Purpose This study aims to examine the emotional experiences and behaviors of patients during the Levothyrox crisis in France, highlighting the role of online communities in communication, mutual support and emotional regulation. It also analyses the attribution of responsibility for the crisis and the resulting behavioral intentions, taking into account the dynamics of social networks and interactions with healthcare professionals. Design/methodology/approach A netnographic approach was used to analyze 2,006 comments posted in Facebook communities dedicated to Levothyrox. Qualitative content analysis, performed using Sphinx iQ2 software, focused on the profiles of netnographers, their motivations, the emotions expressed, the attribution of responsibility and the behavioral intentions reported. Findings The posts were motivated by a need for information, emotional support, and validation of personal experiences. Patients expressed both positive emotions (gratitude, hope, joy) and negative emotions (anger, anxiety, sadness, hatred, disappointment), reflecting both community support and a loss of trust in the laboratory, health authorities, and healthcare professionals. The attribution of responsibility mainly targeted Merck and the health authorities. Emotions were associated with behavioral intentions such as information sharing, community mobilization, boycotts, complaints and medical vigilance. Practical implications The findings provide actionable guidance for pharmaceutical companies and healthcare professionals to improve crisis communication, rebuild institutional trust, and enhance patient engagement in digital health environments. Originality/value This study extends crisis communication theory by showing how co-constructed online emotions drive collective mobilization and protest, while challenging the dichotomy between positive and negative emotions.
Purpose In the digital era, effective crisis communication has become a cornerstone of organizational resilience, as social media and other digital platforms increasingly shape public perception during crises. This study provides an integrative literature review of academic research on crisis communication in digital environments from 2015 to 2025. Design/methodology/approach The study examines 78 articles from five journals in the Scopus database with the highest CiteScores in the fields of media studies, communication and public relations. This review employs a qualitative content analysis using MAXQDA 24 to code theoretical frameworks, methodological approaches, crisis contexts, platform affordances, crisis actors and public response strategies across communication journals. To provide a systematic overview of patterns in the literature, the coded data were subsequently quantified using frequency and percentage analyses, combining qualitative coding with quantitative reporting. Findings This systematic review demonstrates that research on crisis communication in digital contexts remains predominantly grounded in Situational Crisis Communication Theory, while an emerging trend toward innovative, platform-sensitive models is evident, particularly within journals devoted to new media, reflecting the adaptation of classical frameworks to complex digital environments. From a methodological perspective, quantitative approaches predominate, yet qualitative and mixed-method designs provide critical insights into platform affordances and public response dynamics. Within the contextual domain, corporate and reputational crises occupy central focus, with information vetting and transparency crucial under high uncertainty, whereas misinformation is most salient in political crises. Regarding platform-specific dynamics, social media – and notably Twitter/X – mediates engagement, sentiment and collective coping, while information provision consistently constitutes the dominant strategy across actors. Collectively, these findings underscore the interdependent role of theoretical frameworks, crisis contexts and platform affordances in shaping digital crisis communication. Originality/value Overall, the study moves beyond descriptive mapping by framing crisis communication as a socio-technical system in which theories, crisis contexts and platform affordances are mutually constitutive, shaping both communication effectiveness and perceived legitimacy in digital environments.
Purpose The purpose of this study was to assess the state of ethics training in US communication firms. Design/methodology/approach An online survey was conducted with 257 US employees working for communication firms to assess the effectiveness of their ethics training programs and emerging needs. Findings Agency employees are receiving ethics training, and employees gave their agencies a “B” letter grade for quality. However, the training is not typically provided on an annual basis or as part of new employee orientation. Even more concerning, about a third of agency employees indicated they are not reporting ethics concerns or have faced retaliation. The results also indicate that young professionals may be overconfident regarding their preparedness to provide ethics counsel. These findings suggest agency employees’ positive evaluation of their ethics training program appears to be overly optimistic. Practical implications Ethics training programs can enhance moral efficacy or confidence in their skills, resulting in the necessary moral courage to raise ethical concerns when they arise. Training programs should incorporate case studies and decision trees, which can help prepare employees regarding how to respond when they do face an ethical issue. Other recommendations include providing employees with information about resources such as hotlines for reporting issues, a code of ethics and a list of agency contacts who should be informed when an issue emerges. Originality/value Based on the perspectives of self-efficacy, moral courage and behavioral ethics, the study provides insights regarding agency employees’ preferences for ethics training and identifies industry weaknesses
Purpose The purpose of this article is (1) to present the findings of a systematic literature review of scholarship on corporate media interviews, (2) to compare the study of corporate media interviews across disciplines and (3) to identify gaps and future opportunities for corporate communications research. Design/methodology/approach The systematic literature review identified articles on corporate media interviews, published from 2000 to 2024 in 50 leading Corporate Communication/Public Relations, Journalism, Management/Organization and Critical Discourse Analysis journals, and scholarly books on media interviews published in that time frame. The review included a quantitative content analysis and qualitative thematic synthesis of the journal articles. Findings The systematic literature review found corporate media interview studies to be few and far between. Corporate media interview research was found in just 33 articles (in 19 journals) published between 2000 and 2024. Corporate media interviews were barely mentioned in the scholarly books on media interviews. A comparison of the corporate communications research with that from other disciplines highlights directions in which corporate communications research might expand, such as corporate media interview typology, interviewee demographics, interaction between interviewer and interviewee, short-term event studies using external data and the analysis of more actual interviews (to supplement the studies using simulated interviews). Originality/value This article is the first systematic literature review, to the author's knowledge, of scholarly studies of corporate media interviews, a ubiquitous but understudied form of external corporate communications.
