LUCKNOW, March 18 -- A study by a faculty member of the Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow, has found that diversity and inclusion have become a strategic requirement for hospitality brands to effectively serve an increasingly diverse customer base.

The study, published in the Journal of Hospitality Marketing and Management, examines how diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives affect consumer sentiments, brand integrity, and purchase decisions through two controlled experiments.

The first experiment examines how DEI commitments influence brand attitudes in the context of a fictitious hospitality brand, while the second experiment builds on these findings using a real-world hotel brand, a release from the institute read....