Yingzi Xu

Purpose: This study applies the Affect Theory of Social Exchange (ATSE) to examine how symbolic service recovery strategies, specifically apologies and gratitude expressions, influence patient empathy, forgiveness, and trust. It addresses the challenge of rebuilding trust following healthcare service failures through emotionally grounded mechanisms. Design/methodology/approach: Five experimental studies (N = 1,221) were conducted to assess patients' emotional responses and behavioral intentions across varying levels of error severity, attribution, and history, as well as patient trait empathy. Findings: Gratitude expressions elicited stronger patient empathy than apologies in isolated, low-severity errors, particularly among individuals with high trait empathy. In contrast, apologies were more effective in high-severity, system-attributed failures, where explicit acknowledgment of responsibility was expected. Practical implications: The findings provide evidence-based guidance for tailoring recovery communications to the severity, attribution, and recurrence of errors, as well as to patients' empathy levels. Implementing these strategies can help healthcare organizations strengthen patient trust and promote more empathetic, relationship-centred care. Originality/value: This research extends ATSE to healthcare service recovery by demonstrating how affective mechanisms drive trust restoration. It positions gratitude as an effective yet underused recovery strategy, offering theoretical clarity and practical relevance in contexts where providers may be constrained in offering apologies due to legal or reputational concerns.

Purpose: This study examines how Mobile Augmented Reality (MAR) app features – virtual mirrors versus photo-based try-ons – influence consumers' perceived utilitarian and hedonic values, decision quality and regret (a form of post-purchase dissonance). It contributes to the growing literature on MAR by addressing the underexplored role of MAR in shaping regret and repurchase intention. Design/methodology/approach: Two field experiments were conducted using YouCam Makeup, a leading MAR app and AI selfie editor, with 460 participants randomly assigned to interact with either the virtual mirror or the photo-based try-on feature. After the interaction, participants completed an in-person survey. Data were analyzed using multivariate statistical techniques to test the relationships among app features, perceived value, decision quality, regret and intention to repurchase through the app. Findings: Results show that the virtual mirror feature provides greater utilitarian and hedonic value than photo-based try-ons, leading to higher decision quality and lower regret. However, the benefits are reduced by perceived intrusiveness, particularly among individuals with low privacy self-efficacy. While utilitarian value significantly enhances decision quality, hedonic value does not. Improved decision quality, in turn, reduces regret and increases the likelihood of repurchasing cosmetic products via the MAR app. Originality/value: This research fills a gap in the MAR literature by empirically examining regret in immersive shopping contexts. It offers theoretical insights into how MAR design features influence consumer decision-making and practical guidance for developers and retailers seeking to balance utility, enjoyment and privacy to optimize the online shopping experience.

Purpose: Healthcare service is a process that comprises a series of touchpoints underlying the key facets of service delivery, collectively shaping the users' (i.e. patients, hospital staff, and visitors) experiences. Departing from most sensory studies dedicated to understanding the retail environment and hedonic service, this study focuses on how sensory knowledge can contribute to understanding the sensory-based experiences of hospital users and their interactions with healthcare services at multiple touchpoints.Design/methodology/approach: This study employs a multi-method approach comprising two studies involving semi-structured interviews and a qualitative online survey of past patients.Findings: Drawing upon the user-centered theory, the authors (1) consulted healthcare experts on hospital service touchpoints and standards around medical protocol; (2) explored users' needs, experiences, expectations, and evaluations of healthcare services; and (3) identified the issues and challenges faced by healthcare service users at various service touchpoints. Based on these insights, the authors proposed sensory tactics across healthcare service touchpoints that promote the well-being of major hospital users.Research limitations/implications: The proposed sensory tactics require follow-up empirical evidence. Future research could adopt robust methodological designs on healthcare environmental interventions and progress with a transdisciplinary approach to advance this research area.Practical implications: The authors' experience-based framework forms the basis of a valuable toolkit for healthcare service management.Originality/value: This study advances services literature by integrating sense-based marketing knowledge with healthcare service research to understand the dynamic and interactive relationship between hospital users and the environment.

This longitudinal study among Registered Nurses has four purposes: (1) to investigate whether emotional, quantitative and physical demands, and family-work conflict have a negative impact on nurses’ perceived effort; (2) to investigate whether quality of leadership, developmental opportunities, and social support from supervisors and colleagues have a positive impact on meaning of work; (3) to investigate whether burnout from the combined impact of perceived effort and meaning of work mediates the relationship with occupational turnover intention; and (4) whether the relationships in our overall hypothesized framework are moderated by age (nurses categorized under 40 years versus ≥ 40 years old). In line with our expectations, emotional, quantitative, and physical demands, plus family-work conflict appeared to increase levels of perceived effort. Quality of leadership, developmental opportunities, and social support from supervisors and colleagues increased the meaning of work levels. In addition, increased perceived stress resulted in higher burnout levels, while increased meaning of work resulted in decreased burnout levels. Finally, higher burnout levels appeared to lead to a higher occupational turnover intention. Obviously, a nursing workforce that is in good physical and psychological condition is only conceivable when health care managers protect the employability of their nursing staff, and when there is a dual responsibility for a sustainable workforce. Additionally, thorough attention for the character of job demands and job resources according to nurses’ age category is necessary in creating meaningful management interventions.

