Concealing Your Consumer Stupidity: How the Fear of Appearing as an Incompetent Consumer Reduces Negative Word-of-Mouth

This research proposes that the decision to share negative wordof-mouth (WOM) will involve a dilemma between the various benefits of sharing negative WOM and the potential psychosocial cost of appearing as an incompetent consumer. Specifically, we suggest that dissatisfying purchase experiences – of the kind that are generally assumed to inspire negative WOM – can sometimes reflect poorly on consumers. For example, when a consumer purchased, in retrospect, an inferior product, or paid too high a price because they were not sufficiently careful. Consumers may be concerned that revealing such information could cause them to appear as an incompetent consumer in the eyes of the intended recipient. To avoid this possibility, we predict that individuals will sometimes withhold or distort negative WOM.