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Things We Do, Costs We Yet Don’t Know: Social Sharing as a Catalyst of Service Sabotage

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 September 2025

Erica Xu ,
Kan Ouyang Open the ORCID record for Kan Ouyang [Opens in a new window] ,
Xu Huang ,
Jason D. Shaw  and
Long W. Lam
Erica Xu
Affiliation:
Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong
Kan Ouyang*
Affiliation:
Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, China
Xu Huang
Affiliation:
Hong Kong Baptist University, Hong Kong
Jason D. Shaw
Affiliation:
Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
Long W. Lam
Affiliation:
University of Macau, Macao
*
Corresponding author: Kan Ouyang; Email: ouyangkan@mail.shufe.edu.cn
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Abstract

Building on recent advancements in moral disengagement theory and shared reality theory, we propose that employees do not need to directly experience frequent customer mistreatment to trigger their moral disengagement. Specifically, when employees frequently share their mistreatment experiences with coworkers, even infrequent instances of customer mistreatment can evoke heightened levels of moral disengagement. Conversely, when social sharing occurs less frequently, infrequent instances of customer mistreatment are associated with lower levels of moral disengagement, while more frequent customer mistreatment is linked to higher levels of moral disengagement, which then positively relates to service sabotage, indicating a positive indirect effect of the frequency of customer mistreatment on service sabotage through moral disengagement. Results from two independent time-lagged studies involving samples of call center employees (Sample 1 of Study 1), casino cage cashiers (Sample 2 of Study 1), and service representatives (Study 2) recruited from an online research platform, lend support to our propositions.

摘要

摘要

本文基于道德推脱理论和共同现实理论的最新进展, 提出员工不需要频繁经历顾客欺凌行为来触发其道德推脱。具体而言, 当员工频繁与同事分享其遭受的顾客欺凌经历时, 即使这些欺凌事件只是偶然发生, 也会让员工产生高水平的道德推脱。相反, 如果员工之间不太分享这些经历,那么只有在顾客欺凌行为频率较高时, 员工才会发生道德推脱, 并增加其不好好服务客户的行为。我们做了两项独立的时间滞后研究, 研究样本包括客服中心员工(研究1 的样本1), 赌场收银员(研究1 的样本2) ,以及通过在线研究平台招募的服务代表(研究2)。两项 研究的结果都支持了我们的假设。

Keywords

customer mistreatmentmoral disengagementservice sabotageshared reality theorysocial sharing顾客欺凌行为道德推脱服务破坏行为社会分享分享现实理论

Information

Type
Article
Information
Management and Organization Review , Volume 21 , Issue 5 , October 2025 , pp. 889 - 914
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2025. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of International Association for Chinese Management Research.

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Footnotes

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The article has been updated since original publication. A notice detailing the change has also been published.

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