, providing reliable and unbiased information based on the dining experiences of other consumers. Social media is not only a crucial phenomenon for the strategy of restaurants, but also for their corporations. However, previous literature has focused on the analysis at the establishment level, rather than at the corporate level, especially when referring to financial performance. The present study tries to verify if social media also affects corporate financial performance. For this, the impact of ORs on advanced measures of financial performance was examined at the corporate level on a sample of 800 restaurants selected from the total population of active restaurants in Europe in 2018. The investigation applied both regression analysis and nonparametric techniques. They demonstrate a positive effect of ORs on financial performance, and a heterogeneous relationship between both variables across the European countries. Restaurants are becoming aware of the implications of this phenomenon since it could provide strategies for sustainable economic development.

The negative impact of market-discrimination CSR: How do consumers respond to perceived company greed?

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) is reported to have a positive effect on corporate image. However, if companies that have entered different markets implement market-discrimination CSR, which refers to unfairly applied CSR policies in the intermarket, and if the consumer recognizes this fact, the CSR effects will be diminished. To prove this, this research investigated consumers’ adverse reactions when a company that implements market-discrimination CSR faces a crisis. According to the results of this study, consumers who perceived company greed as evidence of a company practicing market-discrimination CSR activities experienced pleasure at the misfortune which called schadenfreude when the company faced a crisis and schadenfreude positively affected the argument strength of a rumor. Finally, the argument strength of a rumor has a positive effect on the consumer’s intention to spread the rumor as an act of revenge against the company. The results of this research suggest that CSR, which aims to build a positive corporate image, can have an adverse effect when it is felt that it is used to discriminate against consumers. Based on these results, this research presents theoretical and practical implications.

Does KFC sell rat? Analysis of tweets in the wake of a rumor outbreak

Purpose

In the wake of a rumor outbreak, individuals exchange three types of messages: rumor messages, counter-rumor messages, and uncertainty-expressing messages. However, the properties of the three types of messages are relatively unknown particularly in the social media context. Hence, the purpose of this paper is to examine these three types of messages posted on social media in the wake of a rumor outbreak.

Design/methodology/approach

Data included tweets posted after the outbreak of a rumor that wrongly accused the fast food chain Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) for selling rats instead of chicken. Using a deductive approach, codes were derived via content analysis on the tweets. Volume and exposure of tweets were also examined.

Findings

Counter-rumor tweets (52 percent) outnumbered rumors tweets (32 percent) and uncertainty-expressing tweets (16 percent). Emotions and personal involvement were abundant in rumor tweets. Expressions of credence and references to URLs were high in counter-rumor tweets. Social ties were found widely in uncertainty-expressing tweets. The high volume and exposure of counter-rumor tweets compared with those of either rumor tweets or uncertainty-expressing tweets highlight the potential of counter-rumors to mitigate rumors.

Originality/value

This research ventures into a relatively unexplored territory by concurrently examining rumor messages, counter-rumor messages and uncertainty-expressing messages in the wake of a rumor outbreak. It reveals that counter-rumor messages have the potential to mitigate rumors on social media.