Extending Equity Theory: How Consumers Respond to "Collaborative" Behaviour of Micro-Influencers

KREMS, Austria - July 9, 2024 - PRLog -- Consumers using social media respond to interactions between micro-influencers and the hospitality industry when the latter two act in a "collaborative" setting (free food/accomodation vs. mentioning the hospitality business on social media). Interestingly, the results of a study conducted by an international team of researchers, including IMC Krems University of Applied Sciences, indicate that consumers tend to dislike the "collaboration" behaviour of micro-influencers, because they perceive it as unfair or unequal. The researchers' interpretation of the results, recently published in the prestigious Q1 magazine Journal of Tourism and Hospitality Management, helps to extend the application of the so-called equity theory by including the perspective of social media users as a third party.

Equity theory is a motivational theory suggesting that people seek fairness in social relationships by comparing their own efforts and rewards with those of others. Feeling unfairly treated compared to others leads to dissatisfaction, which may result in behavioural changes to compensate for the perceived imbalance. Based on equity theory, the current study analyses the perceptions and reactions of a third party (consumers using social media) to the exchange between the taking party (social media micro-influencers) and the giving party (restaurants) in "collaboration scenarios" of the hospitality industry. Although practices of paid influencers have been well studied in the existing scientific literature, the collaboration phenomenon with unpaid micro-influencers has yet been a grey area as it is theoretically and empirically unclear how it influences user behaviour. Giancarlo Fedeli from the Institute of Tourism, Wine Business and Marketing at IMC Krems and his colleagues Zhuowei (Joy) Huang from Sun Yat-sen University (China) and Mingming Cheng from Curtin University (Australia) have tackled this so far poorly researched topic – and discovered some interesting facts.

Original Publication: Trouble in paradise? Collaboration behavior and ethics of micro-influencers in the hospitality industry. Zhuowei(Joy) Huang, Giancarlo Fedeli, Mingming Cheng. Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management 59 (2024) 25–35. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhtm.2024.03.005

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IMC Krems University of Applied Sciences

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