Brand forgiveness

Marc Fetscherin and Alexandra Sampedro

Department of Business, Rollins College, Winter Park, Florida, USA

Abstract
Purpose – This paper aims to explore and discuss the concept of brand forgiveness. It empirically assesses the relationships among three types of
brand transgressions, brand forgiveness and three consumer coping strategies.
Design/methodology/approach – A 3  2 research design is used to evaluate the effects of three types of brand transgression (performance,
image and value) and two degrees of severity (high vs low) for brand forgiveness. Then, this paper use a 2  3 research design, evaluating two
degrees of brand forgiveness (high vs low) together with their effects on three different consumer coping strategies (switching, attacking and
purchasing again). Using a representative sample of 472 US consumers, various hypotheses related to these research designs are tested.
Findings – The results show that almost half (48 per cent) of the consumers are unlikely or very unlikely to forgive a brand compared to about a
third (32 per cent) who are likely or very likely to forgive. The results of ANOVA show the more severe the brand transgression, the less likely the
forgiveness. Consumers who are more likely to forgive are less likely to avoid the brand or engage in attacking behaviors; they are also more likely
to purchase the brand again. The results of regression analyses show that consumers witnessing a performance-based brand transgression are more
likely to forgive the brand than in the case of image- or value-based brand transgressions.
Originality/value – This paper explores and outlines the brand forgiveness construct, both theoretically and empirically.
Keyword Brand relationships
Paper type Research paper

1. Introduction which can result in millions of dollars of damage to a brand”

The branding literature includes extensive research showing
the importance of building and maintaining positive brand
relationships (Fetscherin and Heinrich, 2015). A little over a
decade ago, the flow of research shifted to include negative
brand relationships. The most notable constructs that have
been studied include, for example, brand dislike (Dalli et al.,
2006; Romani et al., 2009), brand disgust (Alba and Lutz,
2013) or brand hate (Kucuk, 2008; Bryson et al., 2013;
Zarantonello et al., 2016; Hegner et al., 2017). Consumer
responses to negative brand relationships vary, and different
individuals often react to the same stimulus in different ways.
The literature has found that consumers have different coping
strategies such as “take a flight” by avoiding, “fighting” by
attacking or re-engaging (Grégoire and Fisher, 2006; Zourrig
et al., 2009; Grégoire et al., 2010; Johnson et al., 2010) with
brands. Three main conclusions can be drawn from our
literature review.
First, without exception, all companies are subject to
product or service failures or to negative publicity. The
question is not if, but when these brand crises or brand
transgressions will happen (Ran et al., 2016). Second, negative
brand relationships can affect consumer satisfaction, trust and
loyalty (Xie and Peng, 2009). The outcomes of negative brand
relationships “can cause a brand to lose numerous existing
customers and can alienate innumerable potential customers,
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on
Emerald Insight at: www.emeraldinsight.com/1061-0421.htm
(Kähr et al., 2016, p. 25). Third, while the outcomes of
negative brand relationships have received some attention in
the literature, it is surprising to realize that the literature is silent
on the underlying emotional responses allowing companies to
either restore broken relationships or change negative brand
relationships to positive ones. A central mechanism in such a
process is that of forgiveness. In this line, Fernández-Capo et al.
(2017, p. 247) state that forgiveness is “one of the most
important processes in restoring relationships”. The study of
forgiveness was historically confined to theology and
philosophy, only later finding a place in the psychology
literature. However, its entry into the marketing literature
occurred only recently (Zourrig et al., 2009). In psychology, it
has clearly been shown that forgiveness has the potential to
cause the tension associated with negative feelings to be
reduced, neutralized or even “be replaced with positive
emotions” (Tsarenko and Rooslani Tojib, 2011, p. 382). This
possibility demonstrates the centrality and importance of the
study of forgiveness in the context of brand relationships.
This paper supplies the following three contributions: first,
by conducting a detailed literature review and providing an
overview of forgiveness in the marketing context, it summarizes
the current state of research and highlighting the lack of
empirical study of consumer forgiveness of brands. Second,
brand forgiveness is a relatively new construct; this study
extends prior forgiveness research to brand relationships, in
contrast to traditional psychological theories of forgiveness that
assess it in the context of intra- or interpersonal relationships.
Third, this paper discusses and empirically tests two analyses.
The first of these assesses the relationships between the level of

Journal of Product & Brand Management

28/5 (2019) 633–652 Received 8 April 2018
© Emerald Publishing Limited [ISSN 1061-0421] Revised 31 August 2018
[DOI 10.1108/JPBM-04-2018-1845] Accepted 31 August 2018

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Marc Fetscherin and Alexandra Sampedro
severity of three types of brand transgression (performance,
image and value) on brand forgiveness. The other examines the
effects of brand forgiveness on three consumer coping strategies
(switching, attacking and purchasing again). To achieve this, it
first reviews the current interdisciplinary literature on
forgiveness, formulates hypotheses and conducts a survey with
a representative sample in the USA. The hypotheses are then
tested.
The structure of the remainder of this paper is as follows.
Section 2 discusses the origins and conceptualization of the
forgiveness construct and current research on forgiveness in the
marketing context. Section 3 outlines the various hypotheses
proposed. Section 4 describes the instruments of measurement,
sample and methodology. Section 5 presents the results, while
Section 6 provides a discussion of the theoretical and
managerial implications and the limitations of the study, as well
as presenting avenues for future research.
2. Forgiveness
2.1 Origins and domain
Forgiveness has long been considered to fall within the domain
of theology and philosophy. The New Testament discusses
forgiveness in Matthew 6:12: “And forgive us our debts, as we
forgive our debtors”. It is “a well-developed concept with a long
history drawn principally from Judeo-Christian Theology,
where it is used as a metaphor for the removal by a deity of
retribution for wrongdoing” (Tsarenko and Rooslani Tojib,
2011, p. 381). However, it is only in the last few decades that
research in other disciplines, mostly psychology, has focused on
forgiveness. To understand the current state of forgiveness
research, a bibliometric analysis is conducted of articles on the
Web of Science (WoS) having the string “forgiv” in their title.
This string also called up variations of the word forgiveness,
such as forgiveness, forgiving or forgive (Fernández-Capo et al.,
2017). The results show that the topic of forgiveness began to
attract interest around 1990. From that time, according to the
WoS, a total of 1,228 articles by 2,004 authors have been
published in 607 journals as of April 2018. Figure 1 illustrates
the increasing numbers of articles related to forgiveness
published per year.
This analysis confirms that forgiveness is predominantly
discussed in psychology. Table AI provides an overview of the
15 most productive and impactful journals publishing on
forgiveness, and Table AII provides an overview of the
Figure 1 Number of articles per year
85
74
51 51 54 56
36 38
27
22
1 2 1 4 1 1 3 2
1989
1990
1991
1992
1993
1996
1998
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
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most-cited articles within the WoS. In psychology, “the
psychological antecedents, properties, and consequences of
forgiveness now have been studied in a variety of settings, e.g.
counseling, social, justice, organizational and cultural, with
adolescents and adults, couples, families, and groups” (Strelan
and Covic, 2006, p. 1059). In studies of interpersonal
forgiveness, McCullough et al. (1998, p. 1586) find “that
people’s willingness to forgive an offender can be explained by
variables of a social–cognitive nature, such as the offender’s
perceived responsibility, intentionality, and motives and the
severity of the offense”, which is in line with the findings of
Boon and Sulsky (1997) and Darby and Schlenker (1982). In
other words, the psychology literature finds different severities
and determinants of forgiveness. Moreover, ample evidence
exists that there are at least two types of outcomes or
motivational systems underlying forgiveness:
 feelings of hurt-perceived attack correspond to a motivation
to avoid personal and psychological contact with the
offender (i.e. avoidance); and
 feelings of righteous indignation correspond to a motivation
to seek revenge or see harm come to the offender (i.e.
revenge) (McCullough et al., 1998, p. 1587).
In line with prior psychological research, this paper also
conceptualizes and tests different determinants and outcomes
for forgiveness, but in the brand relationships context.
Turning back to the brief bibliometric analysis, one notices
that only a few business journals have discussed the forgiveness
construct. For example, the Journal of Business Ethics
has published a few articles, but they either focus on forgiveness
as a leadership trait (Caldwell and Dixon, 2010) or forgiveness
in the workplace (Palanski, 2012; Barclay and Saldanha, 2016).
Only a handful of articles have focused on forgiveness in the
marketing context as the following Section 2.3 shows.
2.2 Conceptualization and definition
Like love and hate, the concept of forgiveness is complex and
vague, for the following four reasons. First, forgiveness is a
complex notion; it is hard to determine why someone chooses
to forgive and the mechanisms are tied to a person’s thoughts
and feelings, which differ amongst individuals. Second,
“forgiveness should not be confused with other concepts such
as pardoning, excusing, condoning, forgetting, denying, and
reconciliation”[1] (Zourrig et al., 2009, p. 407). Following this
argument, Sternberg (2003, p. 203) states that:
Forgiveness is being granted and required only one person (the offended)
whereas reconciliation must be earned through trustworthy behavior and
always needs two parties, in that it depends on the offender’s response to the
forgiver.
143
More precisely, Joireman et al. (2013, p. 319) argue that
126
115 “forgiveness is an intrapersonal act of letting go of negative
emotions, whereas reconciliation is an interpersonal act of
85 87 85 goodwill that hopes to restore a relationship”. The literature
75
identifies at least three types of forgiveness: forgiveness of self,
forgiveness of others and forgiveness of situations. This paper
focuses on the last of these, where the word “others” refers to a
company or a brand. Fourth, there is “no universal definition of
forgiveness” (Younger et al., 2004, p. 838). The literature
suggests numerous definitions and suggests various aspects,
including behavioral, affective, cognitive and motivational
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Table I Most relevant forgiveness studies in marketing

