[go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ijrema/v37y2020i4p821-836.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

An investigation of unsustainable luxury: How guilt drives negative word-of-mouth

Author

Listed:
  • Amatulli, Cesare
  • De Angelis, Matteo
  • Pino, Giovanni
  • Guido, Gianluigi
Abstract
This research investigates consumers' reactions to luxury versus mass-market fashion products that are produced in an unsustainable manner. In particular, this research empirically assesses whether and why third-party information revealing the unsustainable nature of luxury versus mass-market fashion products may increase consumers' intention to engage in negative word-of-mouth about the manufacturing company. The results of four experiments demonstrate that, when confronted with information revealing that a purchased luxury fashion product has been produced in an environmentally or socially unsustainable manner, consumers experience a higher sense of guilt over that product, compared to a purchased mass-market fashion product, due to their lower expectations about luxury fashion products' unsustainability. Guilt, in turn, drives consumers' intention to generate negative word-of-mouth about the producer and such an effect is more pronounced among consumers with a higher versus lower individualistic orientation.

Suggested Citation

  • Amatulli, Cesare & De Angelis, Matteo & Pino, Giovanni & Guido, Gianluigi, 2020. "An investigation of unsustainable luxury: How guilt drives negative word-of-mouth," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 37(4), pages 821-836.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ijrema:v:37:y:2020:i:4:p:821-836
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ijresmar.2020.03.005
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S016781162030032X
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ijresmar.2020.03.005?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Cesare Amatulli & Matteo Angelis & Alessandro M. Peluso & Isabella Soscia & Gianluigi Guido, 2019. "The Effect of Negative Message Framing on Green Consumption: An Investigation of the Role of Shame," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 157(4), pages 1111-1132, July.
    2. Catherine Janssen & Joëlle Vanhamme & Adam Lindgreen & Cécile Lefebvre, 2014. "The Catch-22 of Responsible Luxury: Effects of Luxury Product Characteristics on Consumers’ Perception of Fit with Corporate Social Responsibility," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 119(1), pages 45-57, January.
    3. Jean-Noël Kapferer & Pierre Valette-Florence, 2019. "How self-success drives luxury demand: An integrated model of luxury growth and country comparisons," Post-Print hal-02492908, HAL.
    4. Caroline Moraes & Marylyn Carrigan & Carmela Bosangit & Carlos Ferreira & Michelle McGrath, 2017. "Understanding Ethical Luxury Consumption Through Practice Theories: A Study of Fine Jewellery Purchases," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 145(3), pages 525-543, October.
    5. Jean-Noël Kapferer & Anne Michaut-Denizeau, 2014. "Is luxury compatible with sustainability? Luxury consumers' viewpoint," Post-Print hal-00977183, HAL.
    6. Kapferer, Jean-Noël & Valette-Florence, Pierre, 2019. "How self-success drives luxury demand: An integrated model of luxury growth and country comparisons," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 273-287.
    7. Ana Valenzuela & Andrea Bonezzi & Teodóra Szabó-Douat, 2018. "What Goes Around, Comes Around: How Beliefs in Karma Influence the Use of Word of Mouth for Self-Enhancement," Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, University of Chicago Press, vol. 3(4), pages 490-502.
    8. Zeelenberg, M. & Pieters, R., 2004. "Beyond valence in customer dissatisfaction : A review and new findings on behavioral responses to regret and disappointment in failed services," Other publications TiSEM 7bfb4aa9-cba7-4786-850d-1, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    9. Iain Davies & Zoe Lee & Ine Ahonkhai, 2012. "Do Consumers Care About Ethical-Luxury?," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 106(1), pages 37-51, March.
    10. Naresh K. Malhotra & Sung S. Kim & Ashutosh Patil, 2006. "Common Method Variance in IS Research: A Comparison of Alternative Approaches and a Reanalysis of Past Research," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 52(12), pages 1865-1883, December.
    11. Hansen, Nele & Kupfer, Ann-Kristin & Hennig-Thurau, Thorsten, 2018. "Brand crises in the digital age: The short- and long-term effects of social media firestorms on consumers and brands," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 35(4), pages 557-574.
    12. Achabou, Mohamed Akli & Dekhili, Sihem, 2013. "Luxury and sustainable development: Is there a match?," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 66(10), pages 1896-1903.
    13. Cotte, June & Coulter, Robin A. & Moore, Melissa, 2005. "Enhancing or disrupting guilt: the role of ad credibility and perceived manipulative intent," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 58(3), pages 361-368, March.
