Perceived justice, emotions, and behavioral intentions in the Taiwanese food and beverage industry

Purpose The research framework of this study is based on tri-component attitude model (cognition-affect-conation) which explores consumers’ positive or negative emotions, as well as various types of thoughts and actions, triggered by their perceived justice in the context of service failure. This study aims to probe the possible mediating and moderating effects caused by the process where consumers form their thoughts and actions. Design/methodology/approach This study conducts a survey to consumers after restaurant dining. This study collects data from 262 respondents and analyzes the data with the structural equation modeling. Findings The results indicate that perceived justice has significant effect on empathy, anger, positive word-of-mouth, repurchase intention and revenge. Empathy has a significant and positive effect on positive word-of-mouth. Anger has significant and positive effects on revenge and avoidance. Empathy is a mediator between perceived justice and positive word-of-mouth. Blame attribution and service failure severity are the moderators in the relationship between perceived justice and empathy/anger. Research limitations/implications Consumers might have experienced the scenarios described in the questionnaire and their responses might be based on recall of their previous dining experiences in other restaurants, thereby resulting in a time lapse problem and affecting the conclusions of this study. Practical implications It is not adequate to gain consumers’ choices just demonstrate favorable customer perceived justice and empathy in today’s industrial highly competitiveness because blame attribution and perception of service failure severity result in different positive and negative emotions and behavioral intentions. Therefore, food and beverage industry must have a various recovery approaches to recover service failure and create a more appealing relationship with consumers. Originality/value This study investigates the relationships among perceived justice, emotions and behavioral intentions which are seldom discussed in the past studies. In addition, this study investigates the mediating effect of empathy in the relationship between perceived justice and positive word-of-mouth. The results of this study indicate that blame attribution and service failure severity are the moderators between perceived justice and emotions (empathy/anger). The mediator of empathy and the moderators of blame attribution and service failure severity can enhance the research gap in the context of service recovery for the tri-component attitude model.