How Far, How Near Psychological Distance Matters in Online Travel Reviews: A Test of Construal-Level Theory

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Abstract

An online travel review is regarded as more important than a general product review due to the tourism product’s intangibleness. This study’s objective is to explore the effect of online travel reviews’ usefulness to the tourist’s perception using the construal-level theory (CLT). For this goal, online travel reviews are divided based on the review content characteristics, and the review usefulness of two different online reviews is compared using the temporal distance. The results show that the near future tourists are more influenced by concrete reviews than abstract reviews; however, the far future tourists are more influenced by abstract reviews than concrete reviews. Based on the results, the theoretical and practical implications are discussed, and future research directions follow based on the limitations.

Keywords

Online travel review Review usefulness Construal-level theory Temporal distance Concrete review Abstract review 
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Notes

Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea Grant funded by the Korean Government (NRF-2013S1A3A2043345).

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Copyright information

© Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016

Authors and Affiliations

  1. 1.Graduate School, Department of Convention & Exhibition ManagementKyung Hee UniversitySeoulRepublic of Korea
  2. 2.Department of Hotel Management, College of Hotel & Tourism ManagementKyung Hee UniversitySeoulRepublic of Korea
  3. 3.Package Tour & MICE DivisionRedcap TourSeoulRepublic of Korea
  4. 4.Department of Convention Management, College of Hotel & Tourism ManagementKyung Hee UniversitySeoulRepublic of Korea

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