Eric is bad, but Erica is worse: greater negativity bias toward female brands

ABSTRACT We predicted that brand gender moderates the effect of information valence on attitude change, such that negative information leads to a greater decline in attitude for female brands due to differences in trust change. We conducted three studies to test this prediction. Study 1 (N = 260) and Study 2 (N = 205) results reveal a conditional direct effect of negative information on attitude change, whereby negative information decreases attitude more for female (vs. male) brands; these studies also show a conditional indirect effect of negative information on attitude change via trust change, such that negative information decreases trust more for female (vs. male) brands, which leads to a decrease in attitude. By analyzing 2.68 million Yelp.com customer reviews, the results for Study 3 further demonstrate the gender disparity in review usefulness.