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“I” value justice, but “we” value relationships: Self‐construal effects on post‐transgression consumer forgiveness
Author(s) -
Sinha Jayati,
Lu FangChi
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
journal of consumer psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 4.433
H-Index - 110
eISSN - 1532-7663
pISSN - 1057-7408
DOI - 10.1016/j.jcps.2015.06.002
Subject(s) - psychology , forgiveness , social psychology , salience (neuroscience) , construal level theory , interdependence , value (mathematics) , moderation , product (mathematics) , attribution , economic justice , collectivism , individualism , cognitive psychology , sociology , social science , geometry , mathematics , neoclassical economics , machine learning , computer science , economics , political science , law
Causal attributions and brand‐relationships are known to determine how consumers react to brand transgressions. Considering both transgression controllability and brand‐relationship strength, the authors show that self‐construal moderates consumer reactions to brand transgressions. Three studies using different product and service failure scenarios demonstrate that consumers who have independent self‐construals are more forgiving when the brand has no control over the transgression, regardless of brand‐relationship strength. However, consumers who have interdependent self‐construals are more forgiving when they have strong relationships with the transgressing brand, even if the brand is at fault. Furthermore, the salience of justice concerns versus expectancies for long‐term brand‐relationships underlies the self‐construal effects on consumer forgiveness.