Witnessing Consumer Incivility Toward Service Employees: Pity, Support, and Tipping Behavior
研究消费者对服务员工的不文明行为如何影响旁观者的情绪、支持行为和小费支付，发现目睹不文明行为会引发同情，进而增加情感支持和小费。
While organizational scholars have established a strong base of research on workplace incivility, one understudied aspect is how witnessing incivility directed toward employees affects the witness’ actions. This research seeks to close this gap by examining how consumer incivility targeting a service employee impacts emotions, intentions, and financial compensation provided by the witness. Drawing from social exchange theory, we propose witnessing incivility leads to feelings of pity, followed by increased emotional support and, ultimately, an increased tip for the target employee. We find support for our proposed relationships across four studies. Additionally, we demonstrate that this process is robust to influences from bystander effects but is conditional on service quality and group membership of the uncivil consumer in relation to the witnessing consumer. The findings provide theoretical advancement to the growing literature on behavioral responses of witnesses of incivility.