The Effect of Emotional Content and Support on Trust in Internet Forum Posts

Many people now use internet forums for gathering and sharing information on diverse topics, raising questions about the quality and credibility of content on these forums. Although anyone can present questions or advice to online forums regardless of their level of expertise, research shows that internet users do not judge credibility stringently when searching for information online (Flanagin & Metzger, 2000). Factors that influence credibility judgements may include star ratings, length of responses, and the presence of emotional support within the information. We conducted a pilot study that tested the presence of emotional content in questions and emotional support in replies on a hypothetical travel forum. We found that neither the presence of emotional content nor the presence of emotional support influenced user ratings of trust or advice quality. Some limitations of the present study include reply length, salience of the emotional support, and the number of questions presented to each participant. We discuss future directions that should be taken in order to further understand the presence of emotional support in online forums.