Abstract
The voluntary shift of responsibility from the producer to the consumer is one feature of self-design activities. Past research emphasizes the economic gains of such customer co-creation. However, the psychological mechanism underlying customer co-creation behavior is still not fully understood. Notably, the goal-driven self-congruence nature of customer co-creation is mostly ignored in the co-creation literature. The objective of this research is to firstly develop a conceptual understanding of how co-creation literature can be related to the self-congruence theory. Furthermore, this study also extends the original self-congruence theory by arguing the differential role of actual and ideal self-congruence on the relationship between self-congruence and customers’ willingness to participate in the co-creation process. Two laboratory experiments were conducted to examine whether self-congruence plays a prominent role in motivating customers to participate in the self-design process. Specifically, both the actual self-congruence and ideal self-congruence are positively related to customers’ willingness to participate in the self-design process is hypothesized. Moreover, it is expected that product styles and different consumption situations may strengthen the relationship between actual/ideal self-congruence and customers’ willingness to participate in the self-design process. Theoretical and practical implications are also discussed.
Highlights
Previous research has defined customer co-creation as “the joint creation of value by the company and the customer; allowing the customer to co-construct the service experience to suit their context” (Prahalad and Ramaswamy, 2004, p. 8)
Value creation entails a process that increases and applies the customer’s knowledge and skills to convert the potential value into real value, while co-creation emphasizes the role of the customer evolved from self-service, through the firm-scripted staging of customer experiences, to co-designing and co-production of Better Motivate Customers to Participate service (Grönroos and Voima, 2013; Prahalad and Ramaswamy, 2004; Vargo and Lusch, 2004
By employing self-congruence theory, we firstly examined the important role played by self-congruence in the customer co-creation field, which extends the co-creation literature by exploring another important psychological mechanism to understand the motivation of customer co-creation behavior
Summary
Previous research has defined customer co-creation as “the joint creation of value by the company and the customer; allowing the customer to co-construct the service experience to suit their context” (Prahalad and Ramaswamy, 2004, p. 8). Better Motivate Customers to Participate service (Grönroos and Voima, 2013; Prahalad and Ramaswamy, 2004; Vargo and Lusch, 2004). Previous literature has suggested that self-congruence can enhance affective, attitudinal, and behavioral consumer responses to the brand and outcome (Aaker, 1999) Based on this perspective, this study examines the role self-congruence plays in motivating customers to participate in the self-design process. This study explores the consumption situation and product styles as moderators of the relationship between (actual and ideal) self-congruence and willingness of customer participation in the self-design process. The conclusion section summarizes our major expected findings, contributions, and limitations of this study
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