What influences the relationship between customer satisfaction and repurchase intention? Investigating the effects of adjusted expectations and customer loyalty

This study examines how loyalty influences the relationship between customer satisfaction (CS) and repurchase intention (RPI). Considering the effect of time, the study introduces adjusted expectations, which are expectations updated after consumption experience. The present study investigates the role of adjusted expectations in the CS-RPI link. With structural-equation analysis, the proposed model was tested in the family-restaurant setting. The results show that adjusted expectations can mediate the effect of CS on RPI. The results also indicate that processes underlying the CS-RPI link are different between low-loyalty and high-loyalty customers. Specifically, the transient route, which reflects the indirect path from CS to RPI via adjusted expectations, has a greater impact for nonloyals than for loyals. On the other hand, the chronic route, which represents the direct path from CS to RPI, has a greater impact for loyals than for nonloyals. CS is found to have no direct influence on RPI for low-loyalty customers. (C) 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.