The influence of angry customer outbursts on service providers’ facial displays and affective states

This article explores the existence and extent of emotional contagion, as measured by facial displays and reported affective states, in a service failure event. Using video vignettes of customers complaining about a service failure as stimulus material, the authors measured the facial displays and affective states of service providers as proxies for emotional contagion. Following a two-step approach, service providers’ facial expressions were first recorded and assessed, revealing that service providers’ facial displays matched those of the angry consumer. Second, a mixed ANOVA revealed service providers reported stronger negative affective states after exposure to an angry complaint than prior to exposure. The results demonstrated that during a complaint situation, angry outbursts by consumers can initiate the emotional contagion process, and service providers are susceptible to “catch” consumer anger through emotional contagion. Implications for complaint management and future research are discussed

Exploring disagreement prevention and resolution in travel decision-making of young Chinese travellers

The young Chinese travel market is becoming increasingly significant in domestic and international tourism. However, there is limited research on the market. This study examines the decision-making processes of young Chinese travellers, with a particular interest in disagreement prevention and resolution. On the basis of interviews with 25 young Chinese travellers, this study found that while a small number of travellers did not perceive any disagreement, or did not voice their disagreement, the majority of interviewees described the decision-making process as being characterised by periods of disagreement. It was found that Chinese cultural values including ‘forbearance’ and ‘authority’ influence travellers’ disagreement prevention. It was discovered that travellers used five types of strategies for disagreement resolution, including: compromise, problem solving, delay, forcing, and accommodation. These strategies were primarily influenced by two Chinese cultural values: ‘reciprocity’ and ‘conformity’

Flying to Quality: Cultural Influences on Online Reviews

Customers increasingly consult opinions expressed online before making their final decisions. However, inherent factors such as culture may moderate the criteria and the weights individuals use to form their expectations and evaluations. Therefore, not all opinions expressed online match customers’ personal preferences, neither can firms use this information to deduce general conclusions. Our study explores this issue in the context of airline services using Hofstede’s framework as a theoretical anchor. We gauge the effect of each dimension as well as that of cultural distance between the passenger and the airline on the overall satisfaction with the flight as well as specific service factors. Using topic modeling, we also capture the effect of culture on review text and identify factors that are not captured by conventional rating scales. Our results provide significant insights for airline managers about service factors that affect more passengers from specific cultures leading to higher satisfaction/dissatisfaction

The effectiveness of reappraisal as an emotional regulation technique for minimizing negative emotional contagion during angry complaint interactions

The effectiveness of reappraisal as an emotional regulation technique for minimizing negative emotional contagion during angry complaint interactions. This paper expands the research on emotional labor, emotional regulation, and emotional contagion, by investigating the effectiveness of reappraisal or deep acting in reducing the negative impact of emotional contagion on frontline service providers (FSP) during angry compliant interactions

The impact of online reviews on hotel booking intentions and perception of trust

A growing reliance on the Internet as an information source when making choices about tourism products raises the need for more research into electronic word of mouth. Within a hotel context, this study explores the role of four key factors that influence perceptions of trust and consumer choice. An experimental design is used to investigate four independent variables: the target of the review (core or interpersonal); overall valence of a set of reviews (positive or negative); framing of reviews (what comes first: negative or positive information); and whether or not a consumer generated numerical rating is provided together with the written text. Consumers seem to be more influenced by early negative information, especially when the overall set of reviews is negative. However, positively framed information together with numerical rating details increases both booking intentions and consumer trust. The results suggest that consumers tend to rely on easy-to-process information, when evaluating a hotel based upon reviews. Higher levels of trust are also evident when a positively framed set of reviews focused on interpersonal service

Complaining in cyberspace: The motives and forms of hotel guests' complaints online

Traditionally, consumers who have been dissatisfied with service have typically complained to the frontline personnel or to a manager in either a direct (face-to-face, over the phone) manner, indirect by writing, or done nothing but told friends and family of the incident. More recently, the Internet has provided various “new” ways to air a grievance, especially when little might have been done at the point of service failure. With the opportunity to now spread word-of-mouth globally, consumers have the potential to impact the standing of a brand or a firm's reputation. The hotel industry is particularly vulnerable, as an increasing number of bookings are undertaken via the Internet and the decision process is likely to be influenced by what other previous guests might post on many booking-linked sites. We conducted a qualitative study of a key travel site to ascertain the forms and motives of complaints made online about hotels and resorts. 200 web-based consumer complaints were analyzed using NVivo 8 software. Findings revealed that consumers report a wide range of service failures on the Internet. They tell a highly descriptive, persuasive, and credible story, often motivated by altruism or, at the other end of the continuum, by revenge. These stories have the power to influence potential guests to book or not book accommodation at the affected properties. Implications for managers of hotels and resorts are discussed

Film-induced tourism: an incidental experience

This research was conducted to discover how film viewing might be related to tourism activities and whether motivations drive people to become film-specific tourists or whether visitation to film locations is simply an incidental tourism experience. A survey collected data relating to film tourism motivation, film viewing behavior, general travel behavior, and demographic profiles. Factor analysis was applied to reduce 29 statements into themes of motivations that were labeled Novelty, Prestige, and Personalization. Logistic regression was used to predict likely future film tourist behavior