Local Impact of Global Crises, Institutional Trust, and Consumer Well-Being: Evidence from the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Global crises become increasingly more frequent and consequential. Yet, the impact of these crises is unevenly distributed across countries, leading to discrepancies in (inter)national crisis-regulating institutions’ ability to uphold public trust and safeguard their constituents’ well-being. Employing the paradigm of citizens as customers of political institutions, drawing on attribution and socio-political trust theories, and using the COVID-19 pandemic as empirical context, we investigate how consumers’ relative perceptions of local impact following a global crisis affect the psychological processes of institutional trust-formation and consumer well-being. Conducting one survey-based study in two countries affected disproportionately by the pandemic’s first wave (USA, Greece) and one experimental study in a third country (Italy) during the pandemic’s second wave, we find that institutional trust declines more in countries whose citizens hold perceptions of higher relative local impact following a global crisis; institutional blame attributions explain trust erosion; institutional distrust decreases consumer well-being and adherence to institutional guidelines; consumers’ globalization attitudes immunize international institutions from blame and distrust; and political conservatives transfer blame and distrust from national to international institutions amidst global crises. The findings enrich institutional branding and trust literatures and have implications for stakeholders involved in global crisis-management (policymakers, political marketers, institutional brand managers).

Less speed more haste: The effect of crisis response speed and information strategy on the consumer−brand relationship

“…Second, the COVID‐19 pandemic has had a devastating, global impact with strong cross‐national variance (Davvetas et al, 2021). The extent of the COVID‐19 spread, the impact on the economy, and the government's perspective on the pandemic all vary greatly from country to country (WHO, 2020a, 2020b).…”

“…Second, the COVID-19 pandemic has had a devastating, global impact with strong cross-national variance (Davvetas et al, 2021).…”

The mechanisms that make social media effective in building citizens’ trust on local government

“…The concept of engagement was originally studied in the field of organizational behaviour and psychology (Huo et al , 2009). Recent research suggests that the relationship between citizens and governments is similar to a marketplace relationship between customers and firms (Davvetas et al , 2022). Therefore, this study is also inspired in the marketing discipline.…”

Seeking thrills during a crisis? A TSR and hierarchy of effects perspective of the transformative potential of travel

“…Crises are times of intense difficulty, uncertainty or danger, which can often have a considerable negative impact on the well-being of consumers, businesses and society (Davvetas et al , 2021; Nayal et al , 2021; Tuzovic et al , 2021). Crises such as the Global Financial Crisis in 2008 (Volkos and Symvoulakis, 2021) and earthquakes in New Zealand and Japan in 2011 (Cheung and McColl-Kennedy, 2015; Cheung et al , 2017) have been well documented as having a considerable impact on the psychological well-being of consumers and economic well-being of communities.…”