Doing good for good: how does corporate social responsibility drive customer citizenship behavior? The mediation of engagement, trust, and identification

Abstract

How firms’ doing “good” inspires customers to do “good” is rarely investigated. Drawing upon social exchange, social identity, and signaling theories, this study explores the mechanisms between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and customer citizenship behavior (CCB), and examines the mediating effects generated by engagement, identification, and trust. Through convenience and snowball sampling methods, 242 questionnaires were collected from customers of a firm implementing CSR projects. The findings reveal that the most effective path for CSR perception to motivate CCB is to go through a process involving trust, identification, and then customer engagement. Engagement plays the most critical role among these three mediators.