Abstract
As companies continue to utilize co-production (customer participation in product or service creation) strategies with consumers, academic researchers have expanded their study on issues related to co-production. However, research has been scant on the issue of control in such situations. The underlying belief in increasing customer participation and involvement is it increases customers’ perceived control, thereby enhancing their experience and outcomes; this belief creates the necessity for further examination of control in co-production environments. This study examines consumers’ affective responses to differing levels of three types of control (cognitive, behavioral, and decisional) in low and high co-production conditions. Using two experimental contexts and one survey study, the results show increasing cognitive control will increase affect when co-production is low. Behavioral control can negatively or positively influence affect depending on specific situational contexts and perceptions of customization in low co-production conditions. Lastly, decisional control is found to be an important positive contributor to affect regardless of co-production level. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
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Notes
To ensure discriminant validity, we deleted items in our measures that might overlap to determine if the results remain the same. Of particular concern was item 3 under the cognitive control construct in Table 1 and item number 2 under behavioral control. The results for both of these deletions, across both studies did not change the results. All manipulations are still significant, in the expected direction, at p < .001. In study 3, one result changed slightly from significant to p = .11 after deleting item number 2 under behavioral control. However, discriminant validity among all measures was established based on the recommendation of Fornell and Larcker (1981), supporting that our measures are not likely to influence alternative constructs beyond focal construct.
Confounding checks were conducted to determine if the co-production manipulation influenced cognitive, behavioral, or decisional control levels, in addition to the intended involvement level differences. All confounding checks, across both studies 1 and 2, showed that level of co-production did not significantly influence any type of control, illustrating this is not a concern.
The means for realism for the scenarios in study 1 ranged from 4.90 to 5.39 on a 9-point scale anchored by “1” not at all realistic to “9’ very realistic, indicating scenarios were moderately realistic to respondents. In study 2, the scenarios ranged from 5.61 to 5.73 (9-point scale from “1” not at all realistic to “9” very realistic). The results for studies 1 and 2 remain consistent if realism is removed from the analysis.
Items from restaurant context: Due to the tasks the server asked me to perform, I believe that this meal was customized to my needs; I was able to customize the meal to my preferences; The tasks asked of me allowed me to obtain a meal that was tailor-made for me.
Outliers removed were consider extreme (p < .001)(Tabachnick and Fidell 2007). When outliers are included, the level of cognitive control and co-production do not show significant interaction [t(247) = 1.03; p = .302].
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Stevens, J., Esmark, C.L., Noble, S.M. et al. Co-producing with consumers: how varying levels of control and co-production impact affect. Mark Lett 28, 171–187 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11002-016-9413-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11002-016-9413-2