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Keeping both employees and customers highly engaged has become a critical issue for service firms, especially for high-contact and highly customized services. Therefore, it is essential to engage employees and customers during service interactions for better service outcomes. However, past research on employee and customer engagement has primarily focused on brands and organizations. Little research has concentrated on service interactions as the objects of engagement. To fill this research gap, this study aims to clarify and define service engagement behaviors (SEBs), identify various employee and customer SEBs and develop a model to investigate the relationships between these behaviors.

A theoretical framework was developed based on social contagion theory and service-dominant (S-D) logic to explore the effects of employee SEBs on customer SEBs through customer perceptions of relational energy and interaction cohesion. Dyadic survey data collected from 293 customer-employee pairs in various high-contact and highly customized service industries were examined through structural equation modeling.

Results show that employee SEBs (service role involvement, customer orientation behavior and customer empowerment behavior) positively influence relational energy and interaction cohesion, which in turn affect customer SEBs (service exploration behavior and service coordination behavior).

This study represents pioneering research to conceptualize SEBs. Different from the extant literature on engagement, SEBs capture the proactive and collaborative engagement behaviors of employees and customers in service interactions. Various employee and customer SEBs were identified and an empirical model was proposed and tested to investigate the effect of employee SEBs on customer SEBs through relational energy and interaction cohesion.

This study aims to explore the value co-creation for developing cultural and creative virtual brand communities (CCVBCs) by developing a conceptual framework based on the stimulus-organism-response framework, social cognition theory (SCT) and social exchange theory (SET).

The proposed conceptual framework was developed from a comprehensive review of the related literature. This study tested and validated the proposed framework using partial least square structural equation model based on the data collected through a survey.

First, perceived hedonic benefit was positively affected by content personalization, user interaction design and technological innovation. Perceived social benefit and perceived self-achievement benefit were positively affected by user interaction design and technological innovation. Second, user content creation behavior was affected by perceived social benefit and perceived self-achievement benefit; user browsing behavior was significantly affected only by perceived hedonic benefit, and interaction behavior was significantly affected by perceived hedonic benefit, perceived social benefit and perceived self-achievement benefit. Third, perceived social benefit and perceived self-achievement benefit partially mediated the relationship between user interaction design and interaction behavior. As for the influence of technological innovation on interaction behavior, however, and the influence of user interaction design and technological innovation on content creation behavior, both perceived social benefit and perceived self-achievement benefit had complete mediation.

This study found that the characteristics of developing CCVBCs affected perceived benefit in participating in the value co-creation process. The results contributed to the value creation research by enriching the understanding of user value co-creation in developing CCVBCs.

This study seeks to investigate the service interaction behaviors that elicit a sense of comfort for the customer in the service encounter, and to investigate the mediating role of comfort on assessments of quality, customer satisfaction and positive word‐of‐mouth in two industries.

In‐depth interviews were used to create an initial list of interaction behaviors displayed by service employees in an encounter. A quantitative study was then used to collect data to empirically examine the relationship between the constructs of interest.

Two key groups of interaction behavior are identified and contain specific behaviors that create a sense of overall comfort for the customer. Overall comfort positively impacts both overall quality and customer satisfaction, and this ultimately leads to positive word‐of‐mouth.

The research focuses on two industries only: fashion apparel retailing and casual dining restaurants. Future research needs to examine other industries, experiential or credence services, level of involvement or the impact of culture.

Managers are recommended to incorporate interaction behaviors into front‐line employee training and design of comfort‐enhancing strategies.

Research on employee behaviors and emotional aspects of the encounter is relatively scant, and this study investigates the specific behavioral repertoire that gives rise to an overall feeling of comfort in the service encounter. Although employee behavior is widely acknowledged to have an immense impact on the customer's evaluation of the encounter, there still exists much room to explore specific behaviors that are important for successful service delivery.

This paper aims to explore the physical attractiveness stereotype in service encounters. Specifically, this paper examines how physical attractiveness affects a customer’s response and whether a customer’s social interaction anxiety and the consumption situation moderate this relationship.

Three experiments were used to test hypotheses. Participants were subject to scenarios of varying levels of physical attractiveness (more vs less), social interaction anxiety (high vs low) and consumption situation (private vs public). Customer participation intention and citizenship behavior were measured along scales.

The results indicate that the physical attractiveness of service providers positively affects customer citizenship behavior, and customer participation intention mediates this relationship. However, the effect only exists for a customer with low social interaction anxiety or presents itself under public consumption conditions.

This work paints a more nuanced picture of missing links in the understanding of the influence of service providers’ physical attractiveness. It enriches the physical attractiveness stereotype literature by identifying the mediating role of customer participation intention while bounding the relationship within conditions related to a customer’s social interaction anxiety and the service consumption situation.

Management may alter the performance of service employees by considering the employee’s physical attractiveness and gauging customer social interaction anxiety while keeping in mind the consumption situation.

This study advances physical attractiveness stereotype research by examining its effect on customer participation intention and citizenship behavior in the service industry. Additionally, this study adds customer social interaction anxiety and consumption situation to the existing literature that addresses employee factors affecting customer behavior.

This study aims to investigate the relationship between Internet celebrity characteristics and the follower's impulse purchase behavior in YouTuber. Attachment and parasocial interaction are mediating variables concerning the impact of Internet celebrity characteristics on followers' impulse purchase behavior.

This study conducted an online survey of YouTube users in Taiwan and utilized quota sampling with 500 samples to examine the influence of two types of Internet celebrities on impulse purchase behavior.

