This research investigates the influence of taboos on customer decision-making and behavior, specifically applying the "death taboo" concept to hotel accommodations. A death taboo in this context refers to customers encountering information or phenomena related to a death having occurred in the hotel. Even without objective service failures, such encounters trigger psychological responses that impact customer experience and decisions.
It conducted two experiments with 300 participants to explore changes in customer satisfaction, switching intention, switching costs, and repurchase intention (hotel retention). It is manipulated three death taboo scenarios: word-of-mouth (WOM) about a past death(ex. an online rumor about someone had died in a fire at the hotel two years prior, and a guest room had been used as the mortuary), personal experience (PE) of strange phenomena(ex. hearing knocking at their door, but upon opening it, no one was there), and a mixed scenario combining both. These represented low, middle, and high death taboo contexts, respectively. Customer satisfaction was measured with seven items (5-point Likert scale) before and after the manipulation, fear level with eight items (5-point Likert scale) after, and switching intention (seven items) and hotel retention (three items) were assessed, with switching cost being manipulated.
Results indicate that encountering a death taboo significantly reduces customer satisfaction, particularly in the high (mixed) taboo context. Fear levels varied significantly across scenarios (Mix > PE > WOM), influencing satisfaction in low (WOM) and high (mixed) contexts, but not the middle (PE). In low taboo situations, customers consider switching costs rationally; however, stronger death taboos cause fear to override rational considerations of switching costs. Ultimately, a higher switching tendency leads to lower hotel retention, even when no objective accommodation failure occurred. This study demonstrates how the death taboo complexly influences customer behavior, showing a transformation from psychological change to explicit action, providing empirical contributions to marketing and customer decision theories

Authors:
Hui-Hsin Huang, Fu Jen Catholic University, Taiwan

About the Presenter(s)
Hui-Hsin Huang is an associate professor with the Department of Advertising &Public Relations, Fu Jen Catholic University, Taiwan.Her research interests are consumer behavior, consumer psychology, and advertising effectiveness.

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