Do consumers care about CSR activities of their favorite restaurant brands? Evidence from engagement on social networks

ABSTRACT

While prior corporate social responsibility (CSR) research has focused mainly on the positive influences of CSR activities on consumers’ perceptions of and attitudes toward brands with survey and experimental design approaches, the current study examines consumers’ engagement with CSR posts on social media platforms using quantitative content analysis. With emphasis on the restaurant industry, this study was conducted in the Facebook context, aiming to investigate how consumers respond to restaurant companies’ CSR posts. The results of this study indicate that the level of consumer engagement depends on the types of CSR posts – environmental, social, or economic. This study examined whether there are differences in CSR posts between the quick service and casual dining sectors, and whether consumers’ responses differ depending on the nature of the product/service and the type of CSR activities. This study contributes to the CSR and social media literature and provides implications for the restaurant industry.

而以往的企业社会责任（CSR）研究主要集中在企业社会责任活动对消费者对品牌认知和态度的积极影响上，采用调查和实验设计的方法，本研究采用定量内容分析法，考察了消费者对社交媒体平台上企业社会责任帖子的参与度.本研究以餐饮业为重点，在Facebook的背景下进行，旨在调查消费者对餐饮企业企业社会责任帖子的反应. 本研究结果显示，消费者参与程度取决于企业社会责任岗位的类型-环境、社会或经济. 本研究考察了快速服务和休闲餐饮行业的企业社会责任岗位是否存在差异，以及消费者的反应是否因产品/服务的性质和企业社会责任活动的类型而异.本研究有助于企业社会责任和社会媒体文献，并为餐饮业提供启示.

KEYWORDS:

• Corporate social responsibility
• CSR
• online engagement
• social media
• restaurant
• societal marketing