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JOBXXX10.1177/2329488419898222International Journal of Business CommunicationMa

Article
International Journal of
Business Communication
How the Interplay 1­–21
© The Author(s) 2020
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Identification and Crises DOI: 10.1177/2329488419898222
https://doi.org/10.1177/2329488419898222
journals.sagepub.com/home/job
Influences the Effectiveness
of Corporate Response
Strategies

Liang Ma1

Abstract
Consumer-brand identification (CBI) establishes when consumers use the defining
attributes of a brand to define themselves. This study examines whether and how
CBI influences the effectiveness of corporate response strategies suggested by the
situational crisis communication theory in preventable crises and whether this influence
is moderated by a threat to the self-defining attributes shared between consumers and
a brand. A total of 868 consumers of two brands took part in an online experiment.
CBI increases the effectiveness of corporate response strategies at mitigating negative
consumer reactions. Response strategies are even more effective when a crisis does
not threaten the shared defining attributes. Additionally, compensation is the strategy
that really reduces consumers’ negative reactions, instead of apology strategy. More
theoretical and practical implications were discussed.

Keywords
corporate crisis communication, consumer-brand identification, shared defining
attributes, corporate response strategies, consumers’ reactions to a crisis

Crises are critical events that interrupt the normal business of an organization or even
threatens its survival (Fearn-Banks, 2001). For example, Chipotle’s profits in the

1Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, TX, USA

Corresponding Author:
Liang Ma, Department of Strategic Communication, Bob Schieffer College of Communication, Texas
Christian University, TCU Box 298065, Fort Worth, TX 76129, USA.
Email: liang.ma@tcu.edu
2 International Journal of Business Communication 00(0)

second quarter of 2016 were down by 82% from the summer of 2015 after its E. coli
food poisoning scandal (Wattles, 2016). Organizations need to respond to crises prop-
erly to regain the trust and support of their publics. Consequently, the effectiveness of
organizational response strategies is an important topic in crisis communication
research (e.g., Brown & White, 2011; Coombs, 2007, 2014; Coombs & Holladay,
2002; Dean, 2004; Grappi & Romani, 2015). Some research has examined how orga-
nization-public relationships (OPRs; Brown & White, 2011; Coombs, 2007, 2014; H.
Park & Reber, 2011) influence the effectiveness of crisis response strategies at mitigat-
ing publics’ negative reactions. Little is known about how other relational concepts
influence this effectiveness.
Consumers are a vital group of publics. Consumers often equate a company (a
brand’s manufacturer) with the brand (Aggarwal, 2004). Consumer-brand identifica-
tion (CBI; Kressmann et al., 2006; Lam, Ahearne, Hu, & Schillewaert, 2010) estab-
lishes when consumers think themselves and the brand have the same defining
attributes. The defining attributes of a brand are the “distinctive, central, and endur-
ing” (Dutton, Dukerich, & Harquail, 1994, p. 239) attributes that the consumers per-
ceive the brand possesses. CBI is an important relational concept, as it is a closer type
of relationship that consumers establish with companies compared with OPRs, which
are parasocial (Coombs & Holladay, 2015). Several recent studies (Einwiller & Johar,
2013; Hong & Yang, 2009; Hong, Yang, & Rim, 2010) have shown that CBI affects
company-consumer communication.
This study examines whether and how CBI affects the effectiveness of corporate
response strategies at mitigating consumers’ negative reactions to crises, including
consumers’ brand attitudes, certain discrete emotions, and behavioral intentions.
Specifically, this study examines whether CBI has buffering effects or love-becomes-
hate effects (Grégoire & Fisher, 2006, 2008; i.e., making corporate response strategies
more or less effective). Additionally, it examines whether such effects function differ-
ently depending on whether a crisis threatens the self-defining attributes shared
between the consumers and a brand.
By examining how CBI, crises, and their interaction influence the effectiveness of
corporate response strategies, this study contributes to corporate crisis communication
research and public relations in multiple ways. First, the current literature has well
examined how parasocial OPRs affect crisis communication. This study advances the
relationship research in crisis communication by focusing on CBI, a close relationship.
Second, this study contributes to emotion research in crisis communication by exam-
ining disappointment as an outcome. Emotion research in crisis communication has
overwhelmingly focused on anger and sympathy (e.g., Coombs & Holladay, 2005;
Grappi & Romani, 2015; Jin, 2014), but stakeholders may feel other discrete emotions
in crises, such as disappointment. Although consumers with high-quality brand rela-
tionships express a lower amount of negative emotions in service failures, including
disappointment, it is unknown how closer relationships such as CBI affect the change
of consumers’ disappointment in a context of crisis. Disappointment influences con-
sumer behaviors (Xie & Heung, 2012; Zeelenberg & Pieters, 2004). Information on
how CBI affects disappointment will help explain consumer behaviors. Third, this
Ma 3

study compares the effectiveness of different accommodative response strategies in

the situational crisis communication theory (SCCT; Coombs, 2014), including apol-
ogy and compensation, as well as reminder which is a supplementary strategy. Crisis
communication research has unfairly compared apology and compensation with less
accommodative strategies such as denial and excuse (Coombs & Holladay, 2008). The
comparison of the equally accommodative strategies is more meaningful because such
a comparison “can help crisis managers make choices when they face particular cri-
ses” (Coombs & Holladay, 2008, p. 252). Additionally, this study helps business com-
municators better communicate with consumers who identify with the brands in the
context of crisis.

