The application of Aristotle’s rhetorical theory to the sharing economy: an empirical study of Airbnb

ABSTRACT

Sharing economy businesses require extensive trust-based communication between users and service providers to facilitate users’ positive persuasion processes. Based on Aristotle’s rhetorical theory, this study identifies three key persuasive cues (credibility, emotional bonding, and accommodation characteristics) and validates their roles in establishing users’ trust in an Airbnb setting. The moderating role of interactivity is further analyzed. Research findings from a survey sample of 171 Airbnb users indicate that persuasive cues are positively associated with trust in Airbnb hosts, which significantly leads to Airbnb brand trust. Interestingly, the moderating role of interactivity is only found in the relationship between emotional bonding and trust in Airbnb hosts. This study contributes to a better understanding of the factors that affect users’ trust building in the sharing economy context, and it offers guidance for platform providers to better operate their businesses by highlighting the important roles of persuasive cues and interactivity in users’ trust-building processes.     

Lord,please save me from my sins! Can CSR mitigate the negative impacts of sharing economy on consumer trust and corporate reputation?

The explosive growth of Airbnb not only provides travelers with novel accommodation experiences at prices that suit their budget, but also challenges the existing regulatory and market structures. While Airbnb with its distinct peer-to-peer (P2P) accommodation business model is considered a disruptive innovation in the hospitality industry, little is known about its negative side. This gap in extant literature has motivated the present study, aiming to establish whether the negative aspects of Airbnb undermine consumers' overall trust in the company and its corporate reputation, and whether this link is moderated by corporate social responsibility (CSR). Data required to answer these questions was collected via a survey in which 348 potential Airbnb users in Taiwan, selected using a nonprobability purposive sampling technique, took part. Partial least squares-structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) was employed to analyze the data. The results indicate that consumers' overall trust in Airbnb is negatively affected by various factors, ranging from legal, regulatory, and taxation issues to fake reviews/listings. The moderation analysis findings further reveal that, while the overall trust−corporate reputation link is strengthened by the environmental and philanthropic CSR, it is weakened by economic CSR, which can lead to unfavorable consumer attitudes and behavioral intentions.     

The evolution of trust in Airbnb: A case of home rental

Airbnb, a leader of P2P accommodation markets, has acknowledged that “trust is what makes Airbnb work” and has implemented several trust indicators over the years: reputation system, impression formation, and certification. We evaluate the changes in these indicators over time: 1. the modification of the reputation system, 2. the removal of hosts’ photos from the main search screen, and 3. the introduction of the Superhost program. We find that the change of the rating system was associated with a small, yet significant, reduction in ratings, that the removal of the hosts’ photos might have eliminated the price premium of trustworthy images, and that Superhost certification involves a price premium, but does not seem to compensate for established reputation.This article also launches the Annals of Tourism Research Curated Collection on Peer-to-peer accommodation networks, a special selection of research in this field.     

What makes Airbnb likeable? Exploring the nexus between service attractiveness,country image,perceived authenticity and experience from a social exchange theory perspective within an emerging economy context

As a result of the growth of the notions of collaborative consumption and sharing economy in the tourism industry, this paper applies social exchange theory to investigate how the Airbnb platform influences the Airbnb experience and authenticity, which might lead consumers to like Airbnb and influence their behavioural patterns. By recruiting 466 tourists who had stayed in Airbnb accommodation in Istanbul, Turkey via travel-related Telegram, Twitter, travel blogs, and Facebook groups, this study revealed the importance of the platform and its features in enhancing service attractiveness, perceived authenticity and experience. Furthermore, the results revealed that visitors’ experiences have an influence on Airbnb likability, where Airbnb likability influences their intention to re-visit and to recommend. Significant implications for tourism planning, management and researchers are highlighted.     

Be a “Superhost”: The importance of badge systems for peer-to-peer rental accommodations

Many sharing-economy websites like Airbnb that offer vacation-rental options for travelers are very popular. However, few studies targeting the vacation-rental industry have investigated online reviews. To narrow this gap, this study focuses mainly on the gamification design developed by Airbnb that awards a “Superhost” badge to hosts who receive good reviews and observes how this can impact an accommodation's review volume and ratings. All available information regarding Airbnb accommodation offered in Hong Kong was retrieved from Airbnb's website. We then constructed a negative binomial model and a Tobit model with different independent variables and controlled a set of variables relating to accommodation characteristics. The results show that an accommodation with the “Superhost” badge is more likely to receive reviews and higher ratings. In addition, guests are willing to spend more on “Superhost” accommodations. Based on our findings, we present implications for research and host practice.     

What is happening in Paris? Airbnb,hotels, and the Parisian market: A case study

Airbnb has been the subject of heated discussions among tourism and hospitality scholars. In order to understand the true impact of P2Psharing on the tourism and hospitality landscape, it is important to understand that market in detail first. Therefore, in this paper, we explore the development of the Airbnb market over the last seven years in Paris, the most popular destination for Airbnb guests with more than 40,000 accommodation rentals. This research note is a summary of our findings on the Paris market. Our study shows different growth and seasonality patterns for Airbnb and hotels and dissimilarities in the geographical location of the offers. The findings indicate that the two products are not in direct competition and that their relationship might be more complex than previously thought. We trust that exploring the nature of the competitive relationship would be a valuable avenue for further investigation.     

