When the medium massages perceptions: Personal (vs. public) displays of information reduce crowding perceptions and outsider mistreatment of frontline staff.
研究发现，在等待区域，让外部人员通过个人媒介（如传单、手机）而非公共媒介（如海报、墙标）阅读信息，能降低他们的拥挤感知，从而减少对一线员工的虐待行为。
Crowded waiting areas are volatile environments, where seemingly ordinary people often get frustrated and mistreat frontline staff. Given that crowding is an exogenous factor in many industries (e.g., retail, healthcare), we suggest an intervention that can "massage" outsiders' perceptions of crowding and reduce the mistreatment of frontline staff. We theorize that providing information for outsiders to read while they wait on a personal medium (e.g., a leaflet, a smartphone) reduces their crowding perceptions and mistreatment of frontline staff, compared to providing the same information on a public medium (e.g., poster, wall sign). We report two studies that confirm our theory: A field experiment in Emergency Departments (n = 939) and an online experiment simulating a coffee shop (n = 246). Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).