Consumer-Brand Identification
The concept of identification is rooted in the social identity theory (Ashforth & Mael,
1989). Identification is defined as “the perception of oneness with or belongingness”
(Ashforth & Mael, 1989, p. 21) to a social group, such as an organization or a consumer
group. In the consumer-brand context, a consumer identifies with a brand when the con-
sumer’s “self-concept has many of the same characteristics he or she believes define” the
brand (Dutton et al., 1994, p. 239). These attributes or characteristics are “the essence of
the brand . . . most closely associated with the brand’s meaning and success” (Greyser,
2009, p. 592). The shared defining attributes are the foundation of CBI (Dutton et al.,
1994). For example, Harley-Davidson’s consumers embrace “safe rebellion,” which is
the essence or the defining attribute of this brand (Baskin, 2013, para. 2). Consumers
identify with a brand that represents the self-concept that they want to acquire or maintain
(Einwiller, Fedorikhin, Johnson, & Kamins, 2006; Johnson, Matear, & Thomson, 2011).
With CBI, a brand represents who I am for a consumer (Johnson et al., 2011) and
helps build his or her self-concept in multiple ways (Hollenbeck & Kaikati, 2012; Fennis,
Pruyn, & Maasland, 2005; J. K. Park & John, 2010). People perceive themselves more
positively after using products of a brand with an appealing personality for a short period
of time (Fennis et al., 2005; J. K. Park & John, 2010). College students frequently use
brand-related information in their social media posts to manage their image (Hollenbeck
& Kaikati, 2012). CBI also benefits brands by increasing consumers’ intentions of posi-
tive word-of-mouth about the company (Hong & Yang, 2009), intentions to engage in
dialogues with it (Hong et al., 2010), and consumer loyalty (Kressmann et al., 2006).

Crises and CBI

The crisis that elicits the most negative reactions from publics is a preventable crisis
(Coombs, 2007; Coombs & Holladay, 2002) when an organization is fully aware that
its actions are inappropriate, threaten stakeholder well-being, but it still takes these
actions. Preventable crises include organizational misdeeds, human-error accidents,
and human-error product harm (Coombs, 2007). This study examined preventable cri-
ses because they are the most challenging crises for organizations to recover from
(Coombs, 2007).
4 International Journal of Business Communication 00(0)

A crisis may or may not directly threaten the defining attributes shared between
consumers and a brand (hereafter referred to as shared attributes), depending on
whether the attribute is the center of the crisis (Greyser, 2009). When a crisis directly
threatens the defining attributes, the brand’s “marketplace position and its brand mean-
ing are seriously challenged” (Greyser, 2009, p. 592). Such a crisis is harder to recover
from for a brand (Greyser, 2009). For example, suppose that consumers identify with
a luxury brand because the luxuriousness (i.e., the defining attribute) represents the
consumers’ economic status. The shared attribute is directly threatened when the brand
makes its products with cheap materials. By contrast, the shared attribute is not directly
threatened when the brand pollutes the environment.

Corporate Response Strategies

Crisis response strategies are an organization’s words and actions to protect its reputa-
tion in a crisis (Coombs, 2007). Response strategies research originated from corpo-
rate apologia (Coombs, Frandsen, Holladay, & Johansen, 2010), which is “a
communicative effort to defend the corporation against reputation/character attacks,”
(Coombs et al., 2010, p. 338) so as to “repair and restore the image, credibility, and
legitimacy” of the corporation (Arendt, LaFleche, & Limperopulos, 2017, p. 517).
Ware and Linkugel (1973) identified four strategies (i.e., denial, bolstering, differen-
tiation, and transcendence) under apologia, and more strategies have been identified in
theories such as image repair theory and SCCT (Coombs et al., 2010). Corporate apo-
logia research is rhetorical and sender oriented (Coombs et al., 2010; B. K. Lee, 2005),
whereas SCCT is more receiver-oriented and uses experiments to examine how pub-
lics react to a crisis and crisis response strategies (Coombs et al., 2010). SCCT recom-
mends organizations use rebuild strategies for preventable-type crises (Coombs, 2007,
2014) and supplementary bolstering strategies if they have positive precrisis OPRs.

Rebuild Strategies.  Rebuild strategies include apology (the organization takes responsi-
bility and offers a full apology to its publics) and compensation (the organization
offers material compensation to those affected by the crisis). Rebuild strategies are
most effective at protecting organizational reputation and reducing public opposition
to organizations during preventable crises (Brown & White, 2011; Dean, 2004; Grappi
& Romani, 2015; Lyon & Cameron, 2004; Ma & Zhan, 2016; H. Park & Reber, 2011),
as SCCT predicts. Publics perceive a company that apologizes as more likable and
prosocial than a company defending itself, and they are also more likely to purchase
and recommend the apologetic company’s products (Lyon & Cameron, 2004). Confes-
sion results in less anger and more sympathy felt by consumers than denial, excuses,
or no comment (Grappi & Romani, 2015). Compensation tells stakeholders that the
organization is willing to solve the problem (Bentley, 2017).

Bolstering Strategies.  Bolstering strategies rely on the reservoir of public goodwill that
an organization builds prior to a crisis (Coombs, 2007). Bolstering strategies include
reminder (the organization reminds its publics about its past good deeds), ingratiation
Ma 5

(the organization thanks its publics for their support during the crisis), and victimiza-
tion/victimage (the organization portrays itself as a victim of the crisis). Bolstering
strategies should only be supplemental because they focus on the organizations and
using them alone “seem rather egocentric” (Coombs, 2014, p. 149). The empirical
evidence for this proposition, however, is inconclusive. Ki and Brown (2013) found
that when used alone, a reminder has no effect on college students’ attribution of
responsibility to their university or on OPRs during a financial crisis. On the contrary,
Brown and White (2011) found that a reminder, when used independently, reduces the
responsibility attributed to the organization more than an apology during a university’s
financial crisis. The current study is set to further test this SCCT proposition in a cor-
porate setting. Additionally, limited research has examined whether a combination of
bolstering and rebuild strategies is more effective than rebuild strategies alone. This
study will partially fill this research gap.

