Business relationships are often a source of benefits for firms, but they can tip and unleash detrimental effects that diminish or even destroy relationship performance. Although prior studies on dark-side effects in business relationships have advanced the understanding of the phenomenon, they mainly relied on a dyadic perspective exploring single buyer–seller relationships. Yet business relationships are often parts of wider relationship portfolios and networks, and the characteristics of one relationship may have implications for other relationships. This article advances knowledge on the dark side of business relationships by introducing the concept of dark-side-effect contagion, which relies on the idea that dark-side effects can spread between business relationships. We develop a multi-level framework that accounts for inter-organizational, inter-personal, and intra-personal aspects of dark-side-effect contagion. This article contributes to the literature by extending the concept of dark-side effects in business relationships, thereby opening new lines of inquiry.

业务关系通常是公司收益的来源，但是它们可以提示和释放有害的影响，这些影响会减少甚至破坏关系的绩效。尽管先前对业务关系中的负面影响的研究已经加深了对这种现象的理解，但它们主要是基于探索单个买卖双方关系的二元视角。然而，业务关系通常是更广泛的关系投资组合和网络的一部分，并且一种关系的特征可能会对其他关系产生影响。本文通过介绍隐性副作用蔓延的概念来提高对业务关系隐性方面的认识，该概念依赖于隐性副作用可以在业务关系之间传播的思想。我们开发了一个多层次的框架来说明组织间，人际关系和人际内部方面的负面影响。本文通过扩展业务关系中的负面影响的概念，从而开启了新的研究领域，为文献做出了贡献。