The Influential Solo Consumer: When Engaging in Activities Alone (vs. Accompanied) Increases the Impact of Recommendations

Abstract

The social context of consumption is frequently mentioned on review websites or social media: When consumers share word of mouth about an experience, they often indicate whether they engaged in the activity solo or with companions. Across a secondary dataset scraped from Tripadvisor, five main experiments, and one supplemental experiment, the current research finds that individuals who engage in consumption activities alone can be a more influential source of recommendations than people who engage in these same activities with others. The results support an attribution-based process, such that people are more likely to attribute a solo (vs. accompanied) review to the quality of the activity itself, leading the solo person's review to be particularly influential. Further, the studies test whether perceived interest on the part of the solo (vs. accompanied) consumer leads to stronger attribution to the quality of the item/experience being reviewed, and therefore that additional cues to intrinsic interest (e.g., presence of a cue to intrinsic or extrinsic motivation) attenuate the influence of solo (vs. accompanied) word of mouth. This work has theoretical and managerial relevance for those who seek to understand how the social context of consumption influences other consumers.