Blaming the building: How venue quality influences consumer bias against stigmatized leaders

Because stigmatized individuals are viewed as incongruent with commonly held implicit leadership theories, they are often deemed less fit to lead than their nonstigmatized counterparts (Eagly & Karau, 2002). This suggests consumers might use such views to discredit not only stigmatized leaders, but also the companies they represent. However, cognition based on social categories (1 potential form of stigma) may be more likely when there are readily available alternative factors to account for one's decisions via casuistry. Across 2 complementary studies (field and experiment), we find that customers react negatively to stigmatized leaders only when the physical state of the company venue provides an ostensible defense to mask their biased behavior. When facilities are of lower quality, consumers appear to use a leader's stigma to infer lower product quality, coinciding in less patronage for companies with stigmatized as opposed to nonstigmatized leaders. Thus, consumers penalize companies with stigmatized leaders only when doing so can easily be attributed to an alternative factor (e.g., a lower quality venue) not involving the leader's stigma. (PsycINFO Database Record