Confront, Accept or Reinterpret? Coping Mediation Effects on Attribution in Cloud Service Failure

Online service failure can be disruptive to end users, leading some to confront the service provider to vent their anger and anxiety. Prior research holds that users’ attributions regarding the cause of the service failure affect their perceptions of the service provider. These attributions can be mediated by the user’s coping style. However, few studies have examined the role of coping in dealing with online service failure. This study tests the mediating effects of three coping styles (e.g. confrontational, acceptance and positive reinterpretation) on attribution in online service failure in a cloud storage context. The study finds that control attribution predicted confrontational coping but not acceptance or positive reinterpretation. The more the user believes the failure cause is permanent (stability attribution), the more likely they are to use acceptance coping, but the less likely they are to use confrontational coping or positive reinterpretation. In addition, confrontational coping partially mediated the relation between control attribution and satisfaction, and positive interpretation partially mediated the relation between stability attribution and satisfaction. Acceptance did not predict satisfaction.