Smiley guests post long reviews!

Abstract

The inclusion of a photo in users’ profile provides information about them and shows a higher sense of self-expression and potential engagement. On peer-to-peer rental platforms, profile images may be useful for hosts and guests to infer individual characteristics and expectations. We try to fill a gap in the literature by inferring guests’ posting behavior through their profile image. Using Airbnb data and deep learning techniques, our empirical analysis reveals that guests who upload profile images—especially profile images displaying happy emotions—are more involved in posting long reviews. As theoretical implications, these results add knowledge to the application of the Five Factor Model of Personality, deep learning, image recognition, and emotion recognition in hospitality. As managerial implications, the prediction of posting behavior through the mining of visual information can be a relevant tool in the age of big data. • Guests with a profile image tend to post long reviews. • Guests using images with human photos tend to write long reviews. • Guests with profile images displaying happy emotions post long reviews.