IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/jbuset/v158y2019i3d10.1007_s10551-017-3696-y.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

How Does Brand Age Influence Consumer Attitudes Toward a Firm’s Unethical Behavior?

Author

Listed:
  • Chi Zhang

    (University of Indianapolis)

  • Saim Kashmiri

    (The University of Mississippi)

  • Melissa Cinelli

    (The University of Mississippi)

Abstract

This paper identifies brand age as an important factor in consumers’ brand evaluations following unethical firm behavior. In two experiments, we assess the effect of brand age on three types of brand evaluations: perceived quality, brand credibility, and behavioral intentions following a brand crisis. The findings suggest that disclosing an older brand’s age can not only improve consumers’ brand evaluations in general, but can also provide a buffering effect when the firm is involved in unethical behavior. Moreover, the relationship between brand age and consumers’ post-crisis intentions is mediated by perceived brand credibility. By exploring consumers’ attitudes following the most common firm response strategies, this research also identifies a boundary condition of the mitigating effect of brand age. Several significant implications for practitioners are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Chi Zhang & Saim Kashmiri & Melissa Cinelli, 2019. "How Does Brand Age Influence Consumer Attitudes Toward a Firm’s Unethical Behavior?," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 158(3), pages 699-711, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:jbuset:v:158:y:2019:i:3:d:10.1007_s10551-017-3696-y
    DOI: 10.1007/s10551-017-3696-y
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10551-017-3696-y
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10551-017-3696-y?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. Saim Kashmiri & Cameron Duncan Nicol & Liwu Hsu, 2017. "Birds of a feather: intra-industry spillover of the Target customer data breach and the shielding role of IT, marketing, and CSR," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 45(2), pages 208-228, March.
    2. Scott Vitell & Encarnación Ramos & Ceri Nishihara, 2010. "The Role of Ethics and Social Responsibility in Organizational Success: A Spanish Perspective," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 91(4), pages 467-483, February.
    3. Martin Reimann & Raquel Castaño & Judith Zaichkowsky & Antoine Bechara, 2012. "Novel versus familiar brands: An analysis of neurophysiology, response latency, and choice," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 23(3), pages 745-759, September.
    4. Dutta, Sujay & Pullig, Chris, 2011. "Effectiveness of corporate responses to brand crises: The role of crisis type and response strategies," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 64(12), pages 1281-1287.
    5. Michael Maloni & Michael Brown, 2006. "Corporate Social Responsibility in the Supply Chain: An Application in the Food Industry," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 68(1), pages 35-52, September.
    6. Carol J. Simon & Mary W. Sullivan, 1993. "The Measurement and Determinants of Brand Equity: A Financial Approach," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 12(1), pages 28-52.
    7. Laufer, Daniel & Coombs, W. Timothy, 2006. "How should a company respond to a product harm crisis? The role of corporate reputation and consumer-based cues," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 49(5), pages 379-385.
    8. Kashmiri, Saim & Brower, Jacob, 2016. "Oops! I did it again: Effect of corporate governance and top management team characteristics on the likelihood of product-harm crises," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 69(2), pages 621-630.
    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. Baumert, Thomas & de Obesso, María de las Mercedes, 2021. "Brand antiquity and value perception: Are customers willing to pay higher prices for older brands?," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 241-254.
    2. Valor, Carmen & Antonetti, Paolo & Zasuwa, Grzegorz, 2022. "Corporate social irresponsibility and consumer punishment: A systematic review and research agenda," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 144(C), pages 1218-1233.
    3. Neureiter, Michael & Bhattacharya, C.B., 2021. "Why do boycotts sometimes increase sales? Consumer activism in the age of political polarization," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 64(5), pages 611-620.
    4. Ali Besharat & Kimberly A. Whitler & Saim Kashmiri, 2024. "When CEO Pay Becomes a Brand Problem," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 190(4), pages 941-973, April.

