The Influence Of The Negative Online Comments Ratio On Comsumers’ Buying Intention

The online comments system of consumers has become a convenient and important information source for other consumers to make purchase decisions. More and more scholars have begun the study of how the online comments influence consumers buying decisions.This paper integrates the concepts of decision-making in purchasing, product category and liability of negative comments perception. The theory bases include the consumers’decision theory, attribution theory, and prospect theory. After explaining these concepts and theories, this paper use the method of mediating effect to discover how the ratio of negative comments affects consumers’buying intentions. We also exploit the method to test if the different product categories have different research results. In addition, this paper examines whether the personal liability intention has a potential moderating influence on the relation between liability perception and negative comments.In this paper, the online questionnaires survey is used to simulate the shopping environment and collect the data. In order to prevent the interference of different data, three experiments are conducted independently. By controlling, manipulating and testing the variables, this paper has abundant and reliable data.After collecting the data, we analyze the data and examine the negative online comments’influences on consumers’buying intention. We also testify the mediating effect of liability perception as a mediating variable. Another result is about the moderating effects of product categories, namely, how the product category matters in the liability perception influenced by the online negative comments ratio. The basic result is that the negative online comments ratio has a more significant effect on consumers’liability perception if the product belongs to the searchable category. When the product is an experiencing product, this effect would become much less significant. Besides, there is no significant evidence that the personal consumer liability disposition has a moderating effect on the relationship between negative comment ratio and consumers’ liability perception. Last, this paper provides a potential practical application of the research of the relation between online comments and consumer’ buying intention.