Are you happy for me? How sharing positive tourism experiences through social media affects posttrip evaluations

Abstract

Social media has changed travelers’ behavior in many aspects, including tourism experience sharing. This study examines the influence of tourism experience sharing on travelers’ posttrip evaluations, by considering three facets of experience sharing on social media: expressive writing, sharing on social media, and audience response on social media. Through an experimental design, this study reveals that (1) travelers’ posttrip evaluations increase when they write expressively about their positive travel experiences in a private setting; (2) travelers’ posttrip evaluations also increase when they share their positive travel experiences on social media, although the increase shows no significant difference between sharing and expressively writing about their experiences; and (3) constructive responses from online viewers increase travelers’ positive moods when they share positive travel experiences, thereby enhancing their posttrip evaluations.