When feeling good counts! Impact of consumer gratitude and life satisfaction in access-based services

Purpose: Informed by the broaden-and-build theory of emotions, this study aims to investigate the relationships between consumers’ motives and personal and social outcomes in access-based services (ABS). Further, drawing on territorial behaviour literature, the second goal of this research is to test the moderating effects of psychological ownership on the relationships between personal outcomes and consumer territorial behaviour. Design/methodology/approach: This research comprises a quantitative online survey complemented by a qualitative interview study. The quantitative study employed an online consumer panel survey of 317 samples. Later, the qualitative study sought additional insights into the economic benefit motives and manifestation of territorial behaviour of bicycle-sharing users to enrich the results of quantitative study. The quantitative data were analysed using structural equation modelling, and the interviews were transcribed and analysed using an inductive and deductive thematic analysis. Findings: The results indicated that specific motives significantly affected certain personal outcomes. Namely, economic benefit, enjoyment and reputation motives drove life satisfaction, while enjoyment, sustainability and social relationships promoted feelings of gratitude. Furthermore, life satisfaction positively affected consumer cooperation, helping other consumers and territorial behaviour. In contrast, feelings of gratitude had a positive relationship with cooperation and helping other consumers, but a negative one with territorial behaviour. Additional examination revealed that consumers’ psychological ownership of the shared bicycle in an ABS model moderated the effect of gratitude on consumer territorial behaviour. Research limitations/implications: This study offers and tests a model on ABS in the context of bicycle-sharing services. Thus, it presents avenues to test the model on other ABS, e.g. clothing or home sharing. Practical implications: Managers in ABS can foster positive emotional states of gratitude and life satisfaction that will inevitably promote consumer cooperation and helping behaviour. Originality/value: This study is among the first to propose and examine a model that tests the relationships between consumers’ motives and personal and social outcomes in ABS.