The direct and indirect effects of anger and its cognitive appraisals in public relations incidents

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the predictive power of anger and its associated appraisal dimensions of consumer responses to two different public relations incidents. Design/methodology/approach A natural quasi-experiment was conducted within a month after the public relations incidents. Participants randomly viewed one of the two videos relating to the incidents. Path analysis was used to examine the direct and indirect effects of anger, acceptability appraisal, motivational incongruence appraisal, relevance appraisal and other accountability appraisal on consumers’ intention to harm the brand and future purchase intention. Findings Appraisals of acceptability, motivational incongruence and relevance, but not other accountability, have both direct and indirect effects on anger and its motivational tendency. Acceptability appraisal directly increases consumers’ intention to harm, whereas relevance appraisal directly increases their intention to harm and reduces future purchase intention. The degree to which these appraisal structure and anger occur account for the level of negative consumer responses toward the two public relations incidents. Practical implications The current findings empirically replicate the diverse consumer responses toward two public relations incidents and use anger and its appraisal structure to account for the negative responses. This provides researchers and practitioners a framework to explain and manage consumers’ reaction toward different public relations incidents. Originality/value The current findings not only support the motivational role of anger and its accompanying appraisals in public relations incidents, but also demonstrate their predictive power in the given contexts.

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