Gender differences in consumers' word-of-mouth willingness in social networks: a moderated mediation model

Abstract

This paper investigates the influence of gender on consumers' positive word-of-mouth willingness in social networks by conducting two different studies. In study 1, participants completed a questionnaire including the items of self-construal and word-of-mouth willingness. The results indicate that females prefer to generate more word-of-mouth in social networks than males. In addition, the level of self-construal fully mediates the relationship between gender and word-of-mouth willingness. The results of study 2 show that the role of scarcity as a moderator can affect the relationship between gender and word-of-mouth willingness. It moderates the relationship in such a way that when the offering is in a high level of scarcity (comparing to a low level), the gender differences of word-of-mouth would increase. Results also show that self-construal is a moderated mediator that as the offering's scarcity increased, the mediating effect of self-construal between gender and word-of-mouth willingness would be decreased.