The effects of a psychological brand contract breach on customers' dysfunctional behavior toward a brand

Abstract

PurposeThis paper introduces the concept of dysfunctional customer behavior toward a brand and argues that when customers perceive that a brand has failed to fulfill its promises, a psychological brand contract breach occurs, which in turn leads to a psychological brand contract violation, which evokes dysfunctional customer behavior toward the brand. In addition, this study investigates whether the impact of a breach of this contract is dependent on brand relationship quality, brand apology and restitution.Design/methodology/approachStudy 1 conducted the online survey and 224 respondents were used for data analysis and the moderating role of brand relationship quality was examined. Study 2 conducted an experiment with 201 participants to test the moderating role of brand apology and restitution.FindingsThis study found the moderating role of brand relationship quality, brand apology and brand restitution on the relationship between a psychological brand contract breach and dysfunctional customer behavior toward a brand (i.e. brand-negative word-of-mouth, brand retaliation and brand boycott), which is mediated by psychological brand contract violation.Originality/valueThis study contributes to the theoretical understanding of dysfunctional customer behavior toward a brand by integrating the literature on brand management with the organizational literature on psychological contracts between organizations and their employees. Furthermore, this study sheds light on the effectiveness of reparative actions by the firm after occurrence of the psychological brand contract breach.

Dysfunctional customer behavior influences on employees’ emotional labor: The moderating roles of customer orientation and perceived organizational support

“…By empirically examining DCB’s effect on frontline employees’ encounter-specific behavior—emotional labor, our study answers Harris and Reynolds’s (2003) calls and fills the gap of DCB’s instant effects. Furthermore, different from most of the previous research focusing on one specific form of DCB ( Grandey et al, 2004 ; Park and Kim, 2019 ; Gong and Wang, 2021 ), our study, consist with Kang and Gong (2019) , tests the effects of three types of employee-targeting DCB on emotional labor simultaneously. By doing so, we can compare the relative strength of different types of DCB’s effects on emotional labor.…”

Unpacking the relationship between customer citizenship behavior and dysfunctional customer behavior: the role of customer moral credits and entitlement

“…Respondents were provided with a definition and examples of customer citizenship behavior and dysfunctional customer behavior. Respondents were then asked to recall and describe in detail their most recent experience (within the past six months) of having displayed both customer citizenship behavior and dysfunctional customer behavior at the same service provider [1], and then to complete a series of survey items based on their specific experience (Chan et al, 2019;Gong and Wang, 2021;Miranda et al, 2020). Participation was voluntary, and all respondents were assured of confidentiality.…”

“…Likewise, Grégoire and Fisher (2008) confirm that a violation of fairness creates a sense of betrayal among customers, which subsequently pressures customers to display dysfunctional customer behavior. Gong and Wang (2021) find that when customers perceive that a firm (e.g. a brand) fails to fulfill its promises, a psychological contract breach occurs that evokes dysfunctional customer behavior.…”

Service staff encounters with dysfunctional customer behavior: Does supervisor support mitigate negative emotions?

“…For firms, dysfunctional customer behavior, such as shoplifting, fraudulent returns, copyright infringement, fraud, vandalism, etc., all indirectly or directly contribute to the organization’s financial costs ( Harris and Reynolds, 2003 ). Moreover, Gong and Wang (2021) argue that dysfunctional customer behavior can have a negative impact on brands, such as brand-negative word-of-mouth (WOM), brand boycotting, and brand retaliation.…”

“…Moreover, Gong and Wang (2021) argue that dysfunctional customer behavior can have a negative impact on brands, such as brand-negative word-of-mouth (WOM), brand boycotting, and brand retaliation.…”