The antecedents and consequences of humour for service

Abstract

Purpose – While researchers in other disciplines seek to determine the impact that humour has in personal interactions, studies of humour in service delivery are lacking. The purpose of this paper is to examine whether it is beneficial to deliberately use humour in service encounters. Design/methodology/approach – This paper provides a comprehensive review of humour research in multiple disciplines to assess the applicability of their key findings to the service domain. By establishing the antecedents, types, and consequences of humour, the authors build a framework and propositions to help service researchers uncover the potential of injecting humour into service interactions. Findings – The authors find that using humour in service encounters is an ingenious affiliative behaviour which strengthens rapport between service employees and their customers. Humour also permits frontline service employees to better cope with the emotional challenges of their work, thus promising to reduce emotional labour and increase well-being. The effectiveness of service recovery efforts may also grow if employees use humour successfully to soften unpleasant emotional reactions and accept responsibility. Originality/value – The authors explore cross-disciplinary humour research to apply the findings to the use of humour in service encounters. The authors also attempt to identify situations in which humour usage is most promising or beneficial, as well as its main beneficiaries.

Implikasi Humor Dan Peran Layanan Karyawan Garis Depan Terhadap Kepuasan Pelanggan

“…Bergeron & Vachon (2008) dalam penelitian tentang keterkaitan atau penggunaan humor bagi tenaga penjualan menyatakan bahwa humor menjadi variabel independen yang berdampak positif pada layanan dan pelanggan. Mathies, Chiew, & Kleinaltenkamp (2016) dalam penelitian tentang anteseden humor dalam industri jasa mengemukakan bahwa humor membantu mengatasi situasi sulit yang dirasakan oleh layanan karyawan garis depan (frontline service employees) saat memberikan layanan bagi pelanggannya. Stock & Bednarek (2014) dalam penelitiannya dengan data dyadic dari layanan karyawan garis depan dan pelanggan berhasil membuktikan bahwa kepuasan pelanggan sangat ditentukan oleh peran mediasi layanan karyawan garis depan ketika menghadapi perilaku pelanggan yang positif maupun negatif.…”

“…Martin (2010) berpendapat bahwa humor bervariasi disesuaikan dengan situasi, misalnya untuk memperkuat keterikatan emosional terhadap pelanggan agar tercipta kepuasan pelanggan. Mathies, Chiew, & Kleinaltenkamp (2016), memberikan pandangan yang lebih baik yaitu bahwa humor adalah alat komunikasi yang efektif. Sehingga tidak mengherankan banyak perusahaan yang menggunakannnya seperti iklan, media sosial, dan masih banyak lagi.…”

Impact of using humor advertisement on airline customers’ mental image

“…The first dimension is related to demographic variables associated with research sample represented by gender, age, education level, and Monthly Average Income in USD. The second dimension includes a number of paragraphs related to the variables in question: the humor advertisement, which was based on Martin et al (2003) and Mathies et al (2016).…”

“…Companies use this strategy more than ever before to ensure that their customers are continually satisfied (Mathies et al, 2016). In Jordan, Royal Jordanian Airlines (RJ) launched this new type of marketing advertising for the first time in October 2016, before the US presidential election.…”

“…Some studies and researches have indicated that humor advertisements always offer better results than nonhumor ones (Limbu et al, 2012;Lee, 2014). The most important marketing benefits of humor can be summarized as follows (Fugate, 1998 According to Mathies et al (2016), most of previous studies regarding the use of humor in advertising have identified many measures, but the most widely used metric is provided by Mathies et al (2016), which includes four dimensions (the affiliative humor and humor of self-enhancement and selfdeprecating humor and aggressive humor), In this research it can be relied on as dimensions to measure the variable marketing humor for the comprehensiveness of all cases of positive and negative, and they can be illustrated as follows (Mathies et al, 2016): 1) Affiliated humor: this humor is targeting others in a positive way, and often arises in everyday situations, such as when people share funny stories. In social relationships, the affiliative humor can contribute to reducing unpleasant personal tensions, facilitating recognition of others, and increasing group cohesion.…”