Author (year)
Zourrig et al. (2009)
Xie and Peng (2009)
Tsarenko and Tojib
(2011)
Tsarenko and Tojib
(2015)
Casidy and Shin (2015)
Riaz and Khan (2016)
Sinha and Lu (2016)
Joireman, Grégoire and
Tripp (2016)*
Ran, Wei and Li (2016)
Yagil and Luria (2016)
Finsterwalder et al.
(2017)
Note: *Also reporting findings form their previous study, Joireman et al. (2013)
Sample
N/a
130 students (pre-test)
220 students
n/a
Study 1: 202 respondents
Study 2: 252 respondents
332 students
364 students
Study 1: 161 students
Study 2: 166 students
Study 3: 176 students
N/a
Study 1: 243 students
Study 2: 200 students
Study 3: 295 students
Study 1: 52 interviews
Study 2: 286 respondents
11 in-depth interviews
Type of
study/manipulation
Conceptual
Empirical/fictions brands
Conceptual
Empirical/scenario-based
experiment
Empirical/eight
experimental conditions
Empirical/hypothetical
service-failure scenarios
Empirical/eight product
and service-failure
scenarios
Conceptual
Empirical/various
conditions of fictions
news
Empirical/manipulated
scenarios
Conceptual
Key findings
Presentation of the customer forgiveness process model
Psychological mechanism of customer forgiveness viewed
from across cultural perspective
Rebuilding a trustworthy image and earning consumer
forgiveness are crucial steps in repairing consumer trust
If wrongdoers succeeded in demonstrating their integrity,
competence and benevolence during the handling of a crisis,
people were more likely to forgive
Presenting a conceptual model
Consumer forgiveness higher when brand transgression
severity is mild
Consumer forgiveness mediates the effect of brand
transgression severity
Compensation and hybrid recovery strategies have more
positive effects on forgiveness intentions compared to no
service recovery
Severity of failure hampers consumer forgiveness
Forgiveness was higher when the relationship was strong
Forgiveness is higher when the transgression was
uncontrollable
Present a customer forgiveness model
Angry consumers are more likely to forgive in guilt framing
communication
Fearful consumers are more likely to forgive with shame-
framing communication
The stronger the relationship, the more likely to forgive
The higher the blame, the less likely to forgive
Presentation of conceptual framework for consumers’
forgiveness of celebrity’s transgressions

ones. For example, Tsarenko and Rooslani Tojib (2011,
p. 382) argue that “the main component that underlies
forgiveness is the transformation of negative emotions.
Whether negative should be replaced with positive emotions, or
whether there is just a reduction in the tension associated with
feeling those negative emotions, is another debatable issue in
the literature”. Following this line of thought, forgiveness is
conceptualized in this paper as having various determinants
and relates to the process of a reduction or replacement of
negative feelings with positive ones.
2.3 Forgiveness in marketing
As Tsarenko and Rooslani Tojib (2011, p. 382) show:
To date, only a few studies on forgiveness have been conducted in the
consumer research field [. . .] the investigation of forgiveness in business
settings is still in an earlier phase.
The investigation of the forgiveness construct in the context of
brand relationships is a vital precondition for advancing the
brand forgiveness construct. Current marketing studies on
forgiveness can be categorized into three groups. The first
consists of works that have presented conceptual models of
customer or consumer forgiveness (Zourrig et al., 2009;
Tsarenko and Rooslani Tojib, 2011; Joireman et al., 2016); the
second group looks at consumer forgiveness for product or
service failures (Riaz and Khan, 2016; Sinha and Lu, 2016;
Ran et al., 2016); the third group explores forgiveness after a
service recovery strategy (Casidy and Shin, 2015; Yagil and
Luria, 2016).
Among the first group, Zourrig et al. (2009, p. 404) discuss
the “psychological mechanism of customer forgiveness”. They
discuss forgiveness from a cross-cultural perspective and argue
that forgiveness could neutralize negative feelings (e.g. anger
and frustration) or even be transformed to positive emotions.
They present but do not empirically test a customer-forgiveness
process model. Tsarenko and Tojib (2011, p. 381) discuss and
present but do not empirically test “a conceptual framework of
consumer forgiveness which highlights several stages through
which consumers progress in their forgiveness process”. They
also note that “a range of situational and contingent factors that
may facilitate the consumer forgiveness process are also
identified and rationalized in the model”. Joireman et al. (2016)
present a theoretical model of customer forgiveness following