Consumers’ Reactions to Crises

Consumers can have attitudinal, emotional, and behavioral reactions to brands
involved in crises. Two consumer behaviors have a huge impact on a brand: Consumers’
purchases directly affect the brand’s profits, and consumers’ negative word-of-mouth
(NWOM) communication can influence others’ perceptions of the brand. Attitudes
and certain discrete emotions lead to the intentions of these two behaviors. Consumer
attitudes toward a brand refer to how much consumers evaluate the brand positively or
negatively (Grappi & Romani, 2015). Consumers’ brand attitudes predict their loyalty
and support for the brand (Lyon & Cameron, 2004; McDonald, Sparks, & Glendon,
2010).
The integrated crisis mapping (ICM) model (Jin, Pang, & Cameron, 2007, 2012)
predicts publics’ emotions in crises. According to ICM, publics feel different levels of
anger, fright, anxiety, and sadness in different crises, depending on publics’ coping
strategies and the level of organizational engagement. The action tendency of anger is
attacking the organization: anger has been found to increase consumers’ NWOM
intentions and decrease purchase intentions (Coombs & Holladay, 2007; McDonald
et al., 2010). Fright, anxiety, and sadness typically lead to escape from the situation
(Jin et al., 2012): these discrete emotions may lead consumers not to think about how
to punish the organization and therefore not lead to consumers’ NWOM.
On the other hand, sympathy and disappointment are two discrete emotions that are
found to have consequences for brands but are not included in the ICM model.
Sympathy is defined as “the heightened awareness of the suffering of another person
as something to be alleviated” (Wispé, 1986, p. 318). People felt disappointed at an
agent when she or he held the agent responsible for an undesirable situation and
thought that the agent did something the agent should not have done. People felt that
the situation revealed the true nature of the agent and felt abandoned by the agent (Van
Dijk & Zeelenberg, 2002). Disappointment has been found in the service literature to
affect consumers’ NWOM and purchase intentions in a similar way as anger does (Xie
& Heung, 2012; Zeelenberg & Pieters, 2004), while sympathy works the opposite way
6 International Journal of Business Communication 00(0)

(Grappi & Romani, 2015). In this study, the effectiveness of response strategies is
gauged by the change in consumers’ attitudes, anger, sympathy, disappointment, and
behavioral intentions.
Researchers are interested in how different factors affect the effectiveness of corpo-
rate crisis communication, such as OPRs and a brand’s precrisis reputation (e.g., Dean,
2004; Lyon & Cameron, 2004, H. Park & Reber, 2011), the voice of crisis response
(Jahng & Hong, 2017) and threat type and duration (Jin & Cameron, 2007). This study
adds to this part of the literature by examining how a direct threat to the shared attri-
bute, CBI, and their interaction affect the effectiveness of corporate response strate-
gies. Consumers feel betrayed when a brand consciously compromises its defining
attributes (Ma, 2018) and they are less forgiving (Grégoire & Fisher, 2008; Ma, 2018).
Additionally, a sense of betrayal may reduce trust which is the foundation of effective
corporate communication. Consequently, response strategies may be less effective at
changing consumers’ attitudes, anger, disappointment, sympathy, and behavioral
intentions when the shared attribute is the center of a crisis. Hypothesis 1 is proposed
as follows:

Hypothesis 1: When a crisis directly threatens the shared defining attribute, corpo-
rate response strategies are less effective at changing consumers’ (a) attitudes, (b)
emotions, and (c) behavioral intentions.

Compared with OPRs, CBI symbolizes a deeper and more powerful psychological
connection (Coombs & Holladay, 2015). Public relations literature conceptualizes
OPR as a four-dimensional concept including trust, commitment, satisfaction, and
control mutuality (Hon & Grunig, 1999). Neither a positive OPR (H. Park & Reber,
2011) nor positive precrisis reputation (Dean, 2004; Lyon & Cameron, 2004) makes
organizational response strategies more effective at changing public attitudes. The
impact of CBI on response strategies is unknown. Strong CBI indicates a large over-
lapping area of consumers’ self-concept and the brand’s image (Lam et al., 2010).
Consequently, consumers with strong CBI may engage in motivational reasoning and
forgive the brand, so that they can keep their own self-concept intact. Affective iden-
tification mitigates the effect of a car product-recall crisis on purchase intention (Lin,
Chen, Chiu, & Lee, 2011). Fans who strongly identified with Ray Rice, the NFL
player, also experienced less negative moral emotions and tended to disengage them-
selves from his domestic violence transgression so that they can continue supporting
him (J. S. Lee, Kwak, & Braunstein-Minkove, 2016). Strong CBI may motivate con-
sumers to accept the corporate side of the story and make the response strategies more
effective. Hypothesis 2 is proposed as follows:

Hypothesis 2: CBI increases the effectiveness of corporate response strategies at

changing consumers’ (a) attitudes, (b) emotions, and (c) behavioral intentions.

