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.     

A pathway to consumer forgiveness in the sharing economy: The role of relationship norms

The emergence of peer-to-peer accommodations has revolutionized the hospitality industry. Yet, research on peer-to-peer service failures and consumer forgiveness remains scant. This paper shows that relationship type—whether communal ("Airbnb host") or exchange ("hotel")—influences consumer forgiveness in a post-recovery context. Across five studies, this research demonstrates how peer providers (focusing on communal norms) versus conventional providers (focusing on exchange norms) influence consumer forgiveness and their responses to service recovery efforts. Our findings indicate that focusing on social service recovery is particularly effective for Airbnb hosts. These findings have important implications for crafting effective service recovery strategies based on the type of accommodation provider-customer relationship. Finally, our findings can also help peer-to-peer and conventional hospitality providers alleviate consumers’ negative responses to service failures.     

Spanning across the boundary of Airbnb host community: a network perspective

The success of Airbnb has not only provided people with an alternative way of managing their living spaces but also created a rapidly growing number of Airbnb host communities. Guided by boundary spanning theory, this study examines how Airbnb host online communities evolve through novel organizational forms. Data for this study were collected from an online Airbnb host community from which two stages of analysis were performed. These included social network analysis and content analysis. The findings indicate that the online community functions as an informal specialized sub-unit of Airbnb and that hosts’ roles in the organization involve a number of boundary spanning aspects. The research contributes to an evolving understanding of hosts in the peer-to-peer (P2P) accommodation literature as well as extending the theory of boundary spanning in its application to the sharing economy context.     

Understanding repurchase intention of Airbnb consumers: perceived authenticity,electronic word-of-mouth,and price sensitivity

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this paper is to extend the research on consumer repurchase intention, perceived value, and perceived risk into the realm of the peer-to-peer economy, specifically in the context of Airbnb. A total of 395 surveys were collected in Canada and the United States. The results showed that perceived risk negatively impacts Airbnb consumers’ perceived value and repurchase intention while perceived value positively enhances their repurchase intention. Interestingly, price sensitivity was found not to reduce customers’ perceived risk but can improve their perceived value and positively influences them to repurchase the Airbnb products. Perceived authenticity was found to have a significant effect in reducing Airbnb consumers’ perceived risk and positively influencing their perceived value. Electronic word-of-mouth has a positive effect on repurchase intention as well as perceived value whereas it negatively affects perceived risk. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed and future study directions are offered.     

Exploring Airbnb service quality attributes and their asymmetric effects on customer satisfaction

With the rise of the sharing economy, Airbnb has become the predominant example of the online peer-to-peer accommodation market in the hospitality industry. This study adopts a mixed method approach to systematically and comprehensively capture various service aspects of Airbnb. Two main studies are conducted to identify key service quality (SQ) attributes of Airbnb, verify the dimensionality of the SQ attributes, and examine the effects of these attributes on customer satisfaction (CS). The first qualitative study generated a list of SQ attributes by collecting and analyzing 16,430 online reviews. In the second study, online survey (N = 322) is conducted to identify multiple dimensions of SQ attributes and examine their asymmetric effects on CS using impact-range performance analysis and impact asymmetry analysis. Findings suggest that Airbnb has multiple SQ attributes associated with website, host, and facility that produce distinctive effects on CS.     

Brand personality of Airbnb: application of user involvement and gender differences

ABSTRACT

In this study we utilized the concept of brand personality to determine how travelers perceived Airbnb as a lodging brand and investigated the effect of involvement level (low versus high) on view of brand personality. As a viable segmentation variable, this study also utilized the interaction effect to examine how gender affects consumers’ involvement level. Significant differences were observed between travelers with high and low involvement in terms of the dimensions of sincerity, excitement, competence, and ruggedness. In addition, we found the interaction effect to be significant, indicating that level of involvement is higher in female travelers than in male travelers. This research will provide meaningful marketing insights for target marketing and positioning based on consumer involvement and gender within the context of Airbnb.     

Peer-to-peer accommodation experience and guest actual recommendations: A novel mixed-method approach

Obtaining recommendations from guests is critical for Airbnb hosts to thrive in the peer-to-peer accommodation business. By extracting the dominant aspects of the Airbnb experience and the guests' sentiment ratings in online comments, this study examines the impact of the aspects and sentiment on guest actual recommendations. A novel mixed-method was adopted to analyse the online reviews of Airbnb guests in Los Angeles, USA. The text-mining results reveal that hosts, location, and amenities are the dominant aspects of the guests' Airbnb experience. Results show that the guests' sentiment ratings for hosts and amenities have significant impacts on the guests' recommendations, while location only influences the private-room guests' recommendations. This study contributes to the extant literature by offering an innovative methodological approach to building the link between experience aspects and guest actual recommendations.     

Clusters of topics and research designs in peer-to-peer accommodation platforms

This article is a literature review exploring academic papers focused on peer-to-peer accommodation platforms (P2P APs). The sample includes 189 published works indexed in the Scopus and Web of Science databases, identified using 72 queries. The research question underlying the study is centered on clusters of topics and their research designs. Using a cross-citation approach, nine clusters are identified, and a research map is proposed structured around six blocks. These include i) conceptual papers analyzing the sharing economy (cluster 1); ii) demand-side papers based on the consumer behavior approach (cluster 2); iii) host papers exploring spatial patterns (cluster 3) and researching determinants of performance (cluster 4); iv) host-guest relationships, based on Airbnb (cluster 5) and on noncommercial platforms (cluster 9); v) social impact of P2P APs (cluster 6), and vi) effects generated on hotels, including economic impact (cluster 7) and comparison of Airbnb and hotel strategies (cluster 8).     