    14. Hagtvedt, Henrik & Patrick, Vanessa M., 2016. "Gilt and Guilt: Should Luxury and Charity Partner at the Point of Sale?," Journal of Retailing, Elsevier, vol. 92(1), pages 56-64.
    15. Stathopoulou, Anastasia & Balabanis, George, 2019. "The effect of cultural value orientation on consumers' perceptions of luxury value and proclivity for luxury consumption," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 102(C), pages 298-312.
    16. Simona Romani & Silvia Grappi & Richard Bagozzi, 2013. "Explaining Consumer Reactions to Corporate Social Responsibility: The Role of Gratitude and Altruistic Values," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 114(2), pages 193-206, May.
    17. Sea-Jin Chang & Arjen van Witteloostuijn & Lorraine Eden, 2010. "From the Editors: Common method variance in international business research," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 41(2), pages 178-184, February.
    18. Grappi, Silvia & Romani, Simona & Bagozzi, Richard P., 2013. "Consumer response to corporate irresponsible behavior: Moral emotions and virtues," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 66(10), pages 1814-1821.
    19. Jonah Berger & Morgan Ward, 2010. "Subtle Signals of Inconspicuous Consumption," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 37(4), pages 555-569, December.
    20. Peluso, Alessandro M. & Bonezzi, Andrea & De Angelis, Matteo & Rucker, Derek D., 2017. "Compensatory word of mouth: Advice as a device to restore control," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 34(2), pages 499-515.
    21. repec:ucp:bkecon:9780226316529 is not listed on IDEAS
    22. Stefan Markovic & Oriol Iglesias & Jatinder Jit Singh & Vicenta Sierra, 2018. "How does the Perceived Ethicality of Corporate Services Brands Influence Loyalty and Positive Word-of-Mouth? Analyzing the Roles of Empathy, Affective Commitment, and Perceived Quality," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 148(4), pages 721-740, April.
    23. Bian, Qin & Forsythe, Sandra, 2012. "Purchase intention for luxury brands: A cross cultural comparison," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 65(10), pages 1443-1451.
    24. Zeelenberg, Marcel & Pieters, Rik, 2004. "Beyond valence in customer dissatisfaction: A review and new findings on behavioral responses to regret and disappointment in failed services," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 57(4), pages 445-455, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Sharma, Amalesh & Soni, Mauli & Borah, Sourav Bikash & Haque, Tanjum, 2022. "From silos to synergies: A systematic review of luxury in marketing research," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 893-907.
    2. Boukis, Achilleas & Christodoulides, George & Semaan, Rania W. & Stathopoulou, Anastasia, 2024. "What drives consumers towards shared luxury services? A comparison of sequential versus simultaneous sharing," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 177(C).
    3. Luming Zhao & Jiaxi Peng & Shubin Yu, 2023. "Sustainable Luxury and Consumer Purchase Intention: A Systematic Literature Review," SAGE Open, , vol. 13(4), pages 21582440231, December.
    4. Anders Hauge Wien & Alessandro M. Peluso & Marco Pichierri & Luigi Piper & Gianluigi Guido, 2024. "Effects of the dark triad on word of mouth in the luxury context: the moderating role of opinion divergence," Italian Journal of Marketing, Springer, vol. 2024(3), pages 287-309, September.
    5. Husain, Rehan & Paul, Justin & Koles, Bernadett, 2022. "The role of brand experience, brand resonance and brand trust in luxury consumption," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 66(C).
    6. Marlene Vock, 2022. "Luxurious and responsible? Consumer perceptions of corporate social responsibility efforts by luxury versus mass-market brands," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 29(6), pages 569-583, November.
    7. Lembregts, Christophe & Cadario, Romain, 2024. "Consumer-Driven Climate Mitigation: Exploring Barriers and Solutions in Studying Higher Mitigation Potential Behaviors," OSF Preprints ywus6, Center for Open Science.
    8. Pedro, Yael & Friedmann, Enav & Loureiro, Sandra Maria Correia, 2024. "High-end fashion as a social phenomenon: Exploring the perceptions of designers and consumers," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    9. Wang, Ying & Zhao, Jincan & Pan, Jialing, 2024. "The investigation of green purchasing behavior in China: A conceptual model based on the theory of planned behavior and self-determination theory," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 77(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jennifer Kunz & Stephanie May & Holger J. Schmidt, 2020. "Sustainable luxury: current status and perspectives for future research," Business Research, Springer;German Academic Association for Business Research, vol. 13(2), pages 541-601, July.
