Corporate social performance and consumer‐retailer emotional attachment: The moderating role of individual traits

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to examine the influence of corporate social performance (CSP) on the emotional attachment of consumers to firms. In contrast to past CSR studies, this research seeks to investigate the role of personality variables as moderating factors.

Design/methodology/approach

The study tested hypotheses through an experiment using scenarios, addressing corporate social responsibility activities, manipulating domains like environmental protection, treatment of employees, and charitable giving.

Findings

The results indicate that CSP influences consumer‐firm emotional attachment and that this attachment constitutes an unrecognized mediational pathway in the CSP‐loyalty link. The results identify the moderating and strengthening role of altruism, need‐for‐activity, and esteem‐enhancement on the CSP‐emotional attachment link. Finally, the study reveals that attributions are likely to moderate the influence of consumer altruism.

Research limitations/implications

Although the CSP record scenarios reflected real corporate social responsibility practices, future studies employing field experiments or consumer surveys exploring the effects of actual corporate social responsibility initiatives would be valuable to enhance the external validity of these results.

Practical implications

The study helps retailers towards improved and more targeted social responsibility investments. Specifically, retailers targeting consumer groups that are high in altruism, high in need for activity, and high in self‐enhancement motives are probably in a more advantageous position when investing in CSR initiatives as a way to build and further deepen emotional attachment, and indirectly consumer loyalty.

Originality/value

Building on the CSR and attachment literatures, the study investigates the extent to which CSP is capable of influencing customer loyalty through emotion‐laden processes. Furthermore, in contrast to previous CSR studies, this study is one of the first to directly investigate whether consumer differences influence consumer reactions to CSR. Specifically, this study finds that differences in consumers' personality traits may affect the effectiveness of CSR initiatives.

Citation

Vlachos, P.A. (2012), "Corporate social performance and consumer‐retailer emotional attachment: The moderating role of individual traits", European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 46 No. 11/12, pp. 1559-1580. https://doi.org/10.1108/03090561211259989