This research examines the impact of an online platform’s revenue model on consumers’ ethical inferences of the company. We demonstrate that consumers perceive online platforms that employ the advertising-based revenue model to be less ethical than platforms that employ the service-fee-based revenue model because platforms that adopt the advertising-based revenue model are thought to be less consumer-serving motivated. The unfavorable ethical inferences induced by the advertising-based revenue model further lower consumers’ intention to disclose personal information and the intention to generate (...) positive word of mouth for the company. We further find that allowing consumers to skip advertisements does not improve the less favorable ethical inferences while using resources for public-service advertisements does. These findings advance the understanding of consumers’ ethical inferences regarding business models and provide insights for managers to develop effective strategies to alleviate less favorable ethical inferences. (shrink)

Deception is common in the marketplace where individuals pursue self-interests from their perspectives. Extant research suggests that perspective-taking, a cognitive process of putting oneself in other’s situation, increases consumers’ ethical tolerance for marketers’ deceptive behaviors. By contrast, the current research demonstrates that consumers who take the dishonest marketers’ perspective become less tolerant of deception when consumers’ moral self-awareness is high. This effect is driven by moral self-other differentiation as consumers contemplate deception from the marketers’ perspective: high awareness of the “moral (...) self” motivates consumers to distance themselves from the “immoral other.” The findings shed new light on how self-morality can vicariously shape social consideration in ethical judgments. (shrink)

The use of airbrushed “thin ideal” models in advertising creates major ethical challenges: This practice deceives consumers and can be harmful to their emotional state. To inform consumers they are being deceived and reduce these negative adverse effects, disclaimers can state that the images have been digitally altered and are unrealistic. However, recent research shows that such disclaimers have very limited impact on viewers. This surprising result needs further investigation to understand how women who detect that images have been airbrushed (...) are still harmed by them. Three studies reported in this article address this question. The authors identify a typology, based on a combination of three emotional reactions experienced by women who are exposed to the airbrushed thin ideal. In further analyses, they investigate how detection of airbrushing—whether spontaneous or with the help of a disclaimer—relates to these emotional reactions and women’s attitudes to altered images. Results show that detection of airbrushing does not systematically protect women from either wanting to look like airbrushed thin models or the negative emotions triggered by exposure to thin ideal images, nor does it always generate defensive reactions toward ads using such images. Women who detect that images have been airbrushed may still process these images as realistic. In addition to discussing this irrational process of self-deception, this article suggests policy interventions to prevent it. (shrink)

Due to the lack of empirical measures of consumer rights in developing countries in particular, this research aimed to tackle this issue in the context of Jordan. The research adopted a triangulated methodology of initial inductive research work followed by a deductive research approach, implemented empirically. Data were collected from 660 consumers, using a mall intercept method. Multiple statistical techniques were employed for data analysis, using SPSS-23 and a structural equation model. Three key findings emerged from the current research work. (...) First, the results identified six fundamental consumer rights. These were: right to safety; right to be informed; right to be heard; right to choose; right to privacy; and right to redress. These rights were measured on 29 items, based on confirmatory factor analysis results. Second, the status of perceived consumer rights in the study area was not very satisfactory, reflecting a public discontent due to poor consumerism. Third, no significant differences were noticed in consumers’ perception regarding their rights due to their demographic factors. In view of the overall findings, the current authors made several recommendations to both marketing practitioners and public policy makers to improve the quality of consumer rights in the study area. The main contribution of the current research was the development and validation of a measuring scale of consumer rights based on 29 measuring items, structured in six categories. (shrink)