弄“优”成拙--从社会心理距离视角探究受惠方对特殊优待的满意度  

When Preferential Treatment Backfires:Exploring the Satisfaction of Beneficiaries towards Preferential Treatment from the Perspective of Social Psychological Distance

作　　者：王文如 陈荣[1] 黄靓 Wang Wenru;Chen Rong;Huang Liang(School of Economics and Management,Tsinghua University)

机构地区：[1]清华大学经济管理学院

出　　处：《南开管理评论》2024年第4期4-15,共12页Nankai Business Review

基　　金：国家自然科学基金项目(72302125、72172072);国家自然科学基金重大项目(72293561)资助。

摘　　要：特殊优待是一种“向部分顾客提供额外产品或服务”的营销手段。本文探究了消费过程中重要的环境因素--在场群体类型对特殊优待效果产生的影响。通过一个问卷调查和五个实验,本文研究发现特殊优待过程有熟人在场时,受惠者对整体服务的满意度显著降低,甚至低于没有特殊优待的情况。受惠方与熟人之间感知心理距离的变化中介了特殊优待的负面影响。本文进一步探究了以上效应的边界条件:当消费者想要吸引他人的注意力、消费者炫耀消费个性特质较高、特殊优待不可观察、特殊优待可以由消费者和熟人共享时,主效应被削弱。本文丰富了社会心理距离理论在服务营销领域的相关研究,为企业更合理地实施特殊优待提供了有益的营销启示。Preferential treatment is defined as“giving certain customers higher social status and extra or better products and services beyond what is normally offered”.As an easy-to-implement marketing tool,preferential treatment has been widely used in various domains such as restaurants,hotels,and airports to improve consumer experience and satisfaction.Existing literature indicates that preferential treatment in private settings has a positive impact on the beneficiaries.However,previous research has not formed a unified consensus on the impact of preferential treatment on treated consumers in public settings involving social interactions.Given the prevalence of preferential treatment offered by businesses,the advantages of its public implementation,as well as the associated costs,it is crucial to explore this topic from the social perspective.Our research proposes a new factor closely related to interpersonal relationships,the presence of acquaintance,that influences consumer satisfaction with preferential treatment.We suggest that preferential treatment will lead to decreased consumer satisfaction with presence of acquaintance.This happens because preferential treatment makes consumers feel alienated from the acquaintance due to its limited availability and exclusivity.We tested our hypotheses through a survey and five experiments.In the pilot survey(Study 1),we revealed the common occurrence of preferential treatments and the prevalence of encountering acquaintances in daily consumption contexts.In Study 2,we showed that preferential treatment decreased consumers’satisfaction with the presence(vs.no presence)of acquaintances.Besides,Study 2 manipulated the social closeness between participants and acquaintances.The results showed that preferential treatment decreased consumer satisfaction regardless of whether they had a very close or normal relationship with the acquaintance,broadening the scope of the main effect.Studies 3 to 6 further explored the boundary conditions of the negative impact of preferential tr

关 键 词：特殊优待 熟人在场 心理距离 感知疏远程度 

分 类 号：F274[经济管理—企业管理]