    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. Ali Besharat & Kimberly A. Whitler & Saim Kashmiri, 2024. "When CEO Pay Becomes a Brand Problem," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 190(4), pages 941-973, April.
    2. Li, Huashan & Bapuji, Hari & Talluri, Srinivas & Singh, Prakash J., 2022. "A Cross-disciplinary review of product recall research: A stakeholder-stage framework," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 163(C).
    3. Valeria L M A Freundt & Luiza Venzke Bortoli Foschiera, 2024. "The Impact of Voluntary Recall on the Trust of Loyal and First-Time Consumers in a High Awareness Brand After a Functional Transgression," Corporate Reputation Review, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 27(3), pages 172-184, August.
    4. Ganganee C. Samaraweera & Chongguang Li & Ping Qing, 2014. "Mitigating Product Harm Crises and Making Markets Sustainable: How does National Culture Matter?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 6(5), pages 1-16, May.
    5. Topaloglu, Omer & Gokalp, Omer N., 2018. "How brand concept affects consumer response to product recalls: A longitudinal study in the U.S. auto industry," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 88(C), pages 245-254.
    6. Ramah Al Balawi & Yuheng Hu & Liangfei Qiu, 2023. "Brand Crisis and Customer Relationship Management on Social Media: Evidence from a Natural Experiment from the Airline Industry," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 34(2), pages 442-462, June.
    7. Michael S Lin & Yeasun K Chung, 2019. "Understanding the impacts of corporate social responsibility and brand attributes on brand equity in the restaurant industry," Tourism Economics, , vol. 25(4), pages 639-658, June.
    8. Zhihui Sun & Dejun Wu & Min Zhang, 2021. "Better late than never? Corporate social responsibility engagement after product-harm crises," Asia Pacific Journal of Management, Springer, vol. 38(4), pages 1209-1259, December.
    9. Amélie Guèvremont & Bianca Grohmann, 2018. "Does brand authenticity alleviate the effect of brand scandals?," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 25(4), pages 322-336, July.
    10. Hsu, Liwu & Lawrence, Benjamin, 2016. "The role of social media and brand equity during a product recall crisis: A shareholder value perspective," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 59-77.
    11. Kimberly A. Whitler & Ali Besharat & Saim Kashmiri, 2021. "Exogenous brand crises: brand infection and contamination," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 32(1), pages 129-133, March.
    12. Dong Lu & Yide Liu & Hongfeng Zhang & Ivan K. W. Lai, 2016. "The Ethical Judgment and Moral Reaction to the Product-Harm Crisis: Theoretical Model and Empirical Research," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(7), pages 1-17, July.
    13. Almoatazbillah S. Hassan, 2020. "Evaluating the Marketing Communication Strategy of Volkswagen in Post-Crisis Period: Application of Image Repair Theory," International Journal of Marketing Studies, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 11(2), pages 1-87, March.
    14. Fang, Xiang & Wang, Xiaoyu & Shao, Yingying & Banerjee, Pramit, 2024. "Examining the effect of a firm’s product recall on financial values of its competitors," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 176(C).
    15. Muralidharan, Etayankara & Hora, Manpreet & Bapuji, Hari, 2022. "Hazard severity and time to recall: Evidence from the toy industry," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 954-963.
    16. Venkatesh Shankar & Pablo Azar & Matthew Fuller, 2008. "—: A Multicategory Brand Equity Model and Its Application at Allstate," Marketing Science, INFORMS, vol. 27(4), pages 567-584, 07-08.
    17. Yibei Pu & Norzaidahwati Zaidin & Yaodong Zhu, 2023. "How Do E-Brand Experience and In-Store Experience Influence the Brand Loyalty of Novel Coffee Brands in China? Exploring the Roles of Customer Satisfaction and Self–Brand Congruity," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(2), pages 1-17, January.
    18. Stephen Chen, 2009. "Corporate Responsibilities in Internet-Enabled Social Networks," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 90(4), pages 523-536, December.
    19. Carlson, Laura A. & Bitsch, Vera, 2018. "Social sustainability in the ready-made-garment sector in Bangladesh: an institutional approach to supply chains," International Food and Agribusiness Management Review, International Food and Agribusiness Management Association, vol. 21(2), March.
    20. Blanco Callejo, M, 2007. "LA VENTA DE LA ILUSIÓN Y “LA BRUJA DE ORO”: EL EMBRUJO DE UN CÍRCULO VIRTUOSOi /," Investigaciones Europeas de Dirección y Economía de la Empresa (IEDEE), Academia Europea de Dirección y Economía de la Empresa (AEDEM), vol. 13(3), pages 33-56.

    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:kap:jbuset:v:158:y:2019:i:3:d:10.1007_s10551-017-3696-y. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.