The Relationships Between Culture and Behavioral Intentions Toward Services

Some recent studies have shown that culture influences how consumers perceive service quality. Others have shown the relationship between perceived service quality and behavioral intentions. In this article, the authors study how culture influences behavioral intentions toward services on the basis of services marketing and cross-cultural psychology literature. They tested and found that customers from cultures with lower individualism or higher uncertainty avoidance tend to have a higher intention to praise if they received superior service. On the other hand, the same groups tend not to switch, give negative word of mouth, or complain even if they received poor service quality. Customers from cultures with higher individualism or lower uncertainty avoidance tend to switch, engage in negative word of mouth, or complain if they received poor service quality. But they do not tend to praise when they received superior service. Managerial implications, contribution, and future research directions are also discussed.