The impact of CBI on the effectiveness of corporate response strategies may be

moderated by a direct threat to the shared attributes. When the shared attribute is
Ma 7

directly threatened, consumers with strong CBI may feel more betrayed because the
brand undermines the foundation of the CBI. The sense of betrayal may reduce the
effectiveness of response strategies. On the contrary, when the shared attribute is not
directly threatened, the overlapping area of consumers’ self-concept and the brand
image remains intact. Consequently, consumers with strong CBI may be motivated to
accept the corporate account of the crisis. Hypothesis 3 examined this possible interac-
tion of CBI and a threat to the shared attributes:

Hypothesis 3: The impact of CBI on the effectiveness of corporate response strate-

gies at changing consumers’ (a) attitudes, (b) emotions, and (c) behavioral inten-
tions is more obvious when a crisis does not directly threaten the shared defining
attribute.

Scholars concluded that apology and compensation are more effective than the less
accommodative strategies (Brown & White, 2011; Dean, 2004; Grappi & Romani,
2015; Lyon & Cameron, 2004; H. Park & Reber, 2011). However, few studies (Coombs
& Holladay, 2008) have compared the effectiveness of apology and compensation at
mitigating consumers’ negative reactions in a preventable crisis. Coombs and Holladay
(2008) found that apology, compensation, and sympathy do not differ in recovering
reputation and reducing anger and NWOM intention. To compare the effectiveness of
equally accommodative strategies and to examine whether a combination of bolstering
and rebuild strategies is more effective than rebuild strategies alone, the following
research question is proposed:

Research Question: Which response strategy (or a combination of response strate-

gies) is most effective at changing consumers’ (a) attitudes, (b) emotions, and (c)
behavioral intentions?

Method
Pilot Study
A pilot study was conducted to select two real brands with which consumers estab-
lished CBI based on clearly shared attributes. Thirty-six participants were recruited
on the Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) platform, including 18 males and 18
females. First, the concept of CBI was explained in plain language. Then, the par-
ticipants answered whether they were consumers of a particular brand. If they
answered yes, the survey asked how much they identified with the brand on a 1
(not at all) to 11 (very much) scale. If a participant’s rating was higher than the
midpoint of 6, the survey further asked what the self-defining attributes the par-
ticipants shared with the brand. The brands used on the questionnaire were from
Corebrand’s list (Taube, 2014) of the 10 most respected brands in America.
Participants also listed the brands with which they had strong CBI but not on the
list and the shared attributes.
8 International Journal of Business Communication 00(0)

Whole Foods Market and Apple were selected for the main study. Both brands are
American-based international brands. Apple sells its products all over the world, and
Whole Foods has stores in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom (Whole
Foods, n.d.). The self-defining attribute that consumers shared with Whole Foods was
embracing of a healthy lifestyle. The shared attribute for Apple was innovativeness.
Such a clear and unified shared attribute would make the manipulation of a direct
threat to the attribute in crises more straightforward in the main study. If consumers
identify with a brand for different attributes, the crisis stimuli would have to threaten
all these attributes for the manipulation to work with most participants. Such a compli-
cated scenario may be confusing and weaken the direct threat to each attribute. For
other brands either from Corebrand’s list or named by the participants, most consum-
ers either did not identify with them or identified with them for different attributes.

Procedures
Data were collected in a 2 (brand type: Whole Foods vs. Apple) × 2 (crisis type:
directly threatening vs. not directly threatening the shared attribute) × 8 (corporate
response strategy: apology × compensation × reminder1) between-subject online
experiment. Participants were recruited from Amazon MTurk participant pool. To be
eligible to participate in the study, participants needed to (a) have purchased and used
for some time one or multiple products from Apple, or (b) have shopped at Whole
Foods stores multiple times. As a screening process, participants were asked what
Apple products that they had consumed or their frequency of shopping at Whole
Foods. The experiment automatically terminated if a participant was not a consumer
of either brand.
After CBI measurement, participants were randomly assigned to one of the two
crisis conditions of one brand, depending on whether a participant was a Whole Foods
or Apple consumer. After reading about a crisis, participants rated scales regarding
their attitudes, discrete emotions, and behavioral intentions. Then, participants were
randomly assigned to one condition of corporate response strategies, and their atti-
tudes, emotions, and behavioral intentions were measured again after they read the
response. The scale items were randomized to eliminate ordering effects. Participants’
demographic information was also collected.
Crisis type (directly threatening vs. not directly threatening the shared attribute)
was manipulated in the context of a news story. Fictional crises based on real events
were written, and a public relations professional reviewed the crisis stimuli and agreed
that they resembled news stories. For Whole Foods, the crisis that directly threatens
the shared attribute was a selling-nonorganic-and-unhealthy-food scenario. The crisis
that did not directly threaten the attribute was an anti-unionization scenario. For Apple,
the crisis directly threatening innovativeness was a technology-stealing scenario, and
the crisis not directly threatening innovativeness was a tax-avoidance scenario. The
corporate responses were written based on real corporate responses to crises. For apol-
ogy condition, the brand apologized for what it did and promised to avoid similar
mistakes in the future. For the compensation condition, the brand paid in full for the
Ma 9

damage it cost. For the reminder condition, the brand reminded its consumers of its
leadership in its industry and its contribution to society. Please refer to the appendix
for an example of the apology-compensation strategy. The participants were debriefed
that what they had read was fictional before they exited the study, and they were
instructed to refer to credible news outlets and the companies for accurate information
about the brands.

