It seems like it, at least.
the most popular reviews on MAL tend to get more likes than the most popular reviews on AL but the average review on AL tends to get more likes than the average review on MAL
i think this is cause people review less on AL due to its smaller userbase, so the reviews that pop up in the recent reviews section stay there for longer. just eyeballing both sections quickly, the oldest review visible on MAL's homepage is 1 hour old, and the oldest on AL's is 6
AL's social-driven features can also play a role, you can let your followers know that you've posted a review (though admittedly i don't know if MAL has a similar user-feed structure since i didn't use their social features much)
maybe though I can attest when it comes the completion of popular shows you'll find the recent reviews flooded
that's definitely true for both sites, but these times of heightened review activity are anomalies when it comes to looking at why an "average" (in the most general sense of the word) review on AL gets more likes
if you scroll to MAL's least interacted reviews on any show, you'll see a sea of 5 or lower likes, while there's notably less of a heavily-buried backlog on here. a byproduct of fewer reviews for sure, but AL's less busy (on average) recent reviews section also plays a part
I sum it up to the way Anilist's U.I design of their site tends to stimulate more activity around recent reviews
it's a lot harder to have a new review get read on MAL since it feels like they tend to get buried
though like someone pointed out you have to question how many people actually read the review rather than the score
MAL has a disgusting culture of "rat races". Post your review as swiftly as it is humanly possible or get buried underneath countless write-ups from other users, essentially making it invisible to potential readers. That's what reviewing seasonal anime's been like for ages.
On Anilist, no matter when you post your stuff, there are at least a few people who will notice it and interact with your review in some way. It doesn't matter if it's a show that's just finished airing or an obscure title no one's ever heard about... and it's all thanks to a dedicated section of the site where recently posted reviews appear.
On MAL, you can post the most engaging review that shithole has ever seen, but it'll never get even the fraction of the attention it would get on Anilist. Yes, it does have its own "recent reviews" section, but it's barely visited by people because it's usually flooded with... well... not the greatest of contents that's hard to navigate through.
It's the exact opposite. The minimum character limit on this site causes a lot of reviews to be bloated with nonsense. The user base also feels a lot younger. On top of that, the reading on here is more annoying because of the embedded images which in theory could be used to deepen the review, but mostly are used as fillers. Not being able to quickly run through reviews, or filter them by positive/negative also makes the whole experience worse. One thing that AniList does have over MAL is the discoverability. It's much harder to have your review read if you're late to the game, partially because there are way more reviews on MAL, but also because of the review overview being more friendly towards discoverability on here.