Purpose The aim of this article is to develop new and deeper insights into coworker voicing in digital meetings by examining coworkers' experiences and perceptions as well as digital dynamics, this research provides a deeper, contextual understanding of the communicative dynamics in digital organizational settings. From this aim, we have formulated the following research questions: “How is coworker voicing shaped in digital meetings?” and “How do they experience voicing in this context?” Design/methodology/approach This study employed a qualitative research approach grounded in social constructionist epistemology. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with coworkers from a single case organization to explore experiences within a shared context. The organization, a leading international company with over 200,000 employees worldwide, was selected as the case. Purposive sampling ensured the inclusion of participants relevant to the research focus. Ethical considerations included obtaining informed consent and safeguarding the confidentiality of both participants and the organization. Findings Our analysis shows that digital and hybrid meetings reshape not only how coworkers express their voice but also who speaks and to what extent. Platform affordances, such as camera functions regulating visibility and structured turn-taking via hand-raising tools, act simultaneously as enablers and barriers to participation. Furthermore, perceived psychological safety varies considerably in digital settings, influenced by practical constraints like larger group sizes. Originality/value Most existing research adopts a quantitative, functionalist perspective, emphasizing how coworker voice contributes to organizational efficiency and outcomes. In contrast, this qualitative study provides a nuanced, context-sensitive understanding of communication dynamics in digital environments, specifically examining who speaks up, how, when and under what conditions.
Purpose This study examines how prior corporate associations and crisis response strategies jointly shape consumer reactions in crisis contexts. Specifically, it investigates the role of response novelty in explaining when a crisis response becomes effective, particularly when the response highlights an alternative, favorable dimension of the brand. Design/methodology/approach Two experiments were conducted, each simulating a distinct crisis scenario. Study 1 examined a product-harm (competence-related) crisis by comparing CA versus hybrid associations, whereas Study 2 examined a morality-harm (CSR-related) crisis by comparing CSR versus hybrid associations. Across both studies, the effects of crisis response strategy on consumers' responses were examined through the mediating role of response novelty. Findings The findings identify response novelty as a key mechanism in crisis communication effectiveness. Consumers holding single-dimensional associations perceived greater novelty when the company adopted a response strategy that emphasized an alternative, favorable dimension of the brand, whereas those holding hybrid associations perceived less novelty under the same conditions. In addition, response novelty mediated the effects of prior associations and crisis response strategy on post-crisis consumer evaluations. Overall, hybrid associations provided greater resilience during crises, whereas single-dimensional associations were more sensitive to novelty-based response effects. Research limitations/implications This study is limited by its use of experimental scenarios involving a fictitious company and by its focus on two crisis contexts and two response domains, CA and CSR. Future research should examine whether the proposed novelty-based mechanism extends to other crisis response messages, crisis characteristics and longer-term post-crisis outcomes. The findings suggest that effective crisis communication depends not only on message content, but also on the dimensional structure of prior brand associations and the novelty generated by the response. Originality/value This study advances crisis communication research in three ways. First, it extends Expectancy Violations Theory by showing that post-crisis communication can do more than repair violated expectations; it can redirect consumer evaluations through response novelty. Second, it reconceptualizes prior corporate associations not only in terms of their content (CA vs. CSR), but also in terms of their dimensional structure (single-dimensional vs. hybrid). Third, it qualifies the dominant congruence-based view of crisis communication by showing that, under certain conditions, strategic mismatch between prior associations and response strategy can be beneficial when it introduces novel, favorable information.