Participants
A total of 868 participants provided useable questionnaires, of which 395 were Whole
Foods consumers and 473 were Apple consumers. Thirty-seven percent of the partici-
pants (n = 325) were males, and 56% of the participants were females (n = 488). A
majority of the participants were Euro American (n = 563, 64.9%), followed by Asian
American (n = 68, 7.8%), African American (n = 57, 6.6%), Hispanic-American (n =
39, 4.5%), and other (n = 86, 10%). The mean age of the participants was 35.83
(range = 18-79). The annual income data were as follows: less than $10,000 (n = 59,
7.00%), $10,000-$49,999 (n = 398, 45.85%), $50,000-$99,999 (n = 250, 28.80%),
$100,000-$150,000 (n = 59, 7.00%), more than $150,000 (n = 19, 2.19%). A small
percentage of participants skipped certain demographic questions.

Manipulation Check
The unhealthy-food crisis (M = 7.39, SD = 3.01) posed a much higher perceived
threat to Whole Foods’ image of a healthy grocery store than the anti-unionization
crisis (M = 4.43, SD = 3.20), t(391) = −9.49, p < .001, one tailed. The technology-
stealing crisis (M = 6.87, SD = 3.03) posed a much higher perceived threat to Apple’s
innovative image than the tax-avoidance crisis (M = 4.56, SD = 3.32), t(469) =
−7.91, p < .001, one tailed. The crisis manipulation of both brands was effective.2
Participants rated whether the crises were realistic and believable toward the end of
the study. The average scores of these items for each crisis were above 7 on an 11-point
scale, indicating each crisis was perceived as realistic and believable.

Measures
All variables were measured on 11-point scales. Nine items adapted from the self-
brand connection scale (Escalas & Bettman, 2003) measured the CBI, including state-
ments such as “I use Whole Foods to communicate who I am to other people.” Four
items measured brand attitudes (Grappi & Romani, 2015), and an example item was
dislike/like. Four items measured anger (Dillard & Shen, 2005; Jin, 2010), three items
measured sympathy (Grappi & Romani, 2015; Jin, 2010), and three items measured
disappointment (Yi & Baumgartner, 2004; Zeelenberg & Pieters, 2004). An example
item was how angry/sympathetic/disappointed the participant felt at the brand. A five-
item scale measured NWOM intention (Coombs & Holladay, 2007; Grappi & Romani,
2015), including statements such as “I intend to mention unfavorable things about
10 International Journal of Business Communication 00(0)

Table 1.  The Effects of Direct Threat, Brand Types, Their Interaction, and Response
Strategies on Consumers’ Reactions.

Direct threat Brand types Interaction Response strategies

  F η2 F F η2 F η2
Attitudes 2.20 (.139) 0.21 (.645) 2.95 (.087) 6.76* .06
Anger 0.82 (.367) 0.20 (.654) 4.01 (.045) .005 7.79* .06
Sympathy 4.42 (.036) .005 0.01 (.905) 0.76 (.383) 4.55* .04
Disappointment 0.40 (.529) 0.19 (.660) 2.90 (.089) 6.25* .05
NWOM intention 1.67 (.197) 1.05 (.307) 1.69 (.194) 6.05* .05
Purchase intention 4.82 (.028) .006 0.27 (.601) 0.38 (.537) 5.80* .05

Note. NWOM = negative word-of-mouth. p Value was reported in the parentheses. η2 was reported if
the predictor was statistically significant at .05 level.
*p < .001.

Table 2.  The Effects of CBI and Interaction Between CBI and Direct Threat on Attitudes
and Sympathy.

CBI Interaction

  Β 95% CI Β 95% CI
Attitudes 0.53 (.013) [0.11, 0.94] −0.25 (.058) [−0.51, 0.01]
Sympathy 0.71 (.005) [0.21, 1.20] −0.34 (.034) [−0.65, −0.03]

Note. CBI = Consumer-brand identification; CI = confidence interval. p Value was reported in the
parentheses. The dependent variables for which neither the CBI nor the interaction was significant were
not reported in the table. Unstandardized regression coefficients were reported following suggestions of
Kelley and Maxwell (2010).

Whole Foods to my friends, relatives, and other people.” A three-item scale measured
purchase intention (Currás-Pérez, Bigné-Alcañiz, & Alvarado-Herrera, 2009). A sam-
ple item was “I will definitely continue to buy a product of Whole Foods.” All the
scales were reliable, with Cronbach’s alpha ranging from .81 to .98.

Results
The change scores of attitudes, emotions, and behavioral intentions prior to and after
participants’ reading the strategy indicated the effectiveness of corporate response
strategies. The statistical significance of analyses was judged at the .05 level. The
statistical results of Hypothesis 1 and Research Question are summarized in Table 1,
and the results of Hypothesis 2 and Hypothesis 3 are in Table 2.
Hypothesis 1 proposes that corporate response strategies are less effective when a
crisis directly threatens shared attributes. A two-way analysis of variance (ANOVA)
was conducted to examine the main effect of the direct threat to the shared attribute
Ma 11

