Digital Therapy for Negative Consumption Experiences: The Impact of Emotional and Rational Reviews on Review Writers

Abstract

This research tests a solution for consumers to recover faster from negative experiences. We identify this solution by examining how the manner in which review writers express their emotions and rational thoughts in their reviews causally influences review writers. The results of five studies (field data and experiments) show that, similar to writing about traumatic life events, when review writers express both emotional and rational aspects in reviews about negative consumption experiences, they feel better afterwards (ie, they recover affectively), and are more likely to purchase again (ie, they recover cognitively). We further examine why writing integrated reviews has positive effects on review writers by collecting biophysiological response data, which provides support for an account related to affective recovery, and by analyzing thought listing data, which provides support for an account related to cognitive recovery. This research shows that writing online reviews can serve as a digital therapy tool that helps consumers recover from negative experiences.