From customer incivility to turnover intention: roles of negative affect state and customer-oriented perspective taking

The study aims to empirically analyse the effect of customer incivility on turnover intention and the mediating role of the negative affect state on the said relationship. The study also examines the moderating role of customer-oriented perspective taking in mitigating the adverse effect of customer incivility on negative affect state and turnover intention. The study adopted a time-lagged methodological design by collecting data in two intervals and data was collected from 419 frontline hotel employees. Data analysis was conducted using the structural equation modelling technique and process macro models. The findings supported that customer incivility positively related to turnover intention and negative affect state mediated the positive relationship. Further, customer-oriented perspective taking ability of frontline employees buffers the effects of customer incivility on the negative affect state directly on turnover intention indirectly through the negative affect state. The findings of the study provide various contributions to theory and practice.