Effect of Country of Origin Awareness on Attitudes Toward Foreign Made Products

With the globalization of the world’s marketplace and the increased competition of products and services manufactured outside of the United States, consumers are faced with new challenges when evaluating and purchasing products. Recent country-of-origin studies (e.g. studies focusing on where the product is made and how that affects a consumer’s perception of the product) have been conducted, as have studies examining the phenomenon of consumer ethnocentrism, a term used to describe a consumer’s propensity to purchase or not purchase foreign made products. The majority of consumer ethnocentrism studies have focused on the social-psychological factors affecting consumer ethnocentrism like patriotism, openness to foreign cultures, collectivism-individualism, and conservatism. Few studies, however, have examined product class knowledge and awareness as possible antecedents to consumer ethnocentrism. The intent of this study was to further examine the antecedents of consumer ethnocentrism through the design and execution of an empirical study that can establish a platform for further investigation. A sample of 214 students enrolled in an undergraduate English class were surveyed, asked to complete an at-home inventory, and were re-surveyed upon returning to class with a completed inventory worksheet. It was found in this study that consumer awareness had no appreciable impact on the level of consumer ethnocentrism that the individual exhibited after participating in an at-home inventory and that there was seemingly no significant relationship between the respondent’s level of product knowledge and the respondent’s level of consumer ethnocentricity. The paper concludes with a discussion of the findings are their importance in the marketing field