Consumers' Responses to Participation and Customization in Food Services: A Cultural Perspective

Abstract

We examined whether consumers across two cultures would respond differently to food services with different physical participation and customization levels. The likelihood of the self-serving bias when customers highly participate in food service production and delivery process was examined in 2 cultures. A 2 participation × 2 customization × 2 outcome quasi-experiment was conducted in two countries: the United States and Taiwan. A total of 247 U.S. and 213 Taiwanese samples were used for this study. Our research findings suggest that in the food service setting, customers' responses to customization and the likelihood of the self-serving bias do not differ between the two countries.

Keywords:

• Customer participation
• customization
• food services
• self-serving bias
• cultural orientation