(hereafter referred to as the direct threat), the main effect of the brand types (i.e.,
whether the effectiveness of strategies differs across two brands), and the interaction
effect (i.e., whether the effect of the direct threat differs across two brands). For the
effectiveness of response strategies on attitudes, none of the predictors was significant
at .05 level. Hypothesis 1a was not supported.
For the effectiveness of response strategies on anger, although neither main effect
was statistically significant, the interaction effect was significant. Corporate response
strategies were more effective at mitigating anger, t(363) = −1.91, p = .029, in the
anti-unionization crisis than in the unhealthy-food crisis for the Whole Foods consum-
ers. The direct threat did not influence the effectiveness of response strategies at miti-
gating anger, t(454) = 0.84, p = .200, for the Apple consumers. The direct threat had
a statistically significant effect on the effectiveness of response strategies at changing
sympathy. Corporate response strategies were less effective at generating sympathy
when a crisis directly threatens the shared attribute (M = 0.50, SD = 1.76 vs. M =
0.26, SD = 1.66). The main effect of the brand types was not statistically significant,
neither was the interaction. The direct threat had no effect on how response strategies
mitigate disappointment. The main effect of the brand types and the interaction were
also not significant. Hypothesis 1b was partially supported.
For the effectiveness of response strategies on mitigating NWOM intention, none
of the predictors was statistically significant. The direct threat had a statistically sig-
nificant effect on the effectiveness of response strategies at changing purchase inten-
tion. The main effect of the brand types was not statistically significant, nor was the
interaction. Corporate response strategies were less effective at recovering purchase
intention when a crisis directly threatens the shared attribute (M = 0.35, SD = 1.46 vs.
M = 0.15, SD = 1.29). Hypothesis 1c was partially supported.
Hypothesis 2 proposes that CBI increases the effectiveness of the corporate
response strategies, and Hypothesis 3 proposes that the impact of the CBI is moderated
by the direct threat. A multiple regression analysis was performed, in which the inde-
pendent variables included CBI, the direct threat, the brand types, and all the two-way
and three-way interaction terms of these variables. The brand type was coded as 1 =
Whole Foods and 2 = Apple. The direct threat was coded as 1 = Whole Foods’ anti-
unionization crisis/Apple’s tax-avoidance crisis and 2 = Whole Foods’ unhealthy-
food crisis/Apple’s technology-stealing crisis.
The regression coefficient from the CBI (M = 6.51, SD = 2.57) to the attitude
change was statistically significant. Positive attitude increased by 0.53 units with
every one unit increase of the CBI, controlling for the effects of all the other variables
and the interactions. Hypothesis 2a was supported. The interaction between the CBI
and the direct threat was very close to being significant. Hypothesis 3a was marginally
supported. The model explained 2.9% variance of the attitude change.
None of the coefficients was statistically significant when anger or disappointment
was regressed. CBI had no impact on the effectiveness of response strategies regarding
mitigating anger or disappointment, regardless of whether the crisis directly threatens
the shared attribute. Strong CBI made response strategies more effective at increasing
sympathy. Sympathy increased more by 0.71 units with every one unit increase of the
12 International Journal of Business Communication 00(0)

CBI, holding all the other variables and the interactions constant. The interaction
between the CBI and the direct threat was also significant, indicating that the buffering
effect of the CBI was weaker when the crisis directly threatens the shared attribute.
Additionally, the interaction between the CBI and the brand types was also significant
(β = −0.32, p = .032, 95% confidence interval [CI: −0.62, −0.03]). The buffering
effect of the CBI was stronger among Whole Foods consumers than among Apple
consumers. The model explained 3.2% variance of the sympathy change. Hypothesis
2b and Hypothesis 3b were partially supported.
The coefficient of the CBI on the change score of NWOM intention or purchase
intention was not statistically significant; neither was the coefficient of the interaction
between the CBI and the direct threat on NWOM intention or purchase intention. CBI
had no impact on the effectiveness of response strategies regarding mitigating the
NWOM intention or recovering the purchase intention, regardless of whether the crisis
directly threatens the shared attribute.
The research question seeks to determine which response strategy is most effective
at mitigating consumers’ negative reactions regardless of the direct threat. A two-way
ANOVA (independent variables: response strategies and brand types) was performed
to examine whether the effect of the corporate strategy was statistically significant and
whether the change of consumers’ reactions varied across two brands. If the main
effect of the response strategies was statistically significant, then the Tukey-Kramer
pair-wise multiple comparison procedure was used to examine which groups were
statistically different from each other. The main effect of the brand types and the inter-
action between the brand types and the response strategies were not significant in any
of those two-way ANOVA tests.
The effect of response strategies was statistically significant on the change of all
outcome variables. For the attitude change, the apology-compensation-reminder com-
bination had the highest change score (M = 0.89, SD = 1.79), and this combination
was statistically more effective than no-comment (M = −0.32, SD = 1.26; p < .001),
apology-only (M = 0.25, SD = 1.35; p = .021), and reminder-only (M = 0.12, SD =
1.19; p = .002). For the anger change, the apology-compensation-reminder combina-
tion (M = −1.63, SD = 2.63) was statistically more effective than the no-comment (M
= 0.08, SD = 1.15; p < .001), the apology-only (M = −0.34, SD = 1.53; p < .001),
the reminder-only (M = −0.27, SD = 1.44; p < .001), and the apology-reminder com-
bination (M = −0.65, SD = 1.66; p = .009). The apology-compensation-reminder was
also marginally significant than the compensation-reminder (M = −0.80, SD = 2.20; p
= .057). For the sympathy change, the apology-compensation-reminder combination
(M = 0.87, SD = 2.20) was statistically more effective than the no-comment (M =
−0.30, SD = 1.12; p < .001) and reminder-only (M = −0.003, SD = 1.46; p = .007).
For disappointment change, the apology-compensation-reminder combination (M =
−1.48, SD = 2.17) was statistically more effective than the no-comment (M = 0.05, SD
= 1.53; p < .001), apology-only (M = −0.53, SD = 1.84; p = .010), and the reminder-
only (M = −0.46, SD = 1.63; p = .006). For the NWOM intention change, the com-
pensation-reminder combination had the highest change score (M = −0.63, SD = 1.47).
It was statistically more effective than the no-comment (M = 0.30, SD = 1.16;
Ma 13

p < .001) and was marginally more effective than the reminder-only (M = −0.11, SD
= 1.13; p = .052). For the purchase intention change, the apology-compensation-
reminder combination (M = 0.66, SD = 1.51) was statistically more effective than the
no-comment (M = −0.40, SD = 1.47; p < .001), the reminder-only (M = 0.02, SD =
1.17; p = .018), and apology-reminder (M = 0.06, SD = 1.14; p = .031).

