Exploring the Linguistic Characteristics of Online Consumer Reviews by Top Reviewers and Ordinary Reviewers

Consumer online purchase behaviors are heavily depending on online reviews as review platforms are booming. Prior works have identified the effects of different review characteristics on helpfulness, including the review being written by a top reviewer. This study examines the linguistic characteristics that make top reviewers different from ordinary reviewers in their reviews. Drawing on computational linguistic literature, this study performs a linguistic analysis on the reviews written by top reviewers and ordinary reviewers in terms of four language summary variables: analytical thinking, emotional tone, authenticity, and clout. The four variables are examined using review data collected from Yelp. Our preliminary results suggest that top reviewers exhibit higher analytic thinking and more positive emotional tone in their reviews. Interestingly, reviews by top reviewers appear to be lower in authenticity and clout, which can plausibly be interpreted as being more humble and impersonal.