The Effects of Country-Related Affect on Product Evaluations

Abstract

Affect toward countries can be generated by people's personal experiences with the country or by targeted advertising campaigns designed to create positive affect toward the country. In four experiments, this research examines the effect of country-related affect (CRA) on the evaluations of products originating from the country. Country-related affect (CRA) systematically influences product evaluations depending on the valence as well as the warmth or competence associations of CRA. Positive CRA enhances evaluations of products with favorable country-related product (CRP) associations, but it boomerangs and decreases evaluations of products with unfavorable CRP associations. Positive CRA engenders high (vs. low) construal processing that directs consumer attention to CRP associations under low (vs. high) arousal conditions (experiments 1 and 2). Experiments 3 and 4 establish that CRA is a unique type of incidental affect that influences product evaluations based on its warmth or competence associations. The implications for country of origin research are discussed.

The interplay between country stereotypes and perceived brand globalness/localness as drivers of brand preference

“…Although the SCM has been recently employed in marketing research (Aaker, Vohs, & Mogilner, 2010;Chen, Mathur, & Maheswaran, 2014), it has found limited application in the area of international marketing (Chattalas, Kramer, & Takada, 2008). For instance, Chattalas and Takada (2013) use the SCM dimensions to predict hedonic and utilitarian product perceptions and demonstrate that warmth-related country perceptions generate more expectations of hedonic properties, whereas competence-related country perceptions lead to more utilitarian product expectations.…”

“…For instance, Chattalas and Takada (2013) use the SCM dimensions to predict hedonic and utilitarian product perceptions and demonstrate that warmth-related country perceptions generate more expectations of hedonic properties, whereas competence-related country perceptions lead to more utilitarian product expectations. From a different perspective, Chen et al (2014) find that the impact of country-related affect (CRA) on product evaluations is uniquely determined by whether it is induced by judgments of competence or warmth. Their results demonstrate that competence-based CRA transfers directly to consumer evaluations in a valence-consistent manner, while warmth-based CRA first activates country-product associations, which, depending on their favorability, then determine product evaluations (Chen et al, 2014).…”

“…From a different perspective, Chen et al (2014) find that the impact of country-related affect (CRA) on product evaluations is uniquely determined by whether it is induced by judgments of competence or warmth. Their results demonstrate that competence-based CRA transfers directly to consumer evaluations in a valence-consistent manner, while warmth-based CRA first activates country-product associations, which, depending on their favorability, then determine product evaluations (Chen et al, 2014). Finally, Maher and Carter (2011) show that both judgments of a country's warmth and competence increase consumers' feeling of admiration toward the COO which is positively linked to willingness to buy products coming from that country.…”

“…More specifically, the dimension of competence engenders perceptions of a country's ability and efficiency, both of which are typically related to business and manufacturing capabilities (Chen et al, 2014;Wilcox, 2015) and, thus, serve as a diagnostic informational cue of reliable and high quality products. In a similar vein, Heslop and Papadopoulos (1993), and more recently Pappu, Quester, and Cooksey (2007), argue that macro-level country perceptions consist of beliefs about the indusrtiouness of the country's people, the status of the country's economy, and its technological advancement.…”

“…For instance, building on Heslop and Papadopoulos (1993) work, Chattalas et al (2008) conceptualize country affect to be "analogous to the perceived warmth dimension" (p. 59). Nevertheless, despite the seeming similarity between these constructs, judgments of warmth represent a cognitive assessment of the favorability of another group's intentions toward one's own group; these judgments act as antecedents of subsequent affective reactions (Chen et al, 2014;Cuddy et al, 2008).…”