Effective Public Apologies

Communicating with the public after corporate crises is often necessary, yet little evidence provides guidance. To address this, our theoretical and content analyses of public apologies revealed 12 key content elements. From these, we developed a basic apology, and tested its effectiveness alone, and with additional content. In two experiments involving river contamination, the basic apology was effective and improved with additional content. In Experiment 1, effectiveness involved actions taken to reduce harm and reoccurrence. Experiment 2 increased the hazard to carcinogenic chemicals, and one apology was superior: the basic apology plus statements of recovery efforts and defense of company actions. The two experiments show that crisis severity influences apology effectiveness. Experiment 3 found that clarifying causality helps convince people that the crisis source is identified and the problem resolved. Our findings show that an optimal public apology is comprehensive, and details the causes and actions taken to prevent reoccurrence.


Abstract
22 Communicating with the public after corporate crises is often necessary, yet little evidence 23 provides guidance. To address this, our theoretical and content analyses of public apologies 24 revealed 12 key content elements. From these, we developed a basic apology, and tested its 25 effectiveness alone, and with additional content. In two experiments involving river 26 contamination, the basic apology was effective and improved with additional content. In 27 Experiment 1, effectiveness involved actions taken to reduce harm and reoccurrence.
28 Experiment 2 increased the hazard to carcinogenic chemicals, and one apology was superior: 29 the basic apology plus statements of recovery efforts and defense of company actions. The 30 two experiments show that crisis severity influences apology effectiveness. Experiment 3 31 found that clarifying causality helps convince people that the crisis source is identified and 32 the problem resolved. Our findings show that an optimal public apology is comprehensive, 33 and details the causes and actions taken to prevent reoccurrence. To be sure, real-world crises may involve factors that yet escape us, and so it is also 84 valuable to examine solutions derived in the field. We therefore also conducted a content 85 analysis of public statements actually issued by corporations in response to major crises in 86 South Korea (approximately 100 cases) and the United States (approximately 30 cases) from 87 the period of 1980s-2012 via news sources (e.g., newspaper, magazine, television) and crisis 88 case studies in journals and public relations and crisis management textbooks. Our analysis of 89 their contents generated 12 content types listed in Table 1.

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The first eight elements match those from other content analyses of public apologies 95 (Benoit, 1995;Boyd, 2011;Hearit, 2006;Page, 2014). In addition, we also found content 96 elements 9-12. Whether they reflect cultural differences remains to be determined. For 97 example, shame may be more culturally bound to South Korea, reflecting deep concern about 98 social responsibility. Nonetheless, Munoz, chief executive of United Airlines, eventually said  Insert Table 3 about here

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Participants read a news report of a food processing company found to be polluting a 147 regional river (see Table 1). As a control group, 300 college students participated in an initial 148 online survey with no subsequent apology. They first read the news report and then were 149 queried with seven effectiveness measures in Table 2 (all but account acceptance). For the 150 main experimental manipulations, 230 college students participated in a laboratory study, 151 where the participants read the same news report from a computer monitor, and then read one 152 of six different public apology statements based on the content types listed in Table 2. We 153 then queried the experimental group with the same seven effectiveness measures as the 154 control group.

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156 Results 157 Table 4 shows the results with the experimental groups directly compared to the control 158 group (i.e., no apology given). In sum, there were four key findings. First, the basic apology 159 was effective, but only moderately so, being significant with all dependent measures together 160 ("All items"), but when considering each effectiveness measure individually, only 161 significantly improving reputation (thus 1 of 7). Second, on average ("Experimental" in 162

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Insert Table 4 about here 221 which 600 were used as a control group, being exposed to the news report without any 222 apology. All participants were queried using the same seven dependent measures used in 223 Experiment 1 (Table 3).

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Severity appears to influence the degree of public concern, and thus the extent to 262 which they engage in the specifics of the crisis and its aftermath. When in less severe cases, 263 additional actionable statements may induce a sense that the wrongdoer is taking sufficient 264 steps to make amends and limit potential reoccurrence. In more severe cases, the target 265 audience appears less willing to accept a basic account, and further, appears to require more 266 specific statements -in this case, regarding both reparations and defense. It certainly seems  (1) actions taken as part of the standard operating practices of the organization 307 that directly produced the harmful event; or (2) actions not taken but should have been taken 308 as part of standard operating practices, which would have prevented the harmful event. Thus, 309 case (1) or (2) were considered internal to the organization, otherwise they were classified as 310 external. Table 6 provides an example of case (1) for the internal attribution. Table 6 about here

316 Results
317 As seen in Table 7, the apology effectiveness ratings were (a) higher for the internal-   Table 7 about here Our results support those found for annual reports to stockholders who must 332 determine whether to continue investing in a company based on the reports (Lee et al., 2004).
333 When negative events are explained as being based on causes firmly within the company's 334 control (i.e., both internal and controllable), faith remains higher than if out-of-control, even 335 if that means the company made mistakes that led to adverse consequences. This suggests 336 that future performance is most critical to stockholders, with controllability strongly implying 337 overall competence, with the expectation that it will lead to fewer problems and better 338 performance in the future. Our results thus extend the findings found for annual reports and 339 future stock performance to crisis events and public apologies in general, and how cognition, 340 affect, and behavior of the general public are influenced by causal attributions.

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Given that the causal information was communicated by the organization itself rather

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The experimental group was divided into six subgroups in which the first received 439 the basic public apology (Table 1) and the other five an apology with an additional content 440 element: basic + defense (providing excuses for wrongdoing); basic + recovery ("we are 441 doing…to recover…"); basic + acceptance (of responsibility) ("we are responsible…"); basic 442 + shame ("we feel ashamed…"); basic + recovery ("we are doing…to recover…"); basic + 443 contact ("please contact… for any inquiries");. The added message components were placed 444 in the same location, between the second and the third paragraphs, of each basic apology 445 statement.

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All responses were measured using the questionnaire from Coombs and Holladay

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Materials. We developed a mock news story about a chemical company that was 467 accused of discharging untreated wastewater. We left the specific names of the company and 468 CEO in the mock news and public apologies blank (a) to minimize potential participant bias, 469 and (b) to seem more realistic rather than using fake names.  Table 5 for example). We presented 497 the crisis situations to the participants in random order and then asked them seven questions 498 (in random order) about the crisis situations, using a Likert-type seven-point scale. The seven 499 effectiveness categories and the actual survey questions used for each are listed in Table 6 500 (Coombs & Holladay, 2008).    We are committed to the public and our customers as we learn from our mistakes and will make our utmost efforts in preventing this from ever happening again.
Why it occurred & Forbearance (Preventing  reoccurrence) and ask for your kind understanding.
To this end, your kind understanding would be greatly appreciated.
Public understanding Once again, we are extremely sorry for our wrongdoings.

Overall Account acceptance
The people affected by the incident would consider the response by the organization to be appropriate.

Responsibilit y (for the crisis)
The blame for the incident lies with the organization.

Sympathy
Because of the incident situation, I feel sorry for the organization.