    2. Joëlle Vanhamme & Adam Lindgreen & Gülen Sarial-Abi, 2023. "Luxury Ethical Consumers: Who Are They?," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 183(3), pages 805-838, March.
    3. Marlene Vock, 2022. "Luxurious and responsible? Consumer perceptions of corporate social responsibility efforts by luxury versus mass-market brands," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 29(6), pages 569-583, November.
    4. Victoria-Sophie Osburg & Vignesh Yoganathan & Fabian Bartsch & Mbaye Fall Diallo & Hongfei Liu, 2024. "How Sustainable Luxury Influences Product Value Perceptions and Behavioral Intentions: A Comparative Study of Emerging vs. Developed Markets," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 191(4), pages 713-738, May.
    5. Mbaye Fall Diallo & Norchène Ben Dahmane Mouelhi & Mahesh Gadekar & Marie Schill, 2021. "CSR Actions, Brand Value, and Willingness to Pay a Premium Price for Luxury Brands: Does Long-Term Orientation Matter?," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 169(2), pages 241-260, March.
    6. Pengji Wang & Adrian T. H. Kuah & Qinye Lu & Caroline Wong & K. Thirumaran & Emmanuel Adegbite & Wesley Kendall, 2021. "The impact of value perceptions on purchase intention of sustainable luxury brands in China and the UK," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 28(3), pages 325-346, May.
    7. Sharma, Amalesh & Soni, Mauli & Borah, Sourav Bikash & Haque, Tanjum, 2022. "From silos to synergies: A systematic review of luxury in marketing research," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 893-907.
    8. Fernanda Muniz & Francisco Guzmán, 2021. "Overcoming the conflicting values of luxury branding and CSR by leveraging celebrity endorsements to build brand equity," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 28(3), pages 347-358, May.
    9. Karatzas, Stelios & Kapoulas, Alexandros & Priporas, Constantinos Vasilios, 2019. "Consumers' perceptions on complexity and prospects of ethical luxury: Qualitative insights from Taiwan," Australasian marketing journal, Elsevier, vol. 27(4), pages 224-232.
    10. Béatrice Parguel & Thierry Delécolle & Aïda Mimouni Chaabane, 2020. "Does Fashionization Impede Luxury Brands’ CSR Image?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(1), pages 1-16, January.
    11. Victoria-Sophie Osburg & Iain Davies & Vignesh Yoganathan & Fraser McLeay, 2021. "Perspectives, Opportunities and Tensions in Ethical and Sustainable Luxury: Introduction to the Thematic Symposium," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 169(2), pages 201-210, March.
    12. Adıgüzel, Feray & Donato, Carmela, 2021. "Proud to be sustainable: Upcycled versus recycled luxury products," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 137-146.
    13. Jenni Sipilä & Sascha Alavi & Laura Marie Edinger-Schons & Sabrina Dörfer & Christian Schmitz, 2021. "Corporate social responsibility in luxury contexts: potential pitfalls and how to overcome them," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 49(2), pages 280-303, March.
    14. Song, Lei & Meng, Yan & Chang, Hua & Li, Wenjing & Tan (Frank), Kang, 2021. "How counterfeit dominance affects luxury fashion brand owners’ perceptions: A cross-cultural examination," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 1-13.
    15. Smirti Kutaula & Alvina Gillani & Diana Gregory-Smith & Boris Bartikowski, 2024. "Ethical Consumerism in Emerging Markets: Opportunities and Challenges," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 191(4), pages 651-673, May.
    16. Janssen, Catherine & Vanhamme, Joëlle & Leblanc, Sina, 2017. "Should luxury brands say it out loud? Brand conspicuousness and consumer perceptions of responsible luxury," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 167-174.
    17. Cesare Amatulli & Matteo Angelis & Alessandro M. Peluso & Isabella Soscia & Gianluigi Guido, 2019. "The Effect of Negative Message Framing on Green Consumption: An Investigation of the Role of Shame," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 157(4), pages 1111-1132, July.
    18. Michel, Géraldine & Stathopoulou, Anastasia & Valette-Florence, Pierre, 2022. "Luxury is still alive and well: A spotlight on its multifaceted components," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 276-284.
    19. Marina Leban & Thyra Uth Thomsen & Sylvia Wallpach & Benjamin G. Voyer, 2021. "Constructing Personas: How High-Net-Worth Social Media Influencers Reconcile Ethicality and Living a Luxury Lifestyle," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 169(2), pages 225-239, March.
    20. Anicia Jaegler & Tobias Goessling, 2020. "Sustainability concerns in luxury supply chains: European brand strategies and French consumer expectations," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 29(6), pages 2715-2733, September.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ijrema:v:37:y:2020:i:4:p:821-836. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/international-journal-of-research-in-marketing/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.