We examine the conceptual difference between consumer electronic word-of-mouth on online social sites (sWOM) such as Facebook and traditional face-to-face word-of-mouth (WOM). We find that consumers are less willing to engage in sWOM than WOM. Such a difference in willingness to offer word-of-mouth can be explained by social risk associated with different communication modes. We show that the difference between people's desire to engage in sWOM and WOM is mediated by perceived social risk and amplified when social risk is made salient. Furthermore, we show that consumers' need to self-enhance mitigates the difference in willingness to offer sWOM versus WOM.

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The mutual dependence of businesses and society has emphasized the growing importance of the concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Despite the fact that CSR has emerged as one of the leading management concerns worldwide, both businesses and academia have largely ignored its application in developing countries. This study aims to fill these gaps by examining consumer perceptions of CSR and their role in the relationships between consumers' ethical ideologies (i.e., idealism and egoism) and evaluations of a company's product offerings. An empirical study among Vietnamese consumers shows that consumers perceive CSR in four dimensions-economic, ethical, philosophical, and legal.Different ethical ideologies have different effects on consumer perceptions of CSR; for example, idealism positively affects these perceptions, whereas egoism's effect is negative.Furthermore, the perceptions of CSR fully mediate the relationships between idealism/egoism and product evaluation.

Decisions about expanding an existing product portfolio and capturing new markets are of critical importance to a firm's financial performance and growth. Yet, important questions remain in regard to the extent to which product and brand extensions contribute to a firm's profit in B2B and B2C markets, respectively, and how firms with corporate brands in these markets should pursue an extension strategy that provides maximum impact on firm profit. The authors theorize and empirically address these questions based on a study of firms listed in the U.S. Fortune 500 published ranking. Findings of this research have important prescriptive implications for the management of B2B and B2C firms' growth-based extension strategy and contribute to B2B theory

Numerous studies argue that corporate social responsibility (CSR) helps companies build strong and positive relationships with consumers. However, it is not well understood why certain companies are more effective in their CSR activities than others. Some studies have attributed this difference to the country setting, but results are inconclusive. Building on signaling theory, this study explores corporate transparency as a boundary condition of the effects of CSR activities on the consumer–brand relationship. Three experiments and one large survey across three countries examine how a lack of corporate transparency undermines firms’ CSR efforts. Importantly, the authors theorize that the environment of countries differs in terms of transparency, which is then reflected in different levels of corporate transparency. Different country levels of transparency help explain the discrepancies of CSR effectiveness for increasing brand attachment and building consumer behavior. Finally, the authors tie the diminishing effect of CSR in the case of low corporate transparency to an increase in consumer skepticism.

Although existing studies on adolescent well-being have revealed a positive relationship between gratitude and global subjective well-being, little research investigates whether the findings could be applied to domain-specific of subjective well-being, such as school well-being, and why this linkage arises. The present study addresses this gap by examining the effect of gratitude on school well-being, and the mediation of materialism. Participants were 764 late adolescents who completed measures of gratitude, materialism, and school well-being. Results showed that gratitude had a positive effect on school wellbeing, which was partially mediated by materialism. Furthermore, a multi-group analysis suggested that the pathway from gratitude to school well-being was significantly different between genders. Practical implications and limitations of this study are discussed.

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