2007 Annual International CHRIE Conference & Exposition
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Table 3
Behavioral Intentions by NVB
Behavioral Intentions measured
NVB1
NVB2
t
sig
say positive things about this hotel to other
people
6.03
1.93
45.17
.000
recommend this hotel to someone who seeks
your advice
6.07
1.89
45.50
.000
encourage friend and relatives to stay at this
hotel
6.13
1.78
48.35
.000
consider this hotel your first choice in the
next few years
6.07
1.76
47.62
.000
if any problem occur during your stay which
hotel you stay at, how likely is it that you
would get in touch with the same staff
again?
6.08
1.75
46.15
.000
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Like any spoken language, body language has words, sentences and punctuation. Each gesture is like a
single word and one word may have several different meanings. Nonverbal behavior can have several functions in
service recovery. It can clarify verbal message (i.e., communication depends largely on what you are doing vocally
and bodily while saying it). NVC can also help establish a relationship between staff and customer and help
establish staff credibility (i.e., customer’s perception of staff competence, trustworthiness and character). Service
recovery is a very delicate, interaction-intensive and emotionally-driven moment-of-truth in which customer may
become extremely vigilant to any kind of cue. Empirical negligence of the likely effects of nonverbal behavior on
customers’ recovery emotions and how customers evaluate service provider is therefore curious. This study explored
whether staff’s NVB during a service recovery could shape customers’ emotional reactions, their evaluation of the
staff and their behavioral intentions. Empirical evidence in the study suggests that NVB during a recovery could
determine customers’ cognitive and affective states.
An open body posture, accompanied with an appropriate eye
contact leads to positive emotion and favorable perceptions of the service personnel. Staff displaying such positive
NVB is likely to be seen more credible, competent, courteous and trustworthy. Favorable NVB appears to have
significantly increased the respondents’ ratings on behavioral intentions and contacting with the same staff (i.e., trust
and empathy building). This has significant implications on the perceived effectiveness of the recovery effort and
maintaining long-term relationship with customers. The limitations of the study should be noted. The same
respondents were required to rate their evaluation twice for two different NVB. Although it is not reported,
recruiting the same respondents may result in respondent fatigue. Respondents were required to put themselves in
the pictured situation. Their perception of the NVB and verbal response may be shaped by their cultural background,
familiarity with the situation, perceived severity of the problem and so on. Thus, more controlled studies are needed.
Their reactions to NVB may differ in different failure situations. These respondents were having holiday in Turkey,
thus their recovery judgments may have been determined by overall (dis)satisfaction with their present holiday.
Observational methods in real life situations may have been a more suitable research method, as individuals would
naturally react in a negative manner to negative verbal signs. Nevertheless, this study has potential to initiate more
research interest on this much neglected issue. One of the interesting areas would be contrasting the effects of verbal
responses and NVB (separate and combined effects) on customers’ affective and cognitive state. The majority of
previous research have followed a methodology in which only verbal recovery responses were provided and
assessed (i.e., without visual aids for respondents to see the NVB that accompanies that verbal saying). This
exclusion of NVB limits our understanding of how customers evaluate complaint handling. Limited understanding
of NVB’s functions during a service recovery may explain why the majority of recovery efforts could not move
customers’ from a state of satisfaction to a state of dissatisfaction.
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