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service failures and discuss four conditions under which the
customer might or might not forgive. Finally, Finsterwalder
et al. (2017) examine consumer forgiveness in the context of
celebrities or human brands. They conduct a qualitative study
incorporating 11 in-depth interviews and identify four core
drivers of forgiveness of celebrities, namely, celebrity-related,
consumer-related, context-related and time-related drivers.
From their findings, they present a “conceptual framework for
consumers’ forgiveness of celebrity transgressions”
(Finsterwalder et al., 2017, p. 17).
From the second group, Riaz and Khan (2016) examine the
mediating role of consumer forgiveness on the impact of the
severity of service failures on consumer switching intentions.
They find that “service failure severity has a direct positive
impact on switchover intention and it also has an indirect
impact on switchover intention through consumer forgiveness”
(Riaz and Khan, 2016, p. 420). Sinha and Lu (2016) conduct
three studies. Study 1 assesses a health drink, Study 2 assesses
airline brands and Study 3 asks respondents about an
unfamiliar brand. The three studies use different products and
service-failure scenarios; the results show that consumers “are
more forgiving when the brand has no control over the
transgression, regardless of brand-relationship strength”
(p. 265). However, they also find consumers with strong
relationships with brands are more forgiving. Ran et al. (2016)
conduct three studies, examining the interactions of the
emotional frames of guilt and shame with consumer
forgiveness. They find that angry consumers are more likely to
forgive after receiving guilt-framing communications, and
fearful consumers are more likely to forgive after receiving
shame-framing communications.
In the third group, Casidy and Shin (2015) study the
relationship between “harm and the role of service-recovery
strategies on customer forgiveness and negative word-of-mouth
intentions” (Casidy and Shin, 2015, p. 103). They find that
“customer intentions are stronger among those who are directly
affected by the service failure than indirectly affected
customers” (Casidy and Shin, 2015, p. 103). Tsarenko and
Tojib (2015) examine, among other things, the relationship of
the “severity of a brand transgression and the firm’s response
(apology vs apologia) with the rates of forgiveness among
consumers” (Tsarenko and Tojib, 2015, p. 1851). They
conduct two experiments, and the “results also show that
consumer forgiveness mediates the effect of brand
transgression severity, firm response, and consumer awareness
on repurchase intentions” (Tsarenko and Tojib, 2015,
p. 1851). Finally, Yagil and Luria (2016) conduct two studies.
First, they hold interviews to explore the manifestations of
forgiveness in the service context. Then, they perform an
empirical study and find that the stronger the brand
relationship, the more likely the forgiveness. Table I provides a
summary of the most relevant work on consumer or customer
forgiveness.
The literature review shows that about one-third of the current
studies in this marketing field present conceptual models. The
novelty of the subject is likely driving researchers to begin by
conceptualizing a construct and then conducting qualitative or
quantitative studies. The remaining two-thirds use scenarios,
conditions or manipulations to assess brand forgiveness. While
these studies do provide valuable contributions to the
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understanding of forgiveness in the marketing context, they do
not directly assess consumers’ real experience with real brands or
whether or not they are likely to forgive a brand. The aim of this
study is to close that gap. Moreover, it extends prior research,
which focused mostly on performance-related factors such as
product and service failures or following a service-recovery
failure, with other types of brand transgression such as corporate
wrongdoing.
3. Hypotheses
As Tsarenko and Tojib (2015) argue, it is impossible to
encompass all aspects of forgiveness within one research design
and model. Furthermore, because of the novelty, complexity
and ambiguity of forgiveness, this article focuses on and
assesses three types of brand transgressions (performance,
image and value) and two degrees of severity (low vs high) for
brand forgiveness. It goes on to assess the relationship of two
degrees of forgiveness (high vs low) on three different consumer
coping strategies (switching, attacking and purchasing again).
3.1 Severity of brand transgression
The psychology literature shows that “the relationship between
transgression severity and forgiveness is arguably the most
robust phenomenon” (Fincham et al., 2005, p. 861), where
more severe transgressions are associated with less forgiveness
(Boon and Sulsky, 1997). Many studies in psychology support
this finding, but the reverse phenomenon is also met with. For
example:
A British woman who was raped but found the strength to meet her attacker
in prison to tell him that she had forgiven him. When journalists asked her
why, she said that she believed that his actions are manifestations of
something wrong with society, rather than the individual (Tsarenko and
Tojib, 2015, p. 1855).
In the branding context, “the severity however may not have
the same effect on the ability of the victim of a service failure or
brand transgression to forgive the transgressor” (Tsarenko and
Tojib, 2015, p. 1855). Therefore, two main gaps as it relates to
severity of transgressions on brand forgiveness are identified.
First, from a methodological point of view, the severity of the
transgression, “is usually limited to analogue studies where
participants respond to hypothetical vignettes that present mild
and severe transgressions” (Fincham et al., 2005, p. 862). In
other words, respondents are categorized by the researcher a
priori to react to either low- or high-severity transgressions. This
study suggests and uses a different approach, wherein
respondents are categorized a posteriori into low- or high-
severity transgressions depending on consumer’s real
experience with a brand. This is more in line with the practical
reality of brand interactions, as different individuals react
differently to transgressions. The issue with the a priori
categorization of respondents is that one consumer might have
a strong reaction to a weakly defined brand transgression in the
research design or a weak reaction to a strongly defined brand
transgression. To prevent such false positives and false
negatives, consumers were divided into groups only after the
survey was concluded. Second, prior studies use either
fictitious brands (Xie and Peng, 2009) or fictitious conditions
(Ran et al., 2016), which may limit the generalization of the
results to practice. By contrast, in this study, respondents share
their experience with a real brand.
 Brand forgiveness
Marc Fetscherin and Alexandra Sampedro
The following approach was used to assess the severity of the
brand transgressions. For each of the three types of brand
transgression (performance, image and value), the mean values
of the corresponding items were calculated. These items were
assessed on a five-point Likert scale, ranging from 1 (strongly
disagree) to 5 (strongly agree), as well as a do not know option
(unscored). When the mean values of these items was greater
than 3, the respondent was placed into the high-severity group;
those whose had a mean value of less than 3 were placed into
the low-severity group. Those with a mean value of 3 were
excluded. The use of real brands and the grouping of
respondents a posteriori into these two groups may overcome
some of the limitations outlined above, but this approach has
the disadvantage that the sizes of the groups are not equal.
However, the authors believe the advantages outweigh the
disadvantages of this approach.
3.2 Brand transgressions
“Firms and their brands are not immune from, and can indeed
be tarnished by, brand-related crises or transgressions”
(Tsarenko and Tojib, 2015, p. 1852). Notable examples of this
include BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010, Cadbury’s
use of palm oils in its chocolate products, IKEA’s decision to
remove images of women from its Saudi Arabian catalog and
most recently, 2018 H&M’s campaign featuring an African
American boy modeling a sweatshirt reading “coolest monkey
in the jungle”.
The literature suggests three categories of brand
transgressions. Tsarenko and Tojib (2015) present two types of
brand transgression: performance-related and value-related.
They state that:
Performance-related crises usually involve the provision of defective
products or services, for example, the detection of lead in Mattel toys.
Value-related crises, on the other hand, involve social or ethical issues
surrounding any values espoused by the brand. The exclusion of females
from the Saudi Arabian IKEA catalogue is an example of a value-related
crisis (Tsarenko and Tojib, 2015, p. 1855).
Zarantonello et al. (2016, 2018) and Hegner et al. (2017)
suggest a third category, not related to the performance of a
product or service nor to a value judgment about corporate
wrongdoing; rather, it relates to incongruence between the
company brand image and the consumer’s self-image. The
following sections discuss and present hypotheses regarding
the effects that the three types of brand transgression have on
brand forgiveness.
3.2.1 Performance-related: negative past experience
Performance-related crises refer to negative past experience(s)
a consumer has with a brand. Such experiences might relate to
product failures, dissatisfaction with the service or negative
associations with the country of origin. Although the reasons
why consumers buy brands vary, the most basic expectation is
an adequate service or product performance. When a consumer
uses a product or service, he or she compares his or her initial
expectations with the actual performance and consumer’s
expectation is either met or not (Oliver, 1980; Halstead, 1989).
Confirmation occurs when the experience matches the
expectation, and disconfirmation occurs when the experience is
either better or worse than the expectation (Oliver, 1980).
Negative disconfirmation happens when the actual
performance is below expectations, which most often results in
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dissatisfaction (Oliver, 1980). Riaz and Khan’s (2016, p. 423)
argument that consumers “experience strong emotional impact
of service failure and they consider whether to stay or to
switchover to another service provider” leads to the hypothesis
that a consumer with a strong negative past experience with a
brand is less likely to forgive that brand. Therefore, the
following hypothesis is tested:
H1. The stronger the negative past experience, the less likely
forgiveness is.
3.2.2 Image-related: image incongruence
Self-congruity research shows there is a positive relationship
between congruity of a consumer’s self-image and the brand
image. Khan and Lee (2014, p. 330) state that “consumers
have the tendency to buy those brands with images congruent
to their self-concepts or those that will give desired meaning to
their lives”. Park and MacInnis (2018, p. 123) state that “some
connections between the brand and the self are so strong that
the concept of ‘self’ includes the brand”. On the other hand,
incongruity between the brand and the consumer’s sense of self
may lead to negative emotions toward the brand. Individuals
deliberately choose or do not choose certain brands in part to
construct their self-concept and their personal identity (Grubb
and Grathwohl, 1967; Escalas and Bettman, 2005). In this
context, the brand image and the consumer’s own self-image
only become distinct when the brand image transgresses in a
way that leads the consumer to no longer want to be associated
with the brand or to feel guilty or ashamed to be associated with
it. For example, many girls wear Disney-branded princess
dresses or outfits, but as the years go by, their fashion taste
changes, and the image the brand projects is no longer
congruent with the consumer’s self-image. As such, a
transgression may not need to be interpreted as wrongdoing on
the part of the brand but as part of the crossing[2] through the
stages of the human lifecycle, such as from childhood to
adolescence for example. As Lee et al. (2009, p. 174) argue,
“disidentification theory suggests that people may develop their
self-concept by disidentifying with brands that are perceived to
be inconsistent with their own image”. Although the marketing
literature is silent on the relationship between image
incongruence and brand forgiveness, one could argue that,
where the brand image no longer aligns with a consumer’s self-
image, a lower willingness to forgive the brand may emerge,
especially as the brand no longer forms part of the consumer’s
self-image or identity. We were interested to assess if and to
what extend does image incongruence influence consumer’s
forgiveness for a brand. Research has not yet assessed this
relationship, and this paper tests it using the following
hypothesis:
H2. The stronger the image incongruence, the less likely
forgiveness is.
3.2.3 Value-related: corporate wrongdoing
The literature shows that corporate wrongdoing, as in illegal,
asocial, immoral or unethical acts, leads to negative feelings for
the brand on the part of the consumer. This might evolve from
moral misconduct, deceptive communication, unethical or
illegal behavior. Prominent examples are the mistreatment of
 Brand forgiveness
Marc Fetscherin and Alexandra Sampedro
Dr Dao on United Airlines Flight 3411 or the VW diesel
scandal in 2017. Unlike the other two types of brand
transgressions, corporate wrongdoing requires a more
contextual and societal or moral focus, extending beyond a
consumer’s performance expectations for a brand or an
interplay between a consumer’s self-image and the brand image
(Nenycz-Thiel and Romaniuk, 2011). While the philosophy
(North, 1987) and psychology literature have examined the
complex relationship between wrongdoing and forgiveness in
detail, the marketing literature has barely discussed this. Ran
et al. (2016, p. 1) assess the relationship between crisis
communication (after corporate wrongdoing) and consumer
forgiveness. Wei and Ran (2017) explore the impact of the
gender of the apologizer (following corporate wrongdoing) on
consumer forgiveness. While both studies contribute
something valuable, neither assesses empirically the direct
relationship between corporate wrongdoing and brand
forgiveness. This paper hypothesizes that the stronger the
perceived corporate wrongdoing is, the less likely the consumer
is to forgive:
H3. The stronger the perceived corporate wrongdoing, the
less likely forgiveness is.
3.3 Coping strategies
Prior to discussing the hypotheses related to the coping
strategies, we would like to make two comments. First, while
few authors have modeled forgiveness as a dependent variable
(Casidy and Shin, 2015; Joireman et al., 2016; Ran et al., 2016;
Sinha and Lu, 2016), most (Tsarenko and Rooslani Tojib,
2011; Tsarenko and Tojib, 2015; Riaz and Khan, 2016)
conceptualize it is as an independent or mediating variable, as
this study also does. Second, following brand transgressions, a
consumer reacts in different ways. He or she may wish to avoid
the transgressor or act in a way the transgressor does not wish
(Grégoire et al., 2009). In some instances, a consumer may
even re-engage and buy the brand again. This study focuses on
three types of consumer coping strategies. These are “take a
flight” or brand switching; “fighting” that is attacking the brand
by complaining about it or taking revenge; and finally, re-
engaging with the brand, by buying it again.
3.3.1 Taking flight
Brand avoidance is a coping process that involves protective
action and a desire to distance oneself from the brand (Harmeling
et al., 2015). Lee et al. (2009, p. 422) state that “brand avoidance
is defined as a phenomenon whereby consumers deliberately
choose to keep away from or reject a brand”. Grégoire et al.
(2010) refer to this as the “take a flight” coping strategy. In the
psychology literature, it is described as “withdrawing from the
relationship with one’s offender” (Aquino et al., 2006, p. 661).
Younger et al. (2004, p. 841) found forgiveness “was significantly
negatively correlated with avoidance (r = 0.72) motivation”. In
the marketing literature, Tsarenko and Tojib (2015, 1858) state
that “there are a number of ways a consumer can respond to a
transgression. A consumer may wish to avoid the transgressor”.
Also, Lee et al. (2009, p. 170) argue one could “use the term
brand avoidance interchangeably with brand switching”; we
believe these are similar but not the same concepts. Although
both do lead to the same consumer outcome of non-
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consumption of the brand, the latter presumes prior purchasing
of the brand. In this study, we were interested to assess brand
switching and hypothesize consumers who are more likely to
forgive are less likely to switch to another brand:
H4. Greater forgiveness leads to reduced incidence of brand
switching.
3.3.2 Fighting
Various types of brand fighting strategies exist. Generally
speaking, it is possible to differentiate between direct and
indirect fighting behavior. Indirect behavior can be pursued
either privately, such as in negative talk to family or friends
about the brand, or publicly, in a way that is more mass-
oriented, addressing a wider audience (Grégoire et al., 2010).
Both relate to the concept of negative word-of-mouth
(NWOM). Also, extensive research exists about NWOM
(Richins, 1983) effects; very limited research exists in the
marketing literature on the relationship between brand
forgiveness and NWOM. Sinha and Lu (2016) discuss
forgiveness and NWOM, both of which they conceptualize as
dependent variables, but they do not examine their inter-
relationship. Taking Grégoire et al.’s (2009, p. 29) argument
that the absence of forgiveness leads to fighting behavior, one
could hypothesize the presence of forgiveness (or higher
forgiveness) leads to reduced fighting behavior. The following
hypotheses related to indirect fighting behavior are tested:
H5a. Greater forgiveness leads to reduced private complaining.
H5b. Greater forgiveness leads to reduced public
complaining.
The most discussed direct fighting behavior is brand revenge.
Grégoire et al. (2009, p. 19) state that “desire for revenge is
defined as customers’ need to punish and cause harm to firms
for the damages they have caused”. In the psychology
literature, Younger et al. (2004, p. 841) find that forgiveness is
“significantly, negatively correlated with revenge (r = –0.42)”.
Other studies support this finding. Aquino et al. (2006, p. 655)
argue that “forgiveness implies that the victim forgoes revenge,
the factors that make revenge less likely should make
forgiveness more likely”. To the best knowledge of the authors,
this point of view has not yet been tested in the marketing
literature. Also, Tsarenko and Tojib (2015) discuss the
relationship between forgiveness and revenge; they do not
empirically assess it. This study addresses this gap by testing the
following hypothesis:
H5c. Greater forgiveness leads to reduced brand revenge.
3.3.3 Re-engaging
As Chung and Beverland (2006, p. 98) state, “following a
transgression, consumers adopted various coping strategies and
processes in re-evaluating the brand relationship”. The third type
of coping strategy is re-engagement with the brand (Noth et al.,
2015). Zarantonello et al. (2018) provide some initial signs that,
in some instances, negative emotions can change over time. The
authors identify five brand-hate trajectories. The first is called
down–up, wherein “respondents are open to buy[ing] the brand
in the future, despite the negative feelings in the present”
 Brand forgiveness
Marc Fetscherin and Alexandra Sampedro
(Zarantonello et al., 2018, p. 10). Unlike the other hypotheses
examining coping strategies, the relationship between consumer
forgiveness and re-engagement has been subject to at least one
empirical study. Tsarenko and Tojib (2015) find a positive and
significant relationship between consumer forgiveness and
repurchase intention, suggesting that consumer brand
forgiveness can, in some instances, rebuild damaged
relationships. This paper retests the following hypothesis:
H6. Greater forgiveness induces increased likelihood to buy
the brand again.
Figure 2, below, provides a visualization of the research
framework used in this paper.
4. Methodology
4.1 Items
The three brand transgression constructs are measured with
items suggested by Lee et al. (2009) and Hegner et al. (2017).
Four items measuring negative past experience, five items
measuring image incongruence and four items measuring
corporate wrongdoing.
To measure forgiveness, five items by Xie and Peng (2009)
were used. There are three main reasons we chose the items by
Xie and Peng (2009). First, forgiveness is, like love and hate, a
very complex and ambiguous constructs with different
interpretations, contexts and scales presented in the literature.
As there is no unique and specific brand forgiveness scale
available, we had to choose one which has been used in the past
in the marketing context. Second, many of the forgiveness
scales discussed in the psychology literature have been
developed in the context of intra- (self) or interpersonal
relationships, and are therefore not suitable for this study.
Third, as Table I shows, there are only a handful of studies
using a forgiveness scale in the marketing context. Some of
them do not provide any details of the items used (Riaz and
Khan, 2016) where others used a scale with less items than the
one by Xie and Peng (2009) which consists of five items. For
example, Ran et al. (2016) used four items, Tsarenko and Tojib
(2015) and Casidy and Shin (2015) measured consumer
forgiveness on a three-item scale or Sinha and Lu (2016) used a
single-item scale. In line with Diamantopoulos et al.’s (2012,
p. 434) argument that “multi-item scales clearly outperform
Figure 2 Research framework
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single items”, we chose the scale used by Xie and Peng (2009)
which had the most items.
For the three coping strategies, three items were taken from
Romani et al. (2012) to measure brand switching and three
more to measure private complaining. To measure public
complaining, a combination of items from Romani et al. (2012)
and Thomson et al. (2012) were used. The items used to
measure brand revenge (four items) are based on Thomson
et al.’s (2012) work. Table AIII presents details of the items.
For all items, a five-point Likert scale, ranging from 1 (strongly
disagree) to 5 (strongly agree) was used. The order of items per
construct was randomized to address common method bias.
Before the survey was conducted in the broader population, a
pre-test was completed to assess whether there were any issues
with any of the items. The final items in the survey were socio-
demographical questions.
4.2 Data collection and sample
To gather data and to address common method bias, an
anonymous and confidential survey was undertaken
(Chang et al., 2010) using the online crowdsourcing platform
Mechanical Turk (MTurk). A number of studies have supported
the use of MTurk respondents (Wang et al., 2013; Gershoff and
Frels, 2015). Buhrmester et al. (2011, p. 5) state that “the quality
of data provided by MTurk met or exceeded the psychometric
standards associated with published research” (p. 5). This study
was restricted to respondents living in the USA. This was done
because many scales have been developed in the context of the
USA, and it is the largest single consumer market, making up
over a quarter of the world’s consumer spending (World Bank,
2018); thus, it is a suitable context for this study. Each
respondent answered questions for one brand only, for which
they had negative feelings for. They were paid US$1.25 upon
completion of the survey. This procedure resulted in 472 usable
responses. The sample includes consumers from a variety of
upbringings, varying in their age, gender, ethnicity, marital status,
educational background and geographical region in a way similar
to that of the USA population, as reported in the US census data
(see Table AIV).
4.3 Participants and brands studies
This study’s sample is well above the minimum range of 300
respondents and has a sample-to-item ratio of 15.22, which is
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Marc Fetscherin and Alexandra Sampedro Volume 28 · Number 5 · 2019 · 633–652