Purpose Social media platforms, such as Twitter, offer companies the opportunity to interact with their stakeholders, thereby explaining and legitimising their business activities and further developing their CSR practices. In reality, however, Twitter is often not used dialogically. While research on corporate stakeholder engagement online has provided several explanations for the absence of dialogue, the question arises as to what role commercial social media can play in engaging stakeholders in the context of CSR and how this role can be conceptualised. By adopting the perspective that “communication constitutes organisation”, this study seeks to answer this question and broaden the understanding of corporate stakeholder engagement on social media and legitimisation beyond the conceptual boundaries of “real” stakeholder dialogue. Design/methodology/approach We apply qualitative analysis to tweets from companies listed on the German stock index (DAX) and analyse conversations containing key hashtags used by climate activists. The underlying assumption is that companies using hashtags that are “charged” with certain meanings on Twitter respond to social expectations by creating stakeholder engagement images. We develop an analytical framework that is based on, firstly, the openness of companies to interact with their stakeholders, as demonstrated by the use of elements that favour dialogue, and secondly, the characterisation of post contents as distancing from the societal expectations or confirming the societal expectations. Findings We reconstruct four basic types of stakeholder engagement images: the “Aspiration”, “Appearance”, “Argumentation” and “Attack” images. The “Aspiration” image is mainly about what could be, which can have a performative and transformative effect even if aspirational talk is not fully translated into action. The “Appearance” image seems to be geared towards fixation and leaves little room for interaction, negotiation and change. The “Argumentation” image has the potential to challenge, influence and affect the boundaries of an organisation. The tweets under the “Attack” image contain one-sided conflicts that usually remain without interaction. Research limitations/implications Due to the qualitative nature of the present study and its limitation to a specific sample, the developed framework cannot be generalised to other contexts without further research. Another limitation is the rapidly changing context of social media research. In our case, this is exacerbated by the change of ownership of Twitter and its transformation into X. This further limits the collection of data for scientific purposes, making it unlikely that a similar, information-rich sample of tweets could be created at a later point in time. Practical implications The novel framework could be used by companies to assess their communication from a novel perspective. It might be interesting to review whether specific CSR topics influence the occurrence and frequency of certain images, if some images in general occur more often than others, and how images are distributed and developed over a longer period or related to certain occasions. Social implications In a rapidly changing environment, effective stakeholder communication is crucial, yet companies face greater challenges and risks. This study aims to identify ways to analyse and facilitate productive stakeholder communication in a digital society. Originality/value In this study, we empirically address the topics of stakeholder engagement and legitimisation in a digital society by offering an approach that recognises communication's constitutive role in engagement. Applying the novel framework we have developed and examining the performativity and impact of the reconstructed images – for instance, on the roles of dissent, struggle and aspiration – can provide a rich basis for further theoretical and practical insights into stakeholder engagement and legitimisation on social media.
Purpose This paper explores how public health authorities' vaccine communication strategies during the COVID-19 pandemic interacted with pre-existing levels of institutional trust, and how these trust levels shaped perceived opportunities and constraints for communicating trustworthiness in high- and low-trust national environments. Design/methodology/approach The study employs an exploratory qualitative comparative case study design, analysing vaccine communication strategies in Norway and Romania. These cases were selected due to their contrasting levels of public trust and vaccine uptake. The analysis draws primarily on semi-structured elite interviews with national-level public health communicators, complemented by selected communication artefacts and documentary sources. Findings The exploratory comparison suggests that Norway's high level of institutional trust enabled a communication strategy based on transparency and voluntary participation, contributing to high vaccine uptake. In contrast, Romania's low-trust context led authorities to rely on intensive expert visibility, depoliticised sources, narrative campaigns, community and role-model involvement, and constant engagement. Political instability, fragmented medical trust, and the politicisation of sources further constrained authorities' ability to build trustworthiness, contributing to lower vaccine uptake. Across both cases, pre-existing trust levels shaped which dimensions of trustworthiness were most salient and which communication strategies were seen as feasible or risky, rather than determining outcomes in a simple causal way. Research limitations/implications The study is limited to two country cases and seven elite interviews, which constrain generalizability. The analysis focuses on communicators' perspectives, not on public attitudes or behavioural outcomes, and does not seek to establish causal relationships between specific communication strategies and vaccination uptake. Instead, it uses interview accounts and contextual data to explore how public health authorities understood, articulated, and operationalised trustworthiness in different trust environments, thereby offering analytically rich insights and ideas for future cross-national and mixed methods research. Practical implications Public health authorities should design vaccine communication strategies that are sensitive to existing trust levels and maintain consistency over time. Strategies effective in high-trust contexts may be ineffective or counterproductive in low-trust settings. Originality/value The paper contributes to the literature by exploratively linking vaccine communication strategies to pre-existing societal trust levels and discussing how shifts in communication can exacerbate or mitigate trust deficits in public health crises.