Purpose: This paper aims to investigate how location-based advertising (LBA) elicits in-store purchase intention. To deepen the understanding of LBA’s effect on consumers’ purchase decision, the research examines the role of consumers’ time consciousness in click intention in pull or opt-out LBA approaches. The study also explores how consumers react to LBA with an asymmetric dominance decoy versus a compromise decoy message.Design/methodology/approach: Two field experiments were conducted, and a total of 363 volunteers within 3 km of a shopping mall participated. The participants were asked to turn on their global positioning system and then informed that a convenience store was planning to launch a mobile coupon subscription service. Data collected were analysed using analysis of variance, regression analysis, bootstrapping and spotlight tests.Findings: The results demonstrate that consumers had a higher intention to click pull LBA than to click opt-out push LBA. Consumers with high time-consciousness had greater click intentions for pull LBA than for opt-out push LBA. Consumers with low time-consciousness, however, showed no difference in click intention for either LBA approach. Further, click intention mediates the effect of LBA on in-store purchase intention, and the asymmetric dominance decoy message is a more powerful strategy for LBA to increase the likelihood of in-store purchase.Originality/value: This research provides insight into location-based services marketing by revealing how time-consciousness and decoy promotional messages affect consumers’ reaction to LBA and in-store purchase intentions. The findings offer practical suggestions for retailers on how to reach and engage with consumers more effectively through the use of LBA.

Understanding interactions between sport fans helps sport marketers customize relationships with the fans and enhance brand loyalty. This paper analyzes the social exchanges that take place in an online sport community and identifies possible fan roles and their influences in the community. Based on a netnography approach, the study identifies 4 different types of role—Oracles, Hollywoods, Jokers, and Rookies—yielding a typology of sport fans that denotes their roles in the online community. This typology may serve as a useful foundation in which a more comprehensive classification of sport fans could be developed. The study contributes to sport communication literature by bringing together the concepts of identity, social exchange, and role theory relative to sport-fan behavior in an online social community. The research offers suggestions for sport organizations regarding leveraging the value cocreated among sport fans and the leadership that emerged in the online sport community to develop effective sp...

Purpose: This research aims to investigate how backstage visibility affects intangibility and perceived risk at the pre-purchase stage and how service credence moderates the effect of backstage visibility on intangibility and perceived risk. It also focuses on the effect of backstage visibility on perceived service quality and value at the post-purchase stage and the moderating role of the service contact level. Design/methodology/approach: This research tests the causal relationships between backstage visibility and customers’ service evaluations through two experimental studies. Findings: Study 1 shows that customers who are exposed to backstage cues perceive less pre-purchase risk in the service than those who are not exposed. Pictures plus text information are more effective than text illustrations alone for risk reduction. This risk reduction effect is stronger for high-credence than for low-credence services and is partially mediated by the perceived intangibility of the service. Study 2 reveals that customers with access to backstage cues perceive higher service quality and higher overall value from service experiences. The value increase is more significant for high-contact than for low-contact services. Research limitations/implications: Future research could apply different methods to different data sources to provide further insight about backstage visibility. Originality/value: The findings of this research suggest that allowing customers to view some backstage activities before purchase helps tangibilize the service, achieve more effective communication with customers and create more positive service experiences.

Purpose: This research investigates customer interactions in an online environment following a service failure, and explores the role of customer-to-customer (C2C) interactions in service recovery. Design/methodology/approach: We examine C2C interactions between airline travellers by analysing their detailed conversations posted on an independent complaint forum. We adopt thematic analysis to scrutinise online dialogue that narrates stories about service failures and how they are resolved with the help of other customers. Findings: Our analysis reveals that other customers act as helpers, educators, listeners and ironists in an online environment following a service failure. We identify information sharing, emotional release, social support, knowledge exchange and learning, and leadership in the online community as forms of C2C service recovery. Research limitations/implications: This study focuses on C2C service recovery in an online environment; C2C interactions in an offline environment after a service failure are not explored. Future research can apply different research methods to different data sources in order to discover further insights into C2C service recovery. Practical implications: C2C interactions in service recovery can lead to value creation that enhances customers’ overall satisfaction with their service experiences, and further re-shapes customers’ expectations of the service. Customers are an operant resource for service recovery; thus, service companies should facilitate customer-to-customer interactions that assist successful service recovery. Originality/value: This research explores the functions and potential impact of online C2C service recovery; that is, service recovery through online C2C interactions. It advances understanding of service recovery by bridging current thinking on customer-dominant logic and the role of C2C interactions.

Customers and employees can co-create a resolution following a service failure through integrating their resources. Their activities and interactions during resource-integration shape the customers' service recovery experiences. Prior research overlooks resource integration between all involved actors in a co-created service recovery process. This research details the process with two empirical studies. Study 1 is a qualitative analysis of narratives of service recovery experiences; Study 2 is a quantitative assessment of scenario-based survey data. The results show that a favourable service recovery experience is resulted from integrating all involved actors' resources in a mutually beneficial manner. Three key resources are financial compensation, service skills including communication and timing. Our findings indicate that co-created service recovery fails in the absence of just one resource or mismatches in their integration. The combined studies reveal that customers use their justice perceptions to assess activities and interactions for resource integration in service recovery.