Preconsumption Mood, Causal Explanations, and Postrecovery Reactions

Abstract

Using two competing affect appraisal models (affect priming and affect-as-information) as frameworks, we examined the joint effect of preconsumption mood and explanations/excuses on customer's postpurchase satisfaction and loyalty. Two factorial experiments were conducted to test the hypotheses. By manipulating the preconsumption mood and the type of service failure information provided after service failure (explanation in Study 1 and excuse in Study 2), the mechanism through which preconsumption mood impacts customer evaluations in the restaurant context was investigated. The findings lend support to the affect priming model, indicating that preconsumption mood can directly impact consumer satisfaction and loyalty in a mood-congruent fashion. To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first to utilize explanations and excuses to test two competing theories, affect priming and affect-as-information. These results contribute to the hospitality literature by shedding light on mechanism through which preconsumption mood influences customers' postfailure evaluations.