The study found that an organization's past crises can make a current crisis worse, even if the current crisis was not intentional. Similar past crises can make a current crisis more damaging to the organization's reputation. The impact on reputation is mainly due to how responsible people think the organization is for the crisis. Knowing about an organization's past crises can affect how people view the current crisis. The more responsible people think the organization is, the worse the impact on reputation. This research can help improve how organizations communicate during crises.