How do foreign customers' perceptions of product-harm crises affect their transfer of capability- and character-based stigma?
International Marketing Review
ISSN: 0265-1335
Article publication date: 30 December 2021
Issue publication date: 3 February 2022
Abstract
Purpose
Customers often trace a product-harm crisis to the deviant firm's capability- or character-relevant issues. This study examines how capability- and character-based stigma associated with product-harm crises influence foreign customers' product preferences (i.e. brand affect and purchase intention) for other firms from the same country of origin.
Design/methodology/approach
Qualitative survey data are used to test hypotheses with a structural equation model.
Findings
The authors find that negative capability judgment significantly affects foreign customers' product preferences for other firms from the same country of origin, whereas negative character judgment does not. However, customers' national animosity and product knowledge moderate the stigma spillover effects. Specifically, national animosity and product knowledge weaken the spillover effects of capability-based stigma but strengthen those of character-based stigma.
Research limitations/implications
Future research could examine strategies for uninvolved firms to avoid the stigma-by-association effect. Moreover, due to the lack of resources to collect data, this study does not investigate how customers' generalized favorability and familiarity with crisis-stricken firms and uninvolved firms moderate the stigma-by-association effect.
Originality/value
The findings of this study advance our knowledge on product-harm crises and the stigma-by-association effect.
Keywords
Citation
Xue, R., Qian, G., Qian, Z. and Li, L. (2022), "How do foreign customers' perceptions of product-harm crises affect their transfer of capability- and character-based stigma?", International Marketing Review, Vol. 39 No. 1, pp. 120-141. https://doi.org/10.1108/IMR-09-2020-0197
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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