Talking in generalities or talking in detail? The role of unconfirmed customer expectations in reviewers’ online expression

What online reviewers say about a product determines readers’ understanding of the product before use. Thus, it is meaningful to understand the reasons behind reviewers’ expressions. Given that review content is a consequence of the emotional and psychological interpretation of the reviewer’s expectations and experience, this study aims to explore how expectation disconfirmation affects online reviewers’ expressions. On the basis of data from online customer reviews in the Ctrip hospitality sector, this study verifies the effects of expectation disconfirmation on review breadth and depth with a correlated topic model and Shannon entropy. The findings reveal that review breadth decreases and review depth increases as expectation disconfirmation increases. Moreover, compared with reviewers’ identity disclosure, reviewers’ anonymity amplifies the effects of expectation disconfirmation on review breadth and review depth, whereas an increase in temporal distance between the dates of consumption and review attenuates these effects. Drawing upon expectation confirmation theory and persuasion theory, this study contributes to the understanding of reviewers’ psychology and behaviors and provides implications for online communication in internet society.