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.     

When empathy prevents negative reviewing behavior

Previous research has found that peer-to-peer platforms have overly positive reviews. Guided by Construal Level Theory, this research investigates the relationship between social distance, empathy, and tourists’ intention to leave negative online reviews. The first study is a qualitative analysis which compares peer-to-peer settings (i.e., Airbnb) to institutional ones (i.e., Booking.com), and explores whether social closeness hinders tourists’ willingness to provide negative online reviews to express their poor experiences. The second and third study are laboratory studies which show that the mechanism behind reviewing biases is the activation of empathy.This research offers practical implications for both traditional hospitality players, on how to activate empathy, and online platforms operators, on how to increase the reliability of their reputation systems.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.     

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.     

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.     

Sources of distrust: Airbnb guests' perspectives

The present study explores sources of distrust in the Airbnb context. The study focuses on Airbnb customers' negative reviews posted in English on Trustpilot's website. The search for posts was employed with the keyword ‘trust’ to find online narratives from customers who had negative experiences of trust with Airbnb. Of the 2733 online reviews screened, the study concentrated on 216 negative reviews. The data analysis followed the grounded theory approach, which resulted in two themes that reflect the sources of distrust: Airbnb's poor customer service and the hosts' unpleasant behaviour. The managerial implications are that Airbnb should invest additional resources into minimising customers' negative experiences by focusing on trust-based relationships and maintaining quality in its core service elements. When customers report their complaints, their concerns should be addressed with prompt apologies, positive actions, and a willingness to compensate these customers to neutralise their distrust in the company.     

Does Airbnb impact non-hosting Residents' quality of life? Comparing media discourse with empirical evidence

In addition to disrupting the hotel industry, Airbnb has been portrayed in the media as significantly diminishing the quality of life of residents in neighborhoods where it is available. There is little empirical research to support such rhetoric, particularly as provided by the residents themselves. To address this gap, the present study uses the social exchange theory framework to develop and test two alternative models of residents' attitudes towards Airbnb. Findings indicate that residents are generally positive towards Airbnb, perceiving higher positive than negative impacts. Moreover, those residents who possess more knowledge of Airbnb, engage more with their communities, and perceive potential benefits from Airbnb also perceive higher positive impacts, while the need for regulation serves as the key determinant of residents' perceptions of Airbnb's negative impacts. The positive impacts, in turn, have a stronger direct effect on residents' support for Airbnb, and tourism more generally, than the dampening effect of Airbnb's negative impacts. Quality of life was not found to have a significant mediating effect on these relationships, a finding that contradicts previous discourse and opens up avenues for future research on the role of this important construct.     

Consumer adoption of the Uber mobile application: Insights from diffusion of innovation theory and technology acceptance model

ABSTRACT

The sharing economy literature has largely concentrated on the examination of peer-to-peer accommodation platforms such as Airbnb, with little attention paid on other innovations in collaborative consumption. This study investigates consumer adoption of the Uber mobile application through lenses of two theoretical models – Diffusion of Innovation Theory and Technology Acceptance Model. The results suggest that relative advantage, compatibility, complexity, observability, and social influence have a significant influence on both perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use, which in turn lead to subsequent consumer attitudes and adoption intentions. This study demonstrates the integration of the two classic adoption theories.     

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.     

Sentiment and guest satisfaction with peer-to-peer accommodation: When are online ratings more trustworthy?

This study aims to decode guest satisfaction with peer-to-peer accommodations by analyzing the relationship between guests’ sentiment and online ratings and examining how analytical thinking and authenticity influence this relationship. Based on reviews of 4602 Airbnb listings in San Francisco, we empirically find that positive (negative) sentiment is linked to a high (low) rating. We further show that this link is stronger when guests manifest a higher extent of analytical thinking and authenticity. Both Tobit and ordered logit models yield consistent estimation results, showing the robustness of our findings. Our study contributes to the tourism and hospitality literature by theoretically explaining the association between sentiment and ratings. In addition, this paper enriches our knowledge regarding the trustworthiness of Airbnb ratings.     

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.     

Price and RevPAR determinants of Airbnb listings: Convergent and divergent evidence

This paper explores the performance determinants of Airbnb listings, analyzing three research questions. First, the study investigates the different effects generated by the antecedents on price and revenue; second, it ranks different groups of variables; third, it distinguishes between private rooms and entire homes or apartments. These research questions are addressed by analyzing Airbnb listings in Milan, a business city where the sharing economy is growing fast. In particular, the study will use the monthly data of all Airbnb listings in Milan recorded by AirDNA during the period from November 2014 to June 2019, which consists of 323,184 total observations. Some hedonic price models are calculated, adding the Shapley value approach. Empirical findings show some important differences between price and revenue determinants. Furthermore, listing type and size, along with location and seasonality, are by far the most important factors that explain performance differentials among Airbnb properties.