Title: Gen-Z social electronic word of mouth communication and mediating role of contents quality and sources: PLS-SEM path modelling

Authors: Manoj Kumar; Pradeep Mamgain; Krishna Pratap Singh

Addresses: School of Management, Department of Business Management, Hemvati Nandan Bahuguna Garhwal University (A Central University), Srinagar, Chauras Campus, Uttarakhand 249161, India ' School of Management, Department of Business Management, Hemvati Nandan Bahuguna Garhwal University (A Central University), Srinagar, Chauras Campus, Uttarakhand 249161, India ' Faculty of English and Foreign Languages, Sri Sri University, Godi Sahi, Cuttack – 754006, Odisha, India

Abstract: The study examined elaboration likelihood model (ELM) information processing routes in the context of Gen-Z active social WOM seeking in the involvement of hospitality service buying. The ELM was employed and serial mediating routes of information processing were investigated. The samples (n = 430) were collected especially from the generation-Z group of individuals from different cities in India, such as Dehradun, Delhi, Nainital, Mussoorie, Bhubaneswar, Ranchi, Srinagar, Pune, Jaipur only. The partial least square-SEM was tested for the proposed relationship and bootstrapping used to verify potential mediation. The findings of the research indicate that active social media WOM information seeking to social WOM influence have a serial mediation effect of opinion leader, source of closeness and communication content quality and process investigated on two ELM routes (i.e., central and peripheral information processing route). The findings of this research may be an asset to the market communication leaders and corporate media administrators. However, it helps to understand the social media WOM communication active seeking pattern and being mediation factors of opinion leader, source of closeness and well as content quality indirectly effect into the further social media electronic word of mouth influence.

Keywords: generation-Z; social media electronic word of mouth; communication content quality; CCQ; hospitality services; information processing; serial mediation; elaboration likelihood model; ELM.

DOI: 10.1504/IJIMA.2023.132723

International Journal of Internet Marketing and Advertising, 2023 Vol.19 No.1/2, pp.122 - 145

Received: 22 Oct 2021
Accepted: 13 Jan 2022
Published online: 09 Aug 2023 *

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