higher than the acceptable 10:1 ratio (Nunnally and Bernstein, Table III Correlations of brand transgressions
1978). The results of the Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO) test,
1 2
with 0.815, and Barlett’s test of sphericity indicate significance,
indicating that this study has an adequate sample. The unit of Performance: negative past experience
analysis is the individual’s brand relationship. The respondents Image: incongruence 0.122**
were free to mention any brand they felt negatively about. In Value: corporate wrongdoing 0.001 0.259**
total, 195 different brands were mentioned, covering numerous Notes: *p > 0.05; **p > 0.01; and Kendall’s tau-b correlations (a
industries. The most cited brands were Apple (8.5 per cent), measure of correlation between ordinal scales)
Walmart (5.7 per cent), McDonalds (3.6 per cent), Comcast
(3.2 per cent) and with 3 per cent each, Nestle and Nike. About
70 per cent of all brands (136 of 195 brands) were mentioned
only once. These results are consistent with previous studies of
negative brand relationships (Kucuk, 2008; Hegner et al., Table IV Correlations of coping strategies
2017). 1 2 3 4
Brand switching
5. Results Private complaining 0.172**
5.1 Validity and reliability tests Public complaining 0.100** 0.207**
Principle factor analysis with promax rotation was used. As Brand revenge 0.003 0.168** 0.323**
theorized, all constructs had eigenvalues > 1, and they explain Brand forgiveness*** 0.096** 0.203** 0.111** 0.111**
71 per cent of the cumulative variance. Of the initial 31 items, Notes: *p > 0.05; **p > 0.01. Kendall’s tau-b correlations (a measure of
no item had significant cross-loadings (> 0.50). The details of correlation between ordinal scales); ***Simply to demonstrate that brand
the principal factor analysis are shown in Table AV. All scales forgiveness is not correlated to any coping strategy
proved to be reliable, with all Cronbach’s a values > 0.70,
ranging from 0.748 to 0.913. A series of regressions models
were used to assess multicollinearity using the variance inflation five items of the forgiveness scale was calculated. Figure 3
factor (VIF). This study obtained values between 1.039 and provides a visualization of the distribution of forgiveness scores.
1.261, which can be considered unproblematic. We calculated It shows a normal distribution, with a median of 3. Both the
the average variance extracted (AVE) and construct reliability skewness ( 0.268) and kurtosis ( 0.374) had low negative
(CR) to assess convergent validity. All values were above the values, indicating a slight, but not problematic, skew to the left.
recommended thresholds (AVE > 0.50; CR > 0.60). Table II The results show that 20 per cent of the respondents (95 of 472
provides a summary of the results. respondents | M  2) are very unlikely, and 6 per cent (55 of
Finally, to achieve discriminant validity, AVE values must be 472 respondents | M  4) are very likely, to forgive their brand.
greater than the squared inter-construct correlation (SIC) Further, 48 per cent (285 of 472 respondents | M < 3) are
estimates. The calculations show that the AVE values were unlikely or very unlikely to forgive and 32 per cent (187 of 472
greater than the SIC values (Tables III and IV). The respondents | M > 3) are likely or very likely to forgive. These
correlations between the various constructs are either non- results suggest that almost half of consumers are unlikely to
significant or significantly lower than 0.60. The highest value forgive a brand (48 per cent) compared to about a third (32 per
was 0.323, suggesting these are different brand transgressions cent) of consumers are likely to. The latter number suggests
and coping strategies. enormous opportunities for companies to identify and fix
broken brand relationships.
5.2 Hypotheses testing 5.2.1 Effect of severity of brand transgressions on brand forgiveness
Before testing the hypotheses, this paper explores how many
As discussed in Section 3.1, respondents were grouped into
respondents were likely/very likely or unlikely/very unlikely to
low- or high-severity groups for each of the three brand
forgive their brand. A score consisting of the mean values of the
transgression types (performance, image or value). Multiple
one-way analyses of variance (ANOVAs) were calculated,
Table II Cronbach’s a, AVE, CR following the appropriate procedure for testing overall
Construct Cronbach’s a AVE CR differences between degrees of severity (high vs low) of the
three types of brand transgression on brand forgiveness.
Brand transgressions All the results for H1-H3 were significant, with results for H1
Performance: negative past experience 0.748 0.58 0.76 (F(1, 442) = 6.840, p < 0.01); H2 (F(1, 459) = 6.406, p < 0.01)
Image: incongruence 0.837 0.62 0.64 and H3 (F(1, 447) = 3.135, p < 0.05). For example, for H1, it
Value: corporate wrongdoing 0.913 0.78 0.94 was found that consumers who had a more severe negative past
Brand forgiveness 0.841 0.61 0.80 experience(s) are less likely to forgive (MForgiveness = 2.78) the
Coping strategies brand than consumers who had a less severe negative past
Switching 0.756 0.67 0.86 experience (MForgiveness = 3.09). Overall, the results show the
Private complaining 0.876 0.80 0.95 more severe the brand transgression is, the less likely the
Public complaining 0.804 0.72 0.90 consumer is to forgive the brand, regardless if the brand
Brand revenge 0.892 0.79 0.95 transgression is performance-, image- or value-related. The
results confirm findings in the psychology showing that “the

