This four-item scale measures how genuinely sorry a person believes a company was when it apologized for an incident that caused harm. Antonetti and Baghi (2023) used it with U.S. Prolific participants in Studies 2, 3, and 4 of research on how projecting lower competence can make apologies more effective. The authors cited Schumann (2012) and appear to have drawn key words from that work.
7-point Likert
Full scale items shown. Always cite the original source when using this scale in research.
Construct reliabilities were .89 (Study 2), .89 (Study 3), and .82 (Study 4) (Antonetti and Baghi 2023, Web Appendix B); the article text also reports α = .89 for Study 2. The authors reported that all conceptual scales performed satisfactorily for reliability and discriminant validity; AVEs for this scale were .92 (Study 2), .90 (Study 3), and .83 (Study 4) (Web Appendix B). Fictitious companies were used in the studies; fill each blank with the company's name. The wording should also suit non-profit organizations, government bodies, and individuals. See also Costliness of the Company's Crisis (ID 90331), from the same article, and Perceived Personal Sincerity (ID 90280).
Antonetti, Paolo and Ilaria Baghi (2023), "Projecting Lower Competence to Boost Apology Effectiveness: Underlying Mechanism and Boundary Conditions," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 51 (3), 695-715.
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