Understanding complaints: the role of moral transgressions in e-commerce interactions

Xu Huang and Xuekun Liu ()
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Xu Huang: Guangdong University of Foreign Studies
Xuekun Liu: Central China Normal University

Palgrave Communications, 2025, vol. 12, issue 1, 1-13

Abstract: Abstract This discourse-pragmatic study examines why a past or on-going action become the focus of customer complaints in e-commerce service encounters. Analyzing interactions between customers and service agents on Taobao, the study reveals how customer complaints are triggered by perceived moral transgressions attributed to service agents. The findings identify two types of transgressions: distributive and interactional. The study highlights metapragmatic expressions that reveal customers’ beliefs about appropriate standards in the complaint resolution process. Customers perceive service agents as violating distributive justice by infringing on their benefactive, epistemic, and deontic rights, and as breaching interactional justice through lapses in responsibility and honesty. Overall, the study illustrates how customers’ metapragmatic perceptions of moral transgressions shape complaint interactions in e-commerce settings, providing crucial insights for both theoretical analysis and practical applications.

Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1057/s41599-024-04316-3

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