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Figure 3 Forgiveness-scores distribution
relationship between transgression severity and forgiveness is
arguably the most robust phenomenon” (Fincham et al., 2005,
p. 861). Moreover, the results suggest the approach used to
categorize respondents a posteriori into low- and high-severity
transgressions, depending on their real experience with a brand,
leads to meaningful and significant results. Table V provides
further details on the ANOVAs.
Figure 4 provides an illustration of the results.
Three linear regressions were conducted separately to assess
the importance of each of the three brand transgressions on
brand forgiveness. The results in Table VI show that each of the
three brand transgressions individually and significantly affects
brand forgiveness.
Finally, a multiple regression analysis was run: the dependent
variable brand forgiveness was regressed for all three
independent variables simultaneously to assess their collective
where the results are presented in Table VII.
The findings show that negative past experience has the
strongest effects on brand forgiveness ( b = 0.186), followed
by image incongruence ( b = 0.158) and corporate
wrongdoing ( b = 0.096). This suggests that consumers are
more likely to forgive a brand after a negative experience with
the brand than if there is an incongruence between the brand
image and consumer’s self-image, or if there is corporate
wrongdoing. This makes sense, as having had a negative past
experience means the consumer once had an interaction or
even had a positive relationship with the brand, but this
relationship is now broken. Finally, the multiple regression
Table V Summary results H1-H3
Construct Low severity (SD)
H1: Performance: negative past experience 3.09 (0.85)
H2: Image: incongruence 3.39 (0.71)
H3: Value: corporate wrongdoing 3.09 (0.67)
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analysis was able to explain almost one-third (29 per cent) of
brand forgiveness.
5.2.2 Effects of brand forgiveness on coping strategies
The second set of analysis assessed two degrees of brand
forgiveness (low vs high) and their effects on three different
types of consumer coping strategies (switching, attacking
and purchasing again). All hypotheses were significant, as
follows: H4 (F(1, 411) = 3.257, p < 0.10); H5a
(F(1, 411) = 11.263, p < 0.01); H5b (F(1, 411) = 7.658,
p < 0.05); H5c (F(1, 411) = 8.288, p < 0.01); and H6 with
(F(1, 411) = 28.704, p < 0.01). The results of the ANOVAs
are shown in Table VIII.
For H4 confirms that consumers who are more likely to
forgive are less likely to switch brands (MSwitching = 4.21)
than to those who are less likely to forgive (MSwitching =
4.39). The results confirm findings from the psychology
literature that show that greater forgiveness leads to lower
switching behavior (Younger et al., 2004). For attack
strategies, the more likely a consumer is to forgive, the less
likely he or she is to engage in private (MPrivate Complaining =
4.16) or public complaining (MPublic Complaining = 1.56) than
those less likely to forgive, who are more likely to complain
privately (MPrivate Complaining = 4.50) or publicly
(MPublic Complaining = 1.82). We get similar results for revenge
behavior, as Table VIII shows.
Finally, the results for H6 indicate that consumers who are
more likely to forgive are also more likely to purchase the brand
High severity (SD) Diff. Significance Supported
2.78 (0.93) 0.31 0.01 
2.81 (0.92) 0.58 0.01 
2.81 (0.94) 0.28 0.05 
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Figure 4 Brand transgressions versus forgiveness

