Examining the Presence of Gender Bias in Customer Reviews Using Word Embedding

32 Pages Posted: 24 Feb 2019

See all articles by Arul Mishra

Arul Mishra

University of Utah - David Eccles School of Business

Himanshu Mishra

University of Utah - David Eccles School of Business

Shelly Rathee

University of Utah - Department of Marketing; Villanova University

Date Written: January 31, 2019

Abstract

Humans have entered the age of algorithms. Each minute, algorithms shape countless preferences from suggesting a product to a potential life partner. In the marketplace, algorithms are trained to learn consumer preferences from customer reviews because user-generated reviews are considered the voice of customers and a valuable source of information to firms. Insights, minded from reviews, play an indispensable role in several business activities ranging from product recommen-dations, targeted advertising, promotions, segmentation, etc. In this research, we question whether reviews might hold stereotypic gender bias that algorithms learn and propagate. Utilizing data from millions of observations and a word embedding approach, GloVe, we show that algorithms designed to learn from human language output, also learn gender bias. We also examine why such biases occur: whether the bias is caused because of a negative bias against females or a positive bias for males. We examine the impact of gender bias in reviews on choice and conclude with policy implications for female consumers, especially when they are unaware of the bias, and the ethical implications for the firms.

Keywords: Gender Bias, Natural Language Processing, Customer Reviews, Text Analysis, Word Embedding

Suggested Citation

Mishra, Arul and Mishra, Himanshu and Rathee, Shelly and Rathee, Shelly, Examining the Presence of Gender Bias in Customer Reviews Using Word Embedding (January 31, 2019). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3327404 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3327404

Arul Mishra

University of Utah - David Eccles School of Business ( email )

1645 E. Campus Center
Salt Lake City, UT 84112
United States

Himanshu Mishra (Contact Author)

University of Utah - David Eccles School of Business ( email )

1645 E. Campus Center Drive
Salt Lake City, UT 84112-9304
United States

HOME PAGE: http://himanshumishra.com

Shelly Rathee

University of Utah - Department of Marketing ( email )

1645 E. Campus Center Drive
Salt Lake City, UT 84112-9304
United States

Villanova University ( email )

800 Lancaster Avenue
Villanova, PA 19085-1678
United States

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