Enabling people with impairments to use Airbnb

Paid peer-to-peer accommodation networks, including Airbnb, have been accused of excluding people with impairments. This study analyses host and guest posts on the Airbnb hosting community to (1) reveal key barriers preventing people with impairments from fully participating in peer-to-peer accommodation trading, and (2) identify solutions to overcoming these barriers, using as theoretical framework the social model of disability. The key conclusion is that we may be witnessing a fundamental shift in the nature of barriers: as the growing peer-to-peer accommodation sector increases the quantity and variability of accommodation options, the primary challenge is no longer a lack of suitable accommodation (physical barrier), but the identification of suitable accommodation (informational barrier). Informational barriers are potentially easier to overcome.     

Pricing in the sharing economy: a hedonic pricing model applied to Airbnb listings

ABSTRACT

This paper examines the impact of a variety of variables on the rates published for Airbnb listings in five large metropolitan areas in Canada. The researchers applied a hedonic pricing model to 15,716 Airbnb listings. As expected, the results show that physical characteristics, location, and host characteristics significantly impact price. Interestingly, more reviews are associated with a drop in price. This information is useful to hosts who are forming a pricing strategy for their listings as well as for Airbnb, who needs to support them. The paper raises important questions about pricing in the sharing economy and suggests avenues for future research in this area.     

Effects of location on Airbnb apartment pricing in Málaga

The relatively recent social movement known as the “sharing economy” is becoming increasingly visible in online peer-to-peer platforms. One such platform is Airbnb; an accommodation marketplace which provides access to tourist accommodation. These platforms are having an important social and economic impact on tourist destinations such as Málaga, Spain. This paper presents a spatial econometric hedonic model that explains the pricing strategy of Airbnb tourist apartments in Málaga using factors such as host, guest, structural characteristics, and location. In relation to locational factors, the model in this study confirms the impact of spatial spillover effects, accessibility to certain amenities, traffic noise, walkability, and the ethnicity of residents in the neighborhood where the listing is located.     

The pricing of European airbnb listings during the pandemic: A difference-in-differences approach employing COVID-19 response strategies as a continuous treatment

The COVID-19 pandemic has been a major shock to the global tourism industry. Given its peculiarity, this paper analyzes one of the most intriguing questions in the Airbnb literature – the pricing of Airbnb listings – by taking advantage of a difference-in-differences methodology that largely draws on variations in country-level policy responses to the pandemic. Relying on a dataset containing weekly information from 130,999 continuously active listings across 27 European countries from 2019 to 2020, this study first investigates the exogenous impact of response policies (proxied by the COVID-19 Stringency Index) on demand. Secondly, accounting for the endogeneity of both demand and prices, this research analyzes pricing responses to demand variations. Results show that: i) increases in the COVID-19 Stringency Index cause significant declines in Airbnb demand; ii) increases in demand cause, on average, increases in Airbnb prices; and iii) pricing strategies between commercial and private hosts differ substantially.     

Price determinants of sharing economy based accommodation rental: A study of listings from 33 cities on Airbnb.com

The advent of the “sharing economy” challenges not only the business of hotel industry but also the theories and models based on the conventional hotel industry. A key dimension of the hospitality industry is pricing. The aim of this study is to identify the price determinants of sharing economy based accommodation offers in the digital marketplace. Specifically, a sample of 180,533 accommodation rental offers in 33 cities listed on Airbnb.com is investigated using ordinary least squares and quantile regression analysis. Twenty-five explanatory variables in five categories (host attributes, site and property attributes, amenities and services, rental rules, and online review ratings) are explored for the intricacies of the relationships between pricing and its determinants.     

Methodological discussion of Airbnb's hedonic study: A review of the problems and some proposals tested on Bordeaux City data

Sharing economy-based accommodations has grown dramatically worldwide. Given the crucial role of pricing, academics have used hedonic methods to estimate a large number of implicit prices and accommodation characteristics. It is now time to question our estimation methods. Based on the hedonic methodological literature, this article outlines five proposals to improve model performance: extended specification of attributes, flexible specification of functional forms, market segmentation, and treatment of time and spatial heterogeneities. Each proposal is tested on 13,991 Airbnb listings in Bordeaux, one of the world's top urban tourism destinations. Findings offer significant guidelines for future studies and more relevant information to market players but also suggest that low performance on specific segments is not due to technical problems.     

Modeling Airbnb demand to New York City while employing spatial panel data at the listing level

Using spatial panel data comprising a cross section of 1,461 continuously active Airbnb listings obtained from AirDNA, as well as time series data from NYC and Company and the OECD covering the time period September 2014 to June 2016, the present study quantifies own price, cross price, and income elasticities of Airbnb demand to New York City within an empirical tourism demand framework. The particular goal of the study is to establish whether the relationship between Airbnb and the traditional accommodation industry is of a substitutional or of a complementary nature. Employing a one-way fixed-effects spatial Durbin model, it can be concluded that demand is price-inelastic for Airbnb accommodation in New York City, which is a luxury good, and that the city's traditional accommodation industry as well as neighboring Airbnb listings are substitutes for the investigated Airbnb listings. The estimation results are robust against several alternative specifications of the regression equation.     