Table VI Individual effects of brand transgressions on brand forgiveness

Independent variables Standard b t-value Significance R2 Significant F
Performance: negative past experience 0.215 4.773 0.000 0.215 0.000
Image: incongruence 0.217 4.831 0.000 0.217 0.000
Value: corporate wrongdoing 0.135 3.108 0.002 0.142 0.002

Table VII Combined effects of brand transgressions on brand forgiveness

Independent variables Standard b t-value Significance
Performance: negative past experience –0.186 –4.149 0.000
Image: incongruence –0.158 –3.377 0.001
Value: corporate wrongdoing –0.096 –2.095 0.037
Notes: R2 = 0.297; Significant F = 0.000

Table VIII Summary results H4-H6

Construct High forgiveness (SD) Low forgiveness (SD) Difference Significance Supported
H4: Brand switching 4.21 (1.05) 4.39 (0.96) 0.18 0.07 
H5a: Private complaining 4.16 (0.95) 4.50 (0.81) 0.34 0.00 
H5b: Public complaining 1.56 (0.82) 1.82 (1.06) 0.26 0.01 
H5c: Brand revenge 1.24 (0.58) 1.44 (0.83) 0.20 0.00 
H6: Likely to buy 1.77 (1.14) 1.26 (0.80) 0.51 0.00 

again (MPurchasing Again = 1.77) than consumers who are less
likely to forgive (MPurchasing Again = 1.26). Figure 5 provides an
illustration of the results.
6. Discussion and implications
6.1 Theoretical discussion
The main objectives of this paper are to explore, discuss and
advance the understanding of brand forgiveness and to stimulate
further study of this under-researched concept. This paper
develops and tests a conceptual framework for brand forgiveness
and advance knowledge in this subject area in three ways.
First, a detailed literature review on forgiveness in the
marketing context is conducted, and the current state of
research is outlined, as well as the lack of empirical studies on
consumer’s real experience with brands is also highlighted.
Second, it is important to note that brand forgiveness is a
relatively new construct, and this study extends prior research
on forgiveness in two ways. First, forgiveness was discussed
exclusively in the theology and philosophy at first. Only a few
decades ago did it begin to be empirically studied in
psychology, where the forgiveness theory assesses mostly intra-
and interpersonal relationships. This study extends prior
research as it studies forgiveness in the context of brand
relationships. Second, although there are many examples in
practice that show brand transgression frequently occurs (e.g.
VW, United Airlines, IKEA, H&M), it has not yet been
sufficiently investigated in the academic marketing literature.
Brand forgiveness is conceptualized as a unique and central
emotion that only requires the consumer to forgive the brand.
Therefore, it is a different construct than pardoning, excusing,
forgetting or reconciliation where consumer forgiveness must
be earned by the brand through trustworthy behavior. This is
what makes this construct so intriguing and exciting.
Third, this study complements the research framework
presented in Figure 2 by also empirically testing it by means of a

