Document Type

Article

Publication Date

5-2022

Publication Title

International Journal of Hospitality Management

First page number:

1

Last page number:

36

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic makes restaurants implement new safety rules. However, because of consumers’ and employees’ resistance, employees may break these rules to improve the service experience. This paper examines how employees’ prosocial safety-rule-breakings (PSRB) affect consumer satisfaction. We propose that PSRB has two competing effects on consumers’ (including both requesters and bystanders) satisfaction via the mediating roles of service performance and perceived safety. We tested our proposed model in two experiments, adopting a 2 (Consumer role: Requesters vs. Bystanders) × 2 (PSRB level: Low vs. High) between-subject experimental design. Our findings suggest that PSRB has a strong negative relationship with bystanders’ service performance rating. PSRB harms both requesters’ and bystanders’ perceived safety. PSRB reduces consumer satisfaction, and the relationship is stronger for bystanders (vs. requesters). This study demonstrates the importance for hospitality organizations to ensure safety rule compliance during and after the pandemic.

Keywords

COVID-19; Prosocial rule-breaking; Service performance; Consumer satisfaction; Perceived safety

Disciplines

Business Analytics | Food and Beverage Management | Hospitality Administration and Management

File Format

pdf

File Size

483 KB

Language

English

Rights

IN COPYRIGHT. For more information about this rights statement, please visit http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

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Available for download on Thursday, May 01, 2025


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