Discussion
Corporate response strategies are more effective at changing consumers’ discrete emo-
tions such as anger and sympathy as well as recovering purchase intention when a
crisis does not directly threaten the shared defining attributes. How the direct threat
affects the effectiveness of response strategies on changing certain emotions, such as
anger, may also depend on the brand types. After hearing the corporate responses,
consumers strongly identifying with a brand perceive it more positively and feel more
sympathetic than consumers weakly identifying with the brand. Additionally, the
increased effectiveness of response strategies because of CBI is more obvious when
the crisis does not directly threaten the shared attributes. In general, apology-compen-
sation-reminder is more effective than no-comment, apology-only, and reminder-only.
Compensation, not a verbal apology, maybe is the strategy that really mitigates con-
sumers’ negative reactions.
Consumers feel betrayed when a brand voluntarily undermines its defining attri-
butes shared with its consumers (Ma, 2018). Consequently, they are less forgiving,
less sympathetic, and less likely to buy the brand’s products in the future. The direct
threat to the shared attributes affects the effectiveness of response strategies on miti-
gating consumers’ anger only for Whole Foods but not for Apple. Whole Foods con-
sumers may feel the brand undermines the consumers’ attachment to the brand by
selling unhealthy food, while Apple consumers may normalize technology steal into a
business competition and perceive it as less unethical. In addition, consumers’ per-
ceived involvement influences their emotional reactions to a crisis (Choi & Lin, 2009).
Whole Foods consumers may feel involved in the unhealthy-food crisis and get angry
even when they were not personally affected. On the contrary, Apple consumers may
not feel much involved in Apple’s industrial competition.
CBI increases the effectiveness of response strategies at increasing positive atti-
tudes and sympathy. Strong CBI indicates a large overlapping area of consumers’ self-
concept and the brand’s image. It is difficult for consumers with strong CBI to sever
their ties with the brand, and they need a positive perception and sympathy to preserve
the ties. The buffering effects of CBI are more obvious when the crisis does not directly
threaten the shared attributes. After all, the shared attribute is the foundation of CBI
(Dutton et al., 1994). The crisis may erode the impacts of CBI when the crisis threatens
CBI’s foundation.
The buffering effects of CBI on consumers’ sympathy increase are also more obvi-
ous for Whole Foods than for Apple. Whole Foods consumers may feel more moti-
vated to accept corporate responses due to the brand’s close connection to their daily
14 International Journal of Business Communication 00(0)

life. Consumers only have direct contact with Apple when they buy tech products or
need customer services. Additionally, some Whole Foods consumers may also identify
with the brand because the connection symbolizes their social economic status. Such
symbolization motivates them even more to accept the corporate responses.
In general, apology-compensation-reminder is more effective than no-comment
and reminder-only at mitigating consumers’ negative reactions. Not surprisingly, no-
comment is the least effective strategy. Corporations should not be stonewalling when
consumers expect them to account for what has happened. Similarly, it is counterpro-
ductive to not mention anything about the crisis and only remind the consumers of the
corporation’s past good deeds. The reminder-only strategy may cause the consumers’
psychological reactance, because they “may view it as an attempt to distract from the
crisis” (Coombs, 2014, p. 148) and evade responsibility.
In general, the apology-compensation-reminder strategy is no more effective than
compensation-only, apology-compensation, or compensation-reminder. When publics
attribute a moderate amount of responsibility to an organization, apology, compensa-
tion, and sympathy are equally effective at changing reputational evaluation, anger,
and NWOM intentions (Coombs & Holladay, 2008). The findings from the current
study showed that when a corporation is fully responsible for the crisis, the strategy
that really mitigates consumers’ negative reactions is compensation, not the verbal
apology.
In its crisis responses, a corporation can remind its consumers about their identifi-
cation with the brand because CBI makes response strategies more effective. A new
strategy that strengthens the CBI needs to be integrated into the theory and practices
of crisis communication. For example, a luxury brand can remind its consumers that
the brand has well represented their social economic status in the past. A brand can
also promise its consumers that it will protect the shared defining attributes in the
future. With such a promise, the brand could ask its consumers to continue supporting
the brand through a difficult time and give it a second chance. This new strategy can
be named identification-intensifier. It can be categorized as a substrategy of SCCT-
suggested reminder strategy. In other words, identification-intensifier is a bolstering
strategy to supplement the primary strategies.
This study examined how CBI, the direct threat to self-defining attributes shared
between consumers and a brand, and their interaction influence the effectiveness of
corporate response strategies at changing consumers’ cognitive, emotional, and behav-
ioral reactions. It also examined which strategy or strategy combination is most effec-
tive. By answering those questions, this study contributes to the theory-building and
practices of corporate crisis communication and public relations.