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Figure 5 Brand forgiveness versus coping strategies
representative US sample of 472 consumers. It that respect, it
conducts two sets of analyses. One of these examines the
relationship between the severity of three types of brand
transgressions (performance, image and value) and brand
forgiveness, while the other assesses the effects of
brand forgiveness on three different consumer coping strategies
(switching, attacking and purchasing again). The findings show
that the severity of the brand transgression impacts brand
forgiveness, a finding that supports previous findings in the
psychology literature (Fincham et al., 2005). In that respect, this
paper not only conceptually argues but also empirically shows
that brand forgiveness is driven by the severity and type of brand
transgressions. It also shows that negative past experience has
the greatest effect on brand forgiveness, meaning that, if a brand
transgression is performance-related, it leads to the greatest
likelihood that a consumer can forgive the brand. Therefore,
this study advances the understanding of brand forgiveness by
showing that it is possible to change a broken or negative brand
relationship by either decreasing switching or attack behaviors,
as well as increasing the likelihood of purchasing the brand
again.
6.2 Managerial implications
This study provides useful insights and recommendations for
managers. First, it is important for companies to understand what
to do when a brand transgression happens. It is not a question of if,
but when it happens (Ran et al., 2016). This is especially
important, given the fact that such transgressions can cause
significant reputational and financial damages to companies.
Second, because companies seek closer relationships with
consumers, and consumers strengthen their ties with brands
(Fournier, 1998), the concept of brand forgiveness forms “the
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basis to restore the relationship to its original pre-transgression
state, or minimize bad feeling and harm” (Chung and
Beverland, 2006, p. 98). This paper advances the
understanding of consumer behavior relative to the role and
importance of brand forgiveness in dealing with performance-,
image- and value-related brand transgressions. As such, this
study provides managers with the insight that different brand
transgressions impact consumers’ forgiveness differently. The
results highlight that relationships damaged by performance-
related transgressions (e.g. poor performance; dissatisfaction
with the product) have the highest likelihood of being restored.
On the other hand, image-related (e.g. not fitting my
personality; not symbolizing me) and specifically, value-related
transgressions, such as corporate wrongdoing (e.g. unethical,
immoral, or irresponsible behavior) are less likely to result in
consumer forgiveness for brands. This insight can allow
companies to classify unhappy consumers into types of brand
transgressions, and then prioritizing which group is more likely
to forgive the brand. In fact, one could classify consumers’
incidences into a 3  2 matrix consisting of the three types of
brand transgression (performance, image and value)  two
levels of consumer spending (high and low). This would allow
companies to prioritize cases, focusing on those that are the
most likely to result in a positive outcome (e.g. performance-
related transgression) for the most important customers
(highest spending). Furthermore, this classification can also
allow companies to better allocate their resources and plan
appropriate communication and service-recovery strategies.
6.3 Limitations and future research
This study has some limitations. First, similar to the emotions
of love and hate (Underhill, 2012), forgiveness is a complex
 Brand forgiveness
Marc Fetscherin and Alexandra Sampedro
emotional reaction and is culturally constructed (Sandage
and Williamson, 2007). The study assessed the brand
forgiveness of US consumers only. Future research could
assess to what extent brand forgiveness varies by country or
culture. Second, for some of the brand transgressions, the
research design did not differentiate whether it was
the company’s fault or not. Future research could refine
the research model presented into scenarios of controllable
and non-controllable transgression, as was done by Sinha and
Lu (2016). Third, this study did not assess any response
strategy by any of the companies involved. Future research
could build on the research design used here and include
additional variables, as well as the investigating the effects of
response strategy on brand forgiveness. Fourth, as Tsarenko
and Tojib (2011, p. 382) state, “there is a general consensus
that forgiveness is a process rather than an act, that evolves
over time”. Work by Grégoire et al. (2009) and Zarantonello
et al. (2018) has shown changes in negative emotions over
time; future research could assess to what extent forgiveness
changes or does not change over time. Fifth, research in
psychology has examined the effects of personality traits on
forgiveness (Neto, 2007), which could be another avenue of
research in regards to brand forgiveness. Sixth, another
avenue of research could be to assess the relationships among
of brand love, brand hate and brand forgiveness. Specifically,
it could be explored what companies can do with brand haters
and how they can change brand haters into brand lovers, as
well as the role of forgiveness. Seventh, while almost 30 per
cent of the brand forgiveness construct was explained by the
three types brand transgressions, future research needs to
explore what other factors could explain brand forgiveness,
such as blame attribution, perceived fairness or relational
norm violations (Joireman et al., 2016). Eighth, forgiveness is
a complex and an ambiguous construct, and it “can be
assessed from the perspective of the forgiver or from the
perspective of the offender”. In that respect, it would be
interesting to explore and compare different methods by
conducting studies which assess brand forgiveness from the
perspective of the company (self-forgiveness) and
the consumer’s perspective and evaluate the overlap and the
differences in these perspectives to draft appropriate response
and communication strategies. In addition, the psychology
literature presents many different forgiveness scales (Hebl
and Enright, 1993; Enright et al., 1995; Rye et al., 2001;
Thompson et al., 2005) depending on the type of
respondents, types of forgiveness and methods used. The few
studies on forgiveness in the marketing literature have
adopted existing scales developed in the psychology
literature. While this is a suitable approach and has shown to
provide meaningful results, the question arises if these scales
cover the entire spectrum of brand forgiveness or maybe there
is more to this construct? To have a definite answer, we
recommend that, on the one hand, future research could
apply and compare different forgiveness scales in the
branding context to assess which of these scales is the most
valid and reliable one and provides meaningful results. But,
on the other hand, we also encourage researchers to develop a
specific brand forgiveness scale. A similar path has been taken
for other constructs such as brand love where researchers first
applied scales developed in the psychology, and then later
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developed specific brand love scales (Batra et al., 2012).
Ninth, research about brand love showed it is not product
category-specific (Fetscherin et al., 2014). Therefore,
another avenue of research could be to assess if, why and to
what extend brand forgiveness is or is not product or service
category-specific. Finally, despite the authors’ best efforts to
address common method bias in the study design, the same
source of data (respondents) was used to gather all
information, which does not allow us to fully exclude
common method bias.
Notes
1 Zourrig et al. (2009, p. 407) also state that “Forgiveness
should be differentiated from ‘pardoning’ (which is a legal
term), ‘condoning’ (which implies a justification of the
offense), ‘excusing’ (which implies that the offender has a
good reason for committing the offense), ‘forgetting’
(which implies that the memory of the offense has simply
decayed or slipped out of conscious awareness), and
‘denying’ (which implies an unwillingness to perceive the
harmful injuries that one has incurred)”.
2 “Transgreession” which in Latin means Tr ansgressus or
Trans = (across the); gressus = (step) or in other words “to
step across”.
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“Mapping symbolic (anti-) consumption”, Journal of Business
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Nyer, P.U. and Gopinath, M. (2005), “Effects of complaining
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Singh, J. (1990), “Voice, exit, and negative word-of-mouth
behaviors: an investigation across three service categories”,
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Development in Marketing, Vol. 17, p. 30.
 Brand forgiveness Journal of Product & Brand Management
Marc Fetscherin and Alexandra Sampedro Volume 28 · Number 5 · 2019 · 633–652

Appendix 1

Table AI Journals with most forgiveness articles published

# Journal # Articles published % of all publications from WoS Total citations within WoS
1 Personality and Individual Differences 46 3.8 973
2 Journal of Psychology and Theology 24 2.0 197
3 Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 22 1.8 1,336
4 Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology 19 1.6 778
5 Personal Relationships 18 1.5 392
6 Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 14 1.1 394
7 Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 14 1.1 1,336
8 Journal of Positive Psychology 13 1.1 106
9 Journal of Religious Ethics 13 1.1 19
10 Philosophia 13 1.1 13
11 European Journal of Social Psychology 12 1.0 215
12 Journal of Religion and Health 11 0.9 79
13 Journal of Social and Personal Relationships 11 0.9 183
14 Journal of Clinical Psychology 10 0.8 189
15 Psychological Reports 10 0.8 27