Purpose Academic interest in metaverse marketing communication has grown rapidly in recent years. Despite this emerging focus, a comprehensive synthesis of the current state of knowledge remains limited. This study conducts a framework-based systematic review of 120 scholarly articles to map and integrate how communication processes unfold in immersive environments. Design/methodology/approach A framework-based systematic review of 120 articles was conducted, employing both the Antecedents–Decisions–Outcomes and Theories–Contexts–Methods frameworks. This dual approach enables a structured mapping of the literature and highlights interconnections across theoretical foundations, contextual applications, and methodological approaches. Findings The review reveals that existing research is heavily anchored in consumer-centric theories, concentrated in a narrow set of industries and geographic contexts, and dominated by quantitative survey-based methods. Building on the ADO–TCM synthesis, this study identifies key gaps and outlines directions for advancing marketing theory and practice in the metaverse. Originality/value Unlike prior theme-based reviews, this study provides an integrative synthesis that contributes a more coherent knowledge base and proposes a future research agenda.
Purpose This preregistered study investigated whether heritage storytelling becomes more effective as more of an organization's past is shared. We tested direct effects of increasing the amount of historic information on heritage, reputation, and legitimacy perceptions, as well as indirect effects mediated by credibility and psychological distance. Design/methodology/approach We conducted an experiment (N = 1,621) using quota sampling to approximate a representative sample. Participants randomly read between one to four heritage frames about one of two fictional companies, thereby exposing them to different amounts of historical information. The frames presented the when (founding time period), where (founding location), who (founder), and how (resilience over time) of the organization's past. Findings Results showed that increasing historic information through heritage framing positively impacted the organizations' perceived heritage and reputation, though effects on perceived legitimacy varied by frame type. Credibility increased with more historic information and positively influenced outcomes, but only with greater amounts of frames. Psychological distance also increased with more historic information, lowering outcomes, and this risk persisted regardless of frame count. The founder frame proved most effective, as it was the only frame that enhanced credibility without increasing psychological distance. Originality/value Previous research has mostly focused on heritage cues in logos or print advertisements such as founding years, leaving storytelling, despite its widespread use in organizational heritage communication, understudied. This study addresses this gap by examining heritage storytelling through a narrative-persuasion lens. By considering story length, the findings identify boundary conditions under which heritage storytelling is effective.
Purpose This study examines the role of local radio in crisis communication within Europe, focusing on Thessaloniki, Greece. It explores how local stations operate under pressure to provide accurate information, foster community engagement and maintain public trust amid crises such as disasters and environmental emergencies and how these practices align with European Union objectives of communication resilience and social cohesion.Design/methodology/approach The study employs a qualitative research design based on semi-structured interviews with ten journalists representing eight officially registered, news-oriented radio stations in Thessaloniki. Data were analysed through thematic analysis following Braun and Clarke's six-phase framework to identify recurring patterns, professional practices and institutional dynamics. Ethical standards of voluntary participation, confidentiality and informed consent were strictly observed.Findings Local radio remains a trusted and community-driven medium in times of crisis. Journalists display strong civic commitment but face challenges, including limited preparedness, lack of training and absence of psychosocial support. Their professional routines centre on the triad "ask-learn-verify", reflecting improvisational resilience rather than formal crisis planning. Radio functions as both informational and emotional infrastructure, absorbing citizens' anxiety and facilitating two-way communication. However, uneven digital skills, centralised information flows and ad hoc coordination constrain efficiency.Originality/value The study reframes local radio as a resilience infrastructure within Europe's crisis communication ecosystem. By highlighting its dialogic and psychosocial dimensions, it expands current crisis communication scholarship - largely focused on digital media - towards inclusive, community-based and trust-centred models. It contributes to theory and practice by proposing an initial, empirically grounded European model -emerging from the case of Thessaloniki, Greece-of resilient crisis communication rooted in pluralism, accessibility and democratic values.
