Stability of Country Image: A Multicultural/Cross-National Perspective

Abstract

The Country-of-Origin (CO) construct has attracted much research attention over the past three decades. In spite of its potential importance in competitive positioning, the nature of the CO construct and its impact on product preferences and purchase intentions are far from clear. There remains a lack of consensus as to the dimensionality of the CO construct and as to what constitutes items relevant to a CO scale. Besides, past research has not been able to arrive at a clear conclusion regarding the strength of the country-of-origin effect in affecting product preferences and purchase intentions, an issue of crucial importance to international marketers. Another crucial but relatively unexplored issue is the variation in country-of-origin perceptions and responses by consumer segment. This research seeks to address the above issues through an empirical study.