When Western hosts meet Eastern guests: Airbnb hosts' experience with Chinese outbound tourists

As the number of Chinese tourists using Airbnb for their holiday accommodation is steadily increasing, this study investigates western Airbnb hosts' experiences with Chinese outbound tourists. In an analysis of hosts' self-reported posts on the Airbnb community forum, the main issues that emerged relate to Chinese guests' daily habits and lifestyles, cultural differences, and language barriers. This research highlights the role that cultural differences and tradition play in guest–host encounters, and offers a theoretical framework on inter-cultural host–guest relationship that provides an initial understanding of this phenomenon. This study extends the knowledge on the host–guest paradigm in the peer-to-peer accommodation literature from an inter-cultural perspective. This article also launches the Annals of Tourism Research Curated Collection on Peer-to-peer accommodation networks, a special selection of research in this field.     

Mutual surveillance on Airbnb

Digital technology affords new means of controlling and managing. The platform economy relies on complex surveillance techniques to analyze, control, and manipulate on the basis of reviews, evaluations, and other volunteered data. This paper conceptualizes mechanisms of surveillance, with a focus on Airbnb. It sets out with a discussion of trust and reputation-building to then analyze the mechanisms employed to control guests and accommodation providers. Findings suggest that communication techniques, technological tools, services, and policies form a surveillant assemblage. Mutual evaluations are engineered as mechanisms supportive of trust. The article contributes to the discussion of emerging complexities of these forms of control, in tourism and for society more generally.     

Benefits of authenticity: Post-failure loyalty in the sharing economy

Across five studies, this research reveals that the nature of the accommodation provider influences customers' post-failure loyalty. We propose a conceptual model that integrates perceived authenticity, social interaction, and positive emotions as primary determinants of post-failure loyalty in the sharing economy context. This article extends previous research by contrasting the impact of perceived authenticity on post-failure loyalty towards Airbnb (host, platform) and hotels. Our findings suggest that customers' post-failure emotional and behavioral responses depend on the accommodation provider type. The finding that authenticity and social interaction drive post-failure loyalty has important implications for managers of Airbnb properties and hotels. Finally, our findings provide new insights into customer perceptions of various service recovery strategies (e.g., apology, compensation) based on the accommodation provider type.     

Tourism clusters and peer-to-peer accommodation

This study examines the importance of tourism clusters in peer-to-peer accommodation. Based on a rich dataset of 112,748 Airbnb listings in Florida, one of the top U.S. tourism destinations, this study uses geographically weighted regression to explore the spatially heterogeneous effects of tourism clusters on Airbnb performance across individual counties (intraregional clusters) and neighboring counties (interregional clusters). The results indicate that overall tourism clusters, especially in the industries of accommodation and food services, lead to superior Airbnb performance, but the tourism clusters-Airbnb performance relationship varies across industry and region, confirming the existence of intraregional and interregional clusters. These findings can help Airbnb hosts and tourism policymakers in other regions implement localized tourism industry strategies for maximizing Airbnb performance.     

The evolution of ‘Airbnb-tourism’: Demand-side dynamics around international use of peer-to-peer accommodation in Australia

This paper investigates the evolution of Airbnb and other peer-to-peer accommodation use by international visitors in Australia over 12 quarters, from 2015 to 2017. It applies a dynamic logistic regression to investigate how user characteristics associated with peer-to-peer accommodations evolve over time. This study contributes to understanding the development of consumption patterns around the Airbnb phenomenon. It is also the first paper to investigate the consumer dynamism in the peer-to-peer accommodation sector beyond Airbnb. Findings indicate that Airbnb consumption has evolved, showing patterns of convergence and ‘normalisation’, supported by a growing Asian participation and increasing regional stays. This dynamism is not shared by other platforms, which suggests peer-to-peer accommodation is becoming a single-platform story rather than a thriving broader accommodation-category.This article also launches the Annals of Tourism Research Curated Collection on Peer-to-peer accommodation networks, a special selection of research in this field.     

An empathy lens into peer service providers: Personal versus commercial hosts

The focus of the peer-to-peer in tourism (Airbnb) has shifted recently from personal peer providers (i.e., individuals that rent a room) to commercial peer providers (i.e., companies that manage several Airbnb lodgings). While prior research encourages peer service providers (Airbnb hosts) to focus on social interactions, there is scant research on how consumers respond to the social dimension across the two peer provider types (personal vs. commercial provider). Two experimental studies (N = 600) reveal that consumers exhibit higher loyalty towards personal (vs. commercial) providers when they focus on communal norms, and this effect is driven via empathy. Study 2 examines the moderating effect of perceived warmth and demonstrates that low perceived warmth has a detrimental effect on loyalty among personal (vs. commercial) peer providers.