As to the empirical results, the main path indicated that the self-disclosure Internet celebrity positively affected the attachment, which mainly positively affected the impulse purchase behavior. The second path showed that the expertise-knowledge Internet celebrity positively affected the attachment, which positively affected the impulse purchase behavior.

YouTube marketers should proceed prudently with the market segmentation and choose the appropriate type of Internet celebrities who are suitable for the product image to differentiate marketing. Empirical results can aid marketers in selecting a product-endorser, and enhance consumers' purchasing effect on product advertisements in interactive marketing.

The novelty of this study is to explore the mediation effect of the impact of Internet celebrity characteristics on followers' impulse purchase behavior in interactive marketing. The explaining mechanism of attachment and parasocial interaction is promised to be highlighted as the contribution of this study to the extant literature. This study constructs a theoretical mechanism between attachment theory and parasocial interaction theory and then can be used as a theoretical lens for designing successful social media strategies and explaining social media brand relationships.

Despite the acknowledged importance of an understanding of the determinants of and processes affecting the salesperson‐customer interaction, this issue still remains an enigma. Posits that, of the two main philosophical stances available in the study of human behaviour (i.e. mediationism and behaviourism), the prevailing approaches adopted in the study of the salesperson‐customer interaction are mediationistic in nature and are, for the most part, uncritically accepted. States that in order to improve current understanding of the salesperson‐customer interaction, alternative sources for explaining this dyad should be introduced into the field of study. Argues that the competing philosophical stance offered by radical behaviourism may be suitable for this purpose, providing an examination of how this approach can be utilized to explain buying behaviour within the sales interaction context.

The purposes of this paper are to (1) explore how personality traits pertaining to the dominance influence steadiness compliance model manifest themselves in terms of user interaction behavior on social media and (2) examine whether social interaction data on social media platforms can predict user personality.

Social interaction data was collected from 198 users of Sina Weibo, a popular social media platform in China. Their personality traits were also measured via questionnaire. Machine learning techniques were applied to predict the personality traits based on the social interaction data.

The results demonstrated that the proposed classifiers had high prediction accuracy, indicating that our approach is reliable and can be used with social interaction data on social media platforms to predict user personality. “Reposting,” “being reposted,” “commenting” and “being commented on” were found to be the key interaction features that reflected Weibo users' personalities, whereas “liking” was not found to be a key feature.

The findings of this study are expected to enrich personality prediction research based on social media data and to provide insights into the potential of employing social media data for the purpose of personality prediction in the context of the Weibo social media platform in China.

Active interaction and knowledge contribution are vital yet challenging elements of the sustainable development of online health communities (OHCs). To investigate the cognitive mechanisms underlying these behaviours in doctors' and patients' use of OHCs, this study develops a theoretical model to examine the relationships among cognitive modes, patterns of interaction, perceived usefulness, and contribution behaviour and the impact of user identity on these relationships.

To test the research hypotheses, structural equation modelling and multiple-group analysis were used to analyse survey data from 207 doctors and 213 patients.

The results indicate that dual processes and perceived usefulness are the key cognitive antecedents of interaction and knowledge contribution, respectively. However, the correlation of the rational mode and instrumental interaction is significantly stronger in the doctors' group than in the patients' group, while a stronger correlation between the experiential mode and instrumental interaction is observed in the patients' group.

These findings support the development of information and system strategies to support the operation of dual processes underlying doctors' and patients' instrumental and affective interactions, facilitate evaluation and sense-making of interaction activities, and motivate knowledge contribution.

This study uncovers the invariance and variability in the relationships between salient cognitive activities and behavioural responses in doctors' and patients' use of OHCs and the impact of user identity on variability.

This study aims to apply the elaboration likelihood model to explore when, how and why robotic services increase customer engagement.

A field survey and two experiments were conducted to examine the proposed theoretical framework.

The robots’ proactive behavior encouraged customers to trust and engage with them. The influence of this behavior on customer engagement increased for highly interaction-oriented customers or when the reputations of companies were poor.

The findings can inform the efficient management of customer–robot interactions and thus support firms’ relationship marketing objectives.

The literature on robotic services has recognized that robots should be proactive to ensure positive customer experiences, but few studies have explored the relational outcomes of proactive robotic services. The authors’ in-depth empirical examination thus extends research into the role these services can play in fostering customer engagement.

Crowding in service environments is a constant concern for many firms due to the negative consequences it has on consumers and companies alike. Yet, scant empirical research exists on firm-generated initiatives aimed at improving customer service experiences in crowded situations. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how information, a managerially actionable variable, influences social interactions (in the form of customer social withdrawal and citizenship behavior) and service experience.

Two experimental studies were conducted using an extended service context.

This research demonstrates that receiving information about crowds in advance results in heightened social withdrawal, which improves customer service experience. However, providing consumers with a platform to share crowding information increases customers’ citizenship behavior toward service employees and other customers, which, in turn, improves customer service experience.

For extended service encounters (e.g. air travel) where social interactions are inevitable, companies should encourage customers to share their real-time experiences with other customers in hopes of creating more positive social interactions (e.g. citizenship behavior) within the crowded environment.

Existing investigations of crowding stem from an overemphasis on the physical and atmospheric aspects of the environment by treating crowds as a “fixture” in the servicescape, rather than as “active participants” involved in the crowding environment. While the mere presence of crowds alone has negative effects, this research takes it a step further by examining interactions among and between customers and service employees within the crowded service environment.