Negative emotions in consumer brand relationship: A review and future research agenda

Abstract

Emotions have a compelling and strong effect on individuals actions and behaviours. They are elicited in consumers during the decision‐making process through brand‐related stimuli. Negative emotions towards a brand can translate directly into actions against it, for instance, propagating negative word of mouth, avoidance and vengeance. Although scholars have conducted consumer–brand relationship (CBR) research for over 20 years, our understanding of negative emotions is still limited. Research in the consumer–brand relationship domain so far has predominantly focused on positive emotions and its constructs. However, with a recent surge in the studies on negative emotions in the consumer–brand relationship domain, a systematic review is essential to identify, evaluate and synthesize the extant literature. Using a citation‐based search, we analyse 55 articles in the literature to achieve three objectives: primarily to illustrate the evolution and growth of negative emotions in the consumer–brand relationship using the seminal article by Fournier (1998) ‘Consumers and their brands: Developing relationship theory in consumer research’ as the base paper. Further, the study aims to identify uncharted negative emotions in consumer–brand relationship literature by integrating it with the hierarchical theory of emotions article and finally, it suggests future research in unexplored and underexplored negative emotions.