Purpose As service robots become embedded in frontline operations, employees increasingly witness customers directing rude or degrading behaviors toward service robots. Although robots are nonsentient technologies, such incidents can violate service interaction norms and disrupt the moral order of robot-augmented encounters. This study aims to examine how observed robot-directed customer mistreatment shapes employees’ moral appraisals, cognitive processing and service behaviors. Design/methodology/approach Across a multistudy research program, Study 1a uses a randomized experiment to test whether observing robot-directed customer mistreatment elicits vicarious moral emotions and deontic injustice perceptions and whether immediate managerial intervention modestly attenuates deontic injustice perceptions. Study 1b uses a construct-boundary experiment comparing robot-directed mistreatment, human-directed mistreatment and respectful customer interaction. Study 2 uses a 10-day experience-sampling design to examine within-person spillover from daily observed robot-directed customer mistreatment to evening cognition and next-workday service behavior. Study 3 uses a field quasi-experiment to assess a structured managerial intervention protocol. Findings Observed robot-directed customer mistreatment increases deontic injustice perceptions; in the daily study, these perceptions are associated with evening affective rumination and limited next-workday service withdrawal. A smaller constructive pathway links problem-solving pondering to proactive service behavior. Immediate managerial intervention modestly attenuates justice-based appraisal; in a nonrandomized field comparison, a formal intervention protocol is associated with modest improvements in proactive service behavior and withdrawal. Originality/value By using a nonsentient service robot as a boundary case, this research shows that witnessed mistreatment can remain normatively consequential even when victim-centered empathic concern is attenuated. The findings distinguish conduct-centered deontic appraisal from concern for a suffering victim and conceptualize managerial intervention as a potential form of normative repair in robot-augmented service systems.
Purpose This study aims to conceptualize therapeutic adherence as a manifestation of patient engagement. It examines how motivational drivers shape engagement across successive stages of the acute patient journey among young adults. Design/methodology/approach A scenario-based survey was conducted with 359 university students exposed to a three-stage acute patient journey (consultation, treatment initiation and treatment continuation). Drawing on Protection Motivation Theory (PMT), the authors assessed how threat and coping appraisals predict engagement intentions at each stage. Findings Engagement varies significantly across stages. Entry into care represents a critical activation threshold, largely driven by perceived solution efficacy. Engagement intensifies at treatment initiation, where coping appraisals dominate. It declines at treatment continuation as perceived threat decreases. Therapeutic engagement thus emerges as a stage-dependent reconfigured process. Research limitations/implications The use of a hypothetical scenario and self-reported intentions limits behavioral generalizability. Future research should examine longitudinal and field-based engagement processes across diverse healthcare contexts and vulnerability profiles. Practical implications It provides insights for healthcare providers, universities and public institutions seeking to design coordinated, stage-sensitive interventions that activate, reinforce and stabilize young adults’ engagement across the acute patient journey. These findings can also inform public health policies aimed at improving access to care, therapeutic adherence and health engagement during emerging adulthood. Social implications This article addresses an important issue for public policymakers: the prevention of therapeutic nonadherence through the development of health-related services. Originality/value By applying PMT to a patient journey within a service perspective, this study advances a novel view of therapeutic engagement shaped by evolving perceptions of threat and efficacy across the three stages of acute care.
Purpose The purpose of the present investigation is to illuminate the role of action readiness in promoting behavioral engagement throughout the phygital customer journey. Action readiness is a motivational state that orients people toward behavioral tendencies that allow them to change or maintain their relationships with the environment. Design/methodology/approach Using a creative synthesis approach, this paper reviews interdisciplinary literatures related to action readiness, phygitality and behavioral engagement, presents insights synthesized from across them, and develops a conceptual model to explain how action readiness can be leveraged by practitioners to stimulate behavioral engagement throughout the phygital customer journey. Findings Action readiness in relation to phygitality entails being prepared for seamless interaction across digital and physical touchpoints. Action readiness can be increased through emotional, cognitive, social and behavioral antecedents, which practitioners could use in different combinations and sequences, based on their industry and offerings. Practitioners also can use the antecedents that best respond to customers’ needs, thereby creating customer journeys that are personalized. While fostering action readiness has the potential to create cycles of sustained behavioral engagement, it also carries risks, such as increased willingness to interact with competitors’ offerings. Originality/value This paper makes a theoretical contribution by clarifying how, in phygital service contexts, action readiness can be used to influence behavioral engagement in dynamic, personalized and impactful ways. It contributes a human-centric perspective by establishing the consideration of people’s needs and motivational states as an integral part of designing and managing the phygital customer journey.
Purpose This study aims to examine how older consumers interpret artificial intelligence (AI) disclosure when evaluating the trustworthiness of AI-generated advertising across utilitarian and hedonic service contexts and explores the role of relatability in these evaluations. Design/methodology/approach A qualitative study was conducted using 25 semi-structured interviews with Australian consumers aged 65 years and above. Data were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis with abductive reasoning and gerund-based coding. Findings Findings reveal that advertising trustworthiness is contextually calibrated rather than determined by AI disclosure alone. In utilitarian contexts, disclosure was associated with a transparency-scepticism tension, as greater awareness of AI involvement coincided with stronger expectations for credibility and human presence. In hedonic contexts, disclosure was often less salient but was associated with greater scepticism when AI-generated representations were perceived as unrealistic. Relatability functioned as an interpretive filter, with participants' evaluations reflecting both social similarity and representational realism in judging whether AI-generated content was credible and relevant. Research limitations/implications The study focuses on older Australian consumers and future research should examine other demographic, cultural and service contexts. Practical implications Managers should adopt context sensitive AI disclosure strategies, combining appropriate disclosure with realistic representations and credible human elements. Social implications Responsible AI advertising requires transparent, inclusive and realistic representations that support older consumers' confidence and meaningful participation in increasingly digital marketplaces. Originality/value This study advances AI advertising research by demonstrating that disclosure effects are interpreted through contextual expectations and relatability-based evaluations, providing an interpretive framework explaining how service context, disclosure meaning and perceptions of representational realism jointly shape perceived advertising trustworthiness.
Purpose - Airline ticket blind box services have emerged as a novel service format in which customers purchase a ticket before the destination is revealed. This research aims to investigate how customers form service evaluations when core outcome information is intentionally withheld. Specifically, it examines how customers rely on utilitarian and hedonic value cues, and how perceived destination uncertainty changes the evaluative weight of these cues. Design/methodology/approach - To test the proposed model, this research adopts a sequential multi-method design consisting of a survey-based study and a follow-up scenario experiment. Findings - Both utilitarian value cues (e.g. monetary savings and choice efficiency) and hedonic value cues (e.g. perceived surprise, perceived enjoyment and social interaction) positively influence customer satisfaction, which in turn enhances repurchase intention. More importantly, perceived destination uncertainty weakens the effects of monetary savings and choice efficiency, while strengthening the effects of perceived enjoyment and social interaction. The experiment further shows that destination uncertainty increases perceived loss of control when utilitarian attributes are emphasized, whereas it enhances excitement when hedonic attributes are emphasized. Originality/value - This research contributes to service evaluation research by identifying a value-based evaluation process in uncertainty-driven services where core outcome information is intentionally withheld. This research also extends prior work on uncertainty by demonstrating that destination uncertainty asymmetrically changes the evaluative weight of utilitarian and hedonic value cues, highlighting its dual role of uncertainty as both a potential source of risk and a driver of experiential appeal.