Purpose This article aims to critically assess expert perceptions of the adoption of Brazilian companies regarding the verifiability aspect in sustainability reporting. Design/methodology/approach Thirteen subject matter experts provided evaluations of each of the 7 recommendations proposed by Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) standards, considering three distinct criteria: (1) managers' knowledge preparedness to implement each recommendation; (2) managers' actual capability to follow each recommendation and (3) the perceived importance of each recommendation for enabling society to demand increased corporate participation in sustainable development. The collected data were analyzed using the fuzzy Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) Class method. Findings The expert-based assessment indicated that all seven GRI-based verifiability recommendations fall within the “regular” category. While this result implies no critically unacceptable points, it nevertheless highlights concerns regarding the capacity of Brazilian companies to produce highly mature sustainability reports and to present information whose quality can be genuinely verified by society. Originality/value This research contributes uniquely by employing the fuzzy TOPSIS Class method to systematically evaluate critical points affecting verifiability in sustainability reporting, providing novel insights into the maturity level of Brazilian companies' sustainability disclosures.
Purpose This study proposes a conceptual framework that conceptualizes attitudes toward the #MeToo movement as comprising both cognitive and affective dimensions. Furthermore, it investigates how these attitudes, shaped by social media use, influence individuals' perceptions of the perceived benefits and potential costs associated with the movement within tourism and hospitality workplaces.Design/methodology/approach Employing a quantitative research design and Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM), data were collected via an anonymous online questionnaire completed by employees in the tourism and hospitality sector.Findings Findings reveal that social media use significantly enhances cognitive attitudes, fostering comprehension, awareness, and acceptance of the movement's aims, while it negatively impacts affective attitudes, often leading to emotional exhaustion and caution. Furthermore, cognitive attitudes emerge as significant predictors of perceived benefits, including empowerment, heightened awareness, and organizational reform, whereas affective attitudes are associated with perceived costs, such as fear, discomfort, and social polarization.Practical implications Tourism and hospitality organizations should acknowledge that exposure to #MeToo-related content on social media has the potential to shape both cognitive and affective attitudes within the workplace. The findings suggest that organizations should enhance employees' cognitive awareness through targeted training initiatives, clearly defined reporting procedures, and a visible commitment from human resource management. Simultaneously, attention should be given to employees' affective responses by promoting supportive leadership practices, establishing safe and open communication channels, and implementing structured protection mechanisms to ensure a secure and inclusive work environment.Originality/value This study contributes to the existing literature by differentiating between cognitive and affective attitudes toward the #MeToo movement and by examining their distinct influences on perceptions of the movement's benefits and costs within tourism and hospitality workplaces.
Purpose This study examines the communication tactics of a protest movement, with particular attention to marketing-related media channels and their role in shaping the public image of the movement. Design/methodology/approach This study employs an in-depth case study using digital ethnography to analyze communication tactics during Israel's “high-tech protest” against judicial reform. Focusing on paid, earned, shared and owned channels, it examines how information was distributed. Findings The content and narratives of the “high-tech protest” were distributed across multiple channels, including advertising, public relations, social media, online-digital platforms and offline activities, using a corporate-style marketing approach and a tech-driven branding motif. Originality/value This work proposes a framework for understanding how civic movements adopt an integrated marketing communication approach and leverage “tech” narratives to influence public opinion and reshape the communication of political protest.
Purpose As remote and hybrid work arrangements continue to shape contemporary organizations, understanding how communication functions within remote-based teams remains critical. This study examines how workplace communication in remote teams differs from in-person contexts, explores experiences of disconnection, and identifies opportunities for improving communication practices. Design/methodology/approach Guided by Media Richness Theory, the study employs an exploratory mixed-methods design. Data were collected through an anonymous online survey of remote workers (n = 29) that included both closed-ended items and open-ended questions. Quantitative data were analyzed descriptively, and qualitative responses were analyzed using inductive thematic analysis. Findings Results indicate that remote workers rely on a combination of traditional media, messaging applications, and video conferencing, with channel preferences shaped by task demands and relational context. Qualitative findings reveal that communication quality, particularly clarity, responsiveness, and leadership communication practices, plays a central role in shaping perceived connection and effectiveness in remote teams. Communication autonomy also emerged as an important factor influencing engagement and well-being. Practical implications The findings suggest that organizations should move beyond one-size-fits-all communication policies and instead emphasize clear expectations, strategic channel use, leadership communication practices, and employee autonomy to strengthen communication and engagement in remote teams. Originality/value This study contributes to corporate communication research by applying Media Richness Theory to contemporary remote-work contexts and highlighting conditions under which communication practices support connection and effectiveness in distributed teams.
