To explore how occurring critical incidents affect customer-brand relations, this study measures the impact on the basis of an online experiment. For this purpose, 1,122 usable responses are gathered considering the smartphone brands of Apple and Nokia as well as different scenarios. The...

In Chapter II we investigate consumer behavior when facing target rebates, a rebate practice challenged by antitrust law. In three experiments, we confirm the hypothesis derived from Cumulative Prospect Theory (CPT), that target rebates are likely to create psychological switching costs that can...

We investigate whether and how targeted rebates impede rational switching of consumers from an incumbent to an outside option (e.g., market entrant). In a real trading problem, participants repeatedly buy tokens and can enter a target rebate scheme. Buying in a rebate scheme considerably reduces...