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Appendix 2

Table AII Most cited articles on forgiveness

# Article Total citations from WoS
1 Finkel, E. J., Rusbult, C. E., Kumashiro, M., and Hannon, P. A. (2002), “Dealing with betrayal in close relationships: Does 317
commitment promote forgiveness?” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 82 No. 6, pp. 956-974
2 McCullough, M. E., Bellah, C. G., Kilpatrick, S. D., and Johnson, J. L. (2001), “Vengefulness: Relationships with forgiveness, 246
rumination, well-being, and the Big Five”, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Vol. 27 No. 5, pp. 601-610
3 McCullough, M. E., Fincham, F. D., and Tsang, J. A. (2003), “Forgiveness, forbearance, and time: the temporal unfolding of 234
transgression-related interpersonal motivations”, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Vol. 84 No. 3, pp. 540-557
4 Aquino, K., Tripp, T. M., and Bies, R. J. (2006), “Getting even or moving on? Power, procedural justice, and types of offense 220
as predictors of revenge, forgiveness, reconciliation, and avoidance in organizations”, Journal of Applied Psychology,
Vol. 91 No. 3, pp. 653-668
5 Thompson, L. Y., Snyder, C. R., Hoffman, L., Michael, S. T., Rasmussen, H. N., Billings, L. S., ... and Roberts, D. E. (2005), 210
“Dispositional forgiveness of self, others, and situations”, Journal of Personality, Vol. 73 No. 2, pp. 313-360
6 Fehr, R., Gelfand, M. J., and Nag, M. (2010), “The road to forgiveness: a meta-analytic synthesis of its situational and 194
dispositional correlates”, Psychological Bulletin, Vol. 136 No. 5, pp. 894-914
7 Farrow, T. F., Zheng, Y., Wilkinson, I. D., Spence, S. A., Deakin, J. W., Tarrier, N., ... and Woodruff, P. W. (2001), 190
“Investigating the functional anatomy of empathy and forgiveness”, Neuroreport, Vol. 12 No. 11,
pp. 2433-2438
8 Worthington, E. L., and Scherer, M. (2004), “Forgiveness is an emotion-focused coping strategy that can reduce health risks 189
and promote health resilience: Theory, review, and hypotheses”, Psychology & Health, Vol. 19 No. 3, pp. 385-405
9 Brown, R. P. (2003), “Measuring individual differences in the tendency to forgive: Construct validity and links with 181
depression”, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, Vol. 29 No. 6, pp. 759-771
10 McCullough, M. E. (2000), “Forgiveness as human strength: Theory, measurement, and links to well-being”, Journal of 164
Social and Clinical Psychology, Vol. 19 No. 1, pp. 43-55
Note: As the full citation is provided here, articles are not cited in reference list again

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Table AIII Survey items

Time Construct # items Item description Adapted from
Brand transgressions Performance 4 The performance of products of X is poor Lee et al. (2009)
Negative past experience X’s products are inconvenient
My hate for X is linked to the bad performance of this product
I am dissatisfied by X
Image incongruence 5 The products of X do not reflect who I am Lee et al. (2009)
The products of X do not fit my personality
I do not want to be seen with X
X does not represent what I am
X symbolizes the kind of person I would never want to be
Value 4 In my opinion, X acts irresponsible Lee et al. (2009)
Corporate wrongdoing In my opinion, X acts unethically
X violates moral standards
X does not match my values and beliefs
Coping strategy Brand switching 3 I buy X less frequently than before Romani et al. (2012)
I stop buying X and will not buy it anymore
I switched to a competing brand
Private complaining 3 I discourage friends and relatives to buy X Romani et al. (2012)
I say negative things about X to others
I recommend not to buy X to someone who seeks my advice
Public complaining 3 I became involved in organizations or clubs united against X Romani et al. (2012)
I complained to law enforcement about X
I complained to external agencies (e.g. consumer unions) about X
Brand revenge 4 I imagined how to hurt X Thomson et al. (2012)
I obsessed over what I could do to get back at X
I made it one of my life’s missions to damage X
I became fascinated about the various ways I can do to harm X
Forgiveness Forgiveness scale 5 I would think favorably of X Xie and Peng (2009)
Given X’s response, I would condemn it
Given X’s response, I would forgive it
I would disapprove of X
I feel sympathetic toward X
Anchor: Five-point Likert scale from a scale of extremely likely to extremely unlikely

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Appendix 3

Table AIV Descriptive statistics of samples

Survey 1 US 2010

(n = 472) CENSUS
Gender In % In %
Male 49 49
Female 51 51
Age* In % In %
18-24 5 17
25-34 38 17
35-44 30 17
45-54 16 18
55-64 10 15
> 65 1 16
Marital status In % In %
Single 40 34
Married 50 52
Divorced or widow 10 14
Highest educational level In % In %
High school or less 28 67
Associate degree 22 21
Bachelor’s degree 36 10
Master’s degree 12 2
Doctorate degree (PhD/MD/JD) 2
Ethnicity In % In %
White 85 75
Black or African American 6 14
Hispanic or Latino 4 n/a
Asian 4 6
Native American and other 1 5
Geographical US region In % In %
Northeast 30 18
Midwest 24 22
South 35 37
West 11 23
Note: *Census data reported excluding ages 0-18 years old to make it
comparable to respondents’ sample

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Appendix 4

Table AV Factor analysis

Short description of item 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Bad performance of product 0.864
Poor performance 0.862
Products are inconvenient 0.666
Dissatisfied by product 0.607
Not represent what I am 0.837
Not fit my personality 0.824
Brand not reflect me 0.797
Not seen with 0.736
Not symbolize me 0.721
Acts unethically 0.933
Violates moral standards 0.918
Acts irresponsible 0.859
Does not match my values and beliefs 0.825
I stop buying 0.848
Buy less frequently 0.827
Switched to a competing brand 0.782
I recommend not to buy 0.908
I discourage friends to buy 0.902
I say negative things to others 0.878
I complained to law enforcement 0.874
I am involved in clubs against brand 0.858
I complained to external agencies 0.808
Fascinated about the ways to harm 0.920
I obsessed to get back 0.909
I made my missions to damage 0.895
I imagined how to hurt 0.827
I would think favorably 0.878
I would forgive it 0.841
I would disapprove (reverse) 0.813
I feel sympathetic toward brand 0.729
I would condemn it 0.630

About the authors
Marc Fetscherin is the Ronald G. and N. Jayne Gelbman
Chair of International Business and Professor of Marketing in
the Department of Business (AACSB-accredited) at Rollins,
Florida, USA. His expertise is in international marketing with
a specialization in marketing strategy, marketing research and
branding. He has published a number of books, book chapters
and journal articles. His articles have appeared in Harvard
Business Review, Journal of Business Research, International
Journal of Market Research, International Marketing Review,
European Journal of Marketing, Journal of Consumer Marketing,
Journal of Brand Management and Journal of Product and Brand
Management. His most recent edited books are Consumer
Brand Relationships: Meaning, Measuring, Managing (2015)
and CEO Branding: Theory and Practice (2015).
Marc Fetscherin is the corresponding author and can be
contacted at: mfetscherin@rollins.edu
Alexandra Sampedro is form Brazil and a recent
undergraduate International Business student from the
Department of Business (AACSB-accredited) at Rollins,
Florida. She holds an Honors Bachelor’s Degree in
International Business. Currently, she is a graduate student
and pursues a Master of Human Resources at Rollins, Florida,
USA.

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