Perceptions of country of origin: An approach to identifying expectations of foreign products

Abstract

In the contemporary marketplace, country of origin (COO) has been considered one of the most significant phenomena impacting evaluations of foreign products. Understanding consumer behavior in relation to the perception of COO provides fundamentals to strategic decisions in marketing and consumer behavior. The question of how COO information cues are utilized by consumer insights in what conditions is important in product evaluations. This study endeavored to provide an approach to understanding COO perceptions based on consumer expectations of foreign products. Interviews were conducted with 170 undergraduates in China with the help of a formal questionnaire to collect data. Confirmatory Factor Analysis was conducted in order to examine four types of consumer expectations of foreign products: Economic, Information, Social and Personality. Based on the results, it was concluded that when a consumer buys a foreign product, he considers the economic value of the product, wants more information about the product, and considers to what extent the product has an impact on social status and how the product enhances personality. Moreover, the Goodness of Fit indices of the derived model of consumer expectations of foreign products indicated the potential of using the approach to examine consumer expectations of these products.