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This study examined the influence of a crisis on relational perceptions and the role of an empathetic response from stakeholders by investigating students’ perceptions of their relationship with a university following an on‐campus shooting. Findings show that despite the generally positive relationship, the university maintains with its students, the crisis had a negative impact on the students’ perceptions of their relationship with the university. Furthermore, results show how emotions, especially empathy, about an organization in a crisis situation can influence stakeholder relationships. This research helps provide nuance to the extant scholarship on crisis and emotions by introducing stakeholder empathy as a theoretical construct. Results also demonstrate that crisis managers who invest in relationship building before a crisis may elicit empathy more than blame in a crisis and may emerge with less relational damage.

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The tendency for crises to erupt on social media raises the question: How can strategic communication professionals determine the likelihood that these social media-borne warning signs of an impending crisis (often referred to as a paracrisis) will impact the organization? This study evaluated paracrisis through a semantic network analysis of two cases of claims of racism against two brands, Prada and Gucci. Using interactivity as the lens for evaluating social media claims against an organization revealed paracrisis characteristics, including referencing activities, social tagging and calls for action against corporate misconduct.