DIPLOMARBEIT Titel der Diplomarbeit „The Country-of-Origin Effects in Consumer Brand Perception and Brand Evaluation Processes: A Qualitative Study“ Verfasserin Ursula Wastian Angestrebter akademischer Grad Magistra der Sozial- und Wirtschaftswissenschaften (Mag. rer. soc. oec.) Wien, im Juni 2009 Studienkennzahl lt. Studienblatt: 157 Studienrichtung lt. Studienblatt: Internationale Betriebswirtschaft Betreuer/Betreuerin: Univ.-Prof. Dr. Adamantios Diamantopoulos Preface At this point I would like to thank all those people who supported me throughout the process of writing my diploma thesis and throughout my years at university. My special gratitude goes to Professor Diamantopoulos, who through the passion with which he teaches Marketing, aroused my interest in the topic of Marketing, especially in Marketing research, and without whom this thesis would not have been possible. Furthermore, I would like to take this opportunity to thank Dkfm. Marc Herz for bringing me in touch with the projective collage technique, as without him I would not have been able to execute this research study in the present form, for his active participation in our conjoint study and for the support of supervising my work. My special thanks goes to my family, for preparing me with love and the best of their knowledge for life, for believing in me and for their financial support which gave me the possibility to study at all. In particular, I thank my daddy for the hours he spent revising my diploma thesis and correcting my spelling mistakes and my mum for her emotional support during the last years. Aside from my family, I would like to say thank you to all my friends, who were there for and believed in me over all the years, who were always on my side in good times and shared wonderful and fun times with me, but who also patiently supported me in bad times. You consistently succeeded in inspiring me! i Table of Contents LIST OF FIGURES ............................................................................................................... IV LIST OF TABLES ................................................................................................................. V LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ................................................................................................... VI 1 INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................... 1 1.1 RESEARCH OBJECTIVE ......................................................................................... 2 1.2 STRUCTURE OF THE THESIS .................................................................................. 3 2 CONCEPTUAL FUNDAMENTALS AND DEFINITIONS....................................... 6 2.1 PRODUCT DEFINITION .......................................................................................... 6 2.2 BRAND DEFINITION ............................................................................................. 8 2.2.1 Brand Dimensions .................................................................................. 8 2.2.2 Branding Strategy................................................................................... 9 2.3 COUNTRY OF ORIGIN DEFINITIONS .................................................................... 11 2.3.1 The Country of Origin of the Product................................................... 11 2.3.2 The Country of Origin of the Brand ..................................................... 12 3 GENERAL CONSUMER BEHAVIOR ..................................................................... 13 3.1 THE PSYCHOLOGICAL PROCESSES IN GENERAL INDIVIDUAL BEHAVIOR ........... 14 3.1.1 Information Storage and Individual’s Knowledge ............................... 15 3.1.2 Visual Information Processing and Knowledge ................................... 20 3.2 THE KEY PSYCHOLOGICAL PROCESSES IN CONSUMER BEHAVIOR ..................... 21 3.2.1 Motivation............................................................................................. 21 3.2.2 Perception............................................................................................. 21 3.2.3 Learning................................................................................................ 22 3.2.4 Memory................................................................................................. 23 3.3 THE CONSUMER DECISION MAKING PROCESS ................................................... 25 3.4 CONSUMERS ’ I NFORMATION PROCESSING IN BRAND EVALUATION PROCESSES 28 3.4.1 Information Cues in Consumers’ Product and Brand Evaluation Processes .......................................................................................................... 29 3.4.2 Elaboration Likelihood Model.............................................................. 31 4 THE BRAND AND THE CONSUMER ..................................................................... 33 4.1 CUSTOMER -BASED BRAND EQUITY ................................................................... 33 4.2 CONSUMER BRAND KNOWLEDGE ...................................................................... 35 4.2.1 Brand Awareness.................................................................................. 36 4.2.2 Brand Image ......................................................................................... 37 4.2.3 Secondary Brand Associations ............................................................. 41 4.3 THE INFLUENCE OF CONSUMER BRAND AWARENESS AND BRAND IMAGE ON CONSUMER BRAND EVALUATION AND PURCHASE INTENTION ........................................ 42 4.4 THE COO C UE OF A BRAND .............................................................................. 43 4.4.1 The Superiority of the COO Cue of a Brand vs. the COO Cue of a Product for the Consumer ................................................................................ 43 4.4.2 The COO Cue and the Brand in Marketing Practice ........................... 45 5 COUNTRY OF ORIGIN AND THE CONSUMER.................................................. 47 5.1 THE COO C UE AND THE CONSUMER ................................................................. 47 5.2 THE MILESTONES IN PREVIOUS COO R ESEARCH .............................................. 48 5.2.1 The Experiment That Got the COO Ball Rolling.................................. 48 i 5.2.2 Rethinking COO Research: Single Cue vs. Multiple Cue..................... 49 5.2.3 Stuck on 1968 Relevance ...................................................................... 50 5.3 COUNTRY (OF ORIGIN ) I MAGE ........................................................................... 50 5.4 ASPECTS OF CONSUMERS ’ COO C UE PROCESSING ........................................... 53 5.4.1 Consumers’ Cognitive Processing of the COO Cue............................. 54 5.4.2 Consumers’ Affective Processing of the COO Cue .............................. 54 5.4.3 Consumers’ Normative Processing of the COO Cue ........................... 55 5.5 COUNTRY -OF -ORIGIN EFFECTS .......................................................................... 56 5.6 OVERESTIMATION OF COO E FFECTS ................................................................. 64 6 CONSUMERS’ COO KNOWLEDGE ....................................................................... 67 6.1 THE COO-ELM M ODEL .................................................................................... 67 6.2 CONSUMERS ’ L ACK OF COO K NOWLEDGE ....................................................... 74 6.3 THE COO I NFORMATION CUE : A CTUAL VS . P ERCEIVED COO.......................... 77 7 CONSUMERS’ COO CUE USAGE ........................................................................... 80 7.1 POSSIBLE EXPLANATIONS FOR CONSUMERS ’ N ON -USAGE OF COO C UE .......... 81 7.2 POSSIBLE REASONS FOR CONSUMERS ’ COO C UE USAGE ................................. 82 7.3 POSSIBLE EXPLANATIONS FOR CONSUMERS ’ D ENIAL OF COO C UE USAGE ...... 84 7.3.1 Consumers’ Emotional Reasons........................................................... 84 7.3.2 Consumers’ Limited Awareness of their Actual COO Cue Usage ....... 85 7.3.3 The Automatic Country-Of-Origin Effects on Consumers’ Brand Judgment........................................................................................................... 86 8 RESEARCH GAP AND RESEARCH OBJECTIVE................................................ 89 8.1 THE RESEARCH GAP .......................................................................................... 89 8.2 THE RESEARCH OBJECTIVE AND RESEARCH QUESTIONS ................................... 93 9 RESEARCH METHOD............................................................................................. 100 9.1 PREVIOUS RESEARCH METHOD LIMITATIONS .................................................. 100 9.1.1 Research Method Limitation of Obtrusive Questioning ..................... 100 9.1.2 Research Method Limitation of Single-Cue Studies........................... 101 9.2 CHOICE AND JUSTIFICATION OF THE METHOD ................................................. 102 9.2.1 Improved Marketing Research Methods............................................. 103 9.2.2 Research Method I: Brand Bricolage Method.................................... 105 9.2.3 Research Method II: In-Depth Interview............................................ 107 10 THE RESEARCH STUDY ........................................................................................ 109 10.1 STRUCTURE OF THE RESEARCH PROCESS ........................................................