Discussion, Implications and Future Research

Regardless of the insights of the majority of formal academic disciplines which have already acknowledged the key role that trust plays in the context of interpersonal communication as well as influence, research in the field of online consumer research put little emphasis on a systematic investigation of the trust concept in the context of inter-consumer communication. This situation may be not attributable to the fact that online scholars haven’t recognized the construct’s general importance also in their own research area, but is explainable by a latent conceptual confusion of what trust in eWOM really is. A variety of industry reports and academic studies have nevertheless attempted to measure the construct or closely related concepts (e.g., Briggs et al., 2002; Pan & Chiou, 2011; Racherla et al., 2012; Sen, 2007; Smith et al., 2005). While this research stream represents a valuable contribution, especially to the recognition of the important role of the trust concept for review research, these writings are commonly characterized by a lack of understanding of the construct’s content and scope.