Exploring the Roles of Consumers' Perceived Self-Interest and Accusation Credibility on the Effectiveness of Response Strategies in Corporate Ethical Misconduct

Many companies that are heavily criticized for their morally questionable conduct keep thriving. It is not well understood why consumers continue supporting and purchasing from some morally wrong companies. Using self-interest bias in moral judgments, this study explored how consumers' perceived self-interest and perceived message credibility of the accusation influence the effectiveness of corporate response strategies to mitigate consumers' negative reactions to corporate ethical misconduct. A total of 638 participants provided usable questionnaires in an online between-subject experiment. The results showed that consumers' perceived self-interest mitigates their negative reactions to corporate misconduct, regardless of the corporate response strategies. Furthermore, the effects of consumers' perceived self-interest on perceived corporate ability were mitigated when the accusation was perceived to be credible. Apology better protects consumers' attitudes, perceived corporate ability, and trust; it also mitigates intentions of negative word-of-mouth when the perceived credibility of the accusation is low. However, denial and attack-the-accuser can be more effective when the accusation has high perceived credibility. The theoretical and practical implications were discussed further in the paper.