Theoretical Implications
Although previous research shows that OPRs do not influence the effectiveness of
response strategies very much, this study reveals that close psychological connections
(i.e., CBI) can affect how response strategies change consumers’ negative reactions.
The relationship research in crisis communication should pay more attention to
Ma 15

organization-public identification. Not only can consumers identify with a brand or an

organization, other groups of publics, such as employees and investors, may have an
even stronger attachment to the brand or the organization. Second, the corporate
response strategies are less effective when a crisis threatens the defining attributes
shared between a brand and its consumers. SCCT (Coombs, 2007, 2014) suggests
corporations choose response strategies primarily according to the publics’ attribution
of responsibility. Corporations should also consider how much the crises threaten the
essence of their brands (Greyser, 2009) and respond accordingly. Additionally, the
dominant typology of crises is based on the attribution of responsibility (Coombs,
2007). How much the crises threaten the defining attributes of brands or organizations,
including companies and nonprofits, offers another criterion to categorize crises.
Finally, this study enriches our understanding and operationalization of response strat-
egies by adding the identification-intensifier. The nuanced distinction between
reminder of identification and reminder of past good deeds will crystallize the effects
of different reminder substrategies.

Practical Implications
This study provides several important guidelines for corporate crisis communication
practices. First, brands that have strong and distinct defining attributes should cau-
tiously protect the primary attributes that their consumers share with them because
jeopardizing such attributes will cause major crises that are more challenging to
recover from. If the brands ever undermine such attributes, they should use an identi-
fication-intensifier as a bolstering strategy to supplement other strategies. Second,
compensation is the strategy that really reduces consumers’ negative reactions. A cor-
poration that fears a verbal apology could hold it legally accountable can mitigate
consumers’ negative reactions with compensation only. Combining these two sugges-
tions on the selection of response strategies, the compensation-identification-intensi-
fier combination may be effective. However, an ethical corporation should apologize
verbally and take responsibility if it causes the crisis so that the victims can get the
peace of mind. For example, Chipotle apologized to the consumers affected by the E.
coli food poisoning (Peterson, 2015). Additionally, when loyal consumers raise a con-
cern and a brand does not address it timely, the brand will need to sincerely apologize
to the consumers. Compensation without apologizing may insult the loyal consumers,
as shown in Lululemon’s product recall (Creelman, 2015). Finally, this study helps
corporate communicators better understand consumers’ perspectives. Communicators
can use the findings to help management “see potential decisions through the lenses”
of consumers’ value systems and goals (Bowen, 2009, p. 428) so that management can
make ethical decisions that fulfill the consumers’ needs and protect their well-being.

Limitations and Directions for Future Research

This study had several limitations. First, the study examined two brands whose products
are relatively expensive, which means that their consumer base is relatively affluent
16 International Journal of Business Communication 00(0)

compared with that of other brands in their industry. The examined relations among
concepts may present a different pattern with the consumer base of less expensive
brands. Second, the use of multiple brands enhanced the external validity of the study,
but it also required different crisis stimuli between the two brands to make the stimuli
realistic and effective. The use of different crisis scenarios may have caused some of the
different results between the brands. Third, the participants were recruited from an online
panel (i.e., Amazon MTurk), and they took the study in an environment they chose.
Although several attention checkers were used throughout the experiment to make sure
that the participants paid good attention to the study, some participants may have been
distracted while taking the study. Moreover, the study used fictitious crises. Although the
crisis stimuli were based on real crises, real crises can be not as clear-cut as the stimuli.
Consequently, consumers’ reactions to real crises may be more complicated than what
the study shows. Additionally, the outcome constructs included behavioral intentions
instead of actual behaviors. Behavioral intentions may not perfectly predict the actual
behaviors, and the actual NWOM and purchase behaviors would be more convincing.
For future research, scholars can examine how CBI, the direct threat to the shared
attributes, and their interaction affect crisis communication of other brands that are less
expensive. Moreover, social media has changed the landscape of crisis communication.
Future research can examine how these concepts affect consumers’ reactions to crises on
social media, such as leaving comments on a brand’s account. Additionally, it would be
beneficial to examine how these concepts connect in real crises by using survey method.

Appendix
Fictional Whole Foods’ Apology and Compensation Message
We apologize to our customers for selling nonorganic and nonnatural food in our
stores. We are reviewing our policy to avoid similar events happening again. We will
refund customers for the full price of any products that are nonorganic and nonnatural
that they purchased in the past 2 weeks. Please consult our website for a list of prod-
ucts that qualify.

Acknowledgments
This research is an important part of the author’s dissertation. The author thanks her advisor, Dr.
Elizabeth L. Toth, and all her committee members, Drs. Edward Fink, Nicholas Joyce, Brooke
Fisher Liu, Erich Sommerfeldt, and Laura Stapleton, for their helpful feedback.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship,
and/or publication of this article.

Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this
article.
Ma 17

ORCID iD
Liang Ma https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2668-571X

Notes
1. For bolstering strategies, this study only examined the reminder. Victimization and ingra-
tiation are not applicable when a preventable crisis just happens. Portraying a brand as a
victim of a crisis may not apply to a preventable crisis for which the brand is responsible. It
also seems illogical to thank publics for their support when the crisis just happens, because
it takes time for publics to show their support for a brand.
2. According to O’Keefe (2003), the manipulation check on the brand response strategies was
unnecessary: “when message variations are defined in terms of intrinsic features, message
manipulation checks . . . are unnecessary” (p. 251).

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Author Biography
Liang Ma is an assistant professor at the Department of Strategic Communication, Bob
Schieffer College of Communication, Texas Christian University, Fort Worth.