Venting crisis emotions in secondary crisis communication on social media: the moderating roles of brand identification and social media metrics

Purpose Using the three crisis emotion clusters (attribution-independent (AI), external-attribution-dependent (EAD) and internal-attribution-dependent (IAD) emotions), this research explored how consumers engage in secondary crisis communication on social media by way of emotional venting, depending on their identifying relationship with the brand and the number of social media metrics. Design/methodology/approach For Study 1, confirmatory factor analysis and PROCESS Model 7 were conducted with the data from a total of 345 participants. Study 2 conducted a two-level (the number of social media metrics: high vs low) single factorial design experiment with a total of 173 participants. Findings This study suggested disappointment as an important crisis emotion for consumers. While demonstrating the mediating role of a need for emotional venting in the relationships of different crisis emotions and social media secondary crisis communication, this study suggested consumer brand identification and the number of social media metrics interact with IAD emotions, respectively, to influence a need for emotional venting. Originality/value This study identified 12 emotions within three clusters: (1) AI emotions that consumers feel toward a brand crisis situation (anxiety, apprehension and fear), (2) EAD emotions consumers feel about a brand company in a crisis (anger, contempt, disgust, disappointment, sadness and sympathy) and (3) IAD emotions that consumers feel for themselves as stakeholders involved in a crisis (embarrassment, guilt and shame). It also shed light on how consumers engage in secondary crisis communication on social media as an emotional coping strategy during crises.