Exploring the language of the sharing economy: building trust and reducing privacy concern on Airbnb in German and English
Exploring the language of the sharing economy: building trust and reducing privacy concern on Airbnb in German and English
Several countries’ economies have been disrupted by the sharing economy. Global champions like Airbnb and Uber use similar models and platforms across many countries. However, each country and its consumers have different characteristics including the language used. The text in the profile of those offering their properties in England in English and in Germany in German, are compared to explore whether trust is built, and privacy concerns are reduced in the same way. Six methods of building trust are used by the landlords: (1) the level of formality, (2) distance and proximity, (3) emotiveness and humor, (4) being assertive and passive aggressive, (5) conformity to the platform language style and terminology and (6) setting boundaries. Privacy concerns are not usually reduced directly as this is left to the platform. The findings indicate that language has a limited influence and the platform norms and habits are the biggest influence.
Sharing economy, trust, privacy, Airbnb
Zarifis, Alex
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Ingham, Richard
68976758-e491-477c-9d95-3f487ee05229
Kroenung, Julia
2a7bc3a6-bd94-4081-8fed-c01ef84d9631
Wu, Hung-Che
e2591640-c44c-4cc6-8813-925c9dacb89f
Zarifis, Alex
7622e840-ba78-4a4f-879b-6ba0f62363cc
Ingham, Richard
68976758-e491-477c-9d95-3f487ee05229
Kroenung, Julia
2a7bc3a6-bd94-4081-8fed-c01ef84d9631
Wu, Hung-Che
e2591640-c44c-4cc6-8813-925c9dacb89f
Zarifis, Alex, Ingham, Richard and Kroenung, Julia
,
Wu, Hung-Che
(ed.)
(2019)
Exploring the language of the sharing economy: building trust and reducing privacy concern on Airbnb in German and English.
Cogent Business & Management, 6 (1), [1666641].
(doi:10.1080/23311975.2019.1666641).
Abstract
Several countries’ economies have been disrupted by the sharing economy. Global champions like Airbnb and Uber use similar models and platforms across many countries. However, each country and its consumers have different characteristics including the language used. The text in the profile of those offering their properties in England in English and in Germany in German, are compared to explore whether trust is built, and privacy concerns are reduced in the same way. Six methods of building trust are used by the landlords: (1) the level of formality, (2) distance and proximity, (3) emotiveness and humor, (4) being assertive and passive aggressive, (5) conformity to the platform language style and terminology and (6) setting boundaries. Privacy concerns are not usually reduced directly as this is left to the platform. The findings indicate that language has a limited influence and the platform norms and habits are the biggest influence.
Text
Exploring the language of the sharing economy Building trust and reducing privacy concern on Airbnb in German and English
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Accepted/In Press date: 5 September 2019
e-pub ahead of print date: 17 September 2019
Keywords:
Sharing economy, trust, privacy, Airbnb
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 490000
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/490000
PURE UUID: 5b126fe0-0db9-4bd5-ab11-02c51b1a1b7b
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Date deposited: 13 May 2024 16:31
Last modified: 06 Jun 2024 02:21
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Contributors
Author:
Alex Zarifis
Author:
Richard Ingham
Author:
Julia Kroenung
Editor:
Hung-Che Wu
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