Judgment criteria for the authenticity of internet book reviews

In-depth interviews and genre analysis were conducted to derive the genre characteristics of commercial and noncommercial Internet book reviews in order to explore the judgment criteria for commercial (i.e., fake) and noncommercial (i.e., authentic) Internet book reviews. An empirical investigation was then performed to confirm which genre characteristics could serve as judgment criteria. Results indicated that structure and format, attributes of content, information orientation, number of words, lexical richness, personal pronouns, and paralinguistic features can provide useful clues to judgments. Moreover, commercial Internet book reviews with certain genre characteristics may hide their commercial intentions. These findings can provide reference for judgment criteria for online readers or librarians who want to select books based on objective book reviews, or on Internet bookstore marketing strategies that focus on electronic word-of-mouth comments.

► The authenticity of Internet book reviews is drawn from genre characteristics. ► Certain genre characteristics could serve as judgment criteria. ► Commercial Internet book reviews may use genre traits may hide their intentions.