Globalization and reluctant buyers (PDF Download Available)

Published in the International Marketing Review, Vol.19 No. 6, 2002; 663-680

Globalization and Reluctant Buyers

Taewon Suh, Ph.D. Boeing Institute of International Business John Cook School of Business Saint Louis University 3674 Lindell Boulevard St. Louis, MO 63108 Phone: 1-314-842-8291 Email: [email protected]

Ik-Whan G. Kwon, Ph.D.* The Consortium for Supply Chain Management Studies John Cook School of Business Saint Louis University 3674 Lindell Boulevard St. Louis, MO 63108 Phone: 1-314-977-7155 Email: [email protected] & The KDI School of Public Policy and Management Seoul, Korea

* Contact Person

Globalization and Reluctant Buyers Key Words: International Marketing, Globalization, Cross-Cultural Study, Consumer Behavior, Path analysis

Abstract This study attempted to empirically test a debatable hypothesis that globalization entails homogenization in consumers’ mind and behavior. Using samples from two countries (U.S., n = 120 and Korea, n = 128), this study explored a path model centered on consumers’ reluctance to purchase foreign goods. The findings indicated that, in the U.S. sample only, consumer ethnocentrism plays a mediating role between global openness and the reluctance to buy, although it is on the decrease with the increasing level of global openness. Consumer ethnocentrism is still an important factor in determining the magnitude of reluctance to buy a foreign product in both samples, while product judgment also plays an important role, but only in a certain cultural context (i.e., U.S.). It is concluded, therefore, that consumers in a different culture, who are different in their attitudes and perceptions, tastes and preferences, and values, are still different even after being exposed to the massive wave of globalization.

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Introduction The notion that global thinking would gradually break the wall of economic nationalism and chauvinism (e.g., Levitt, 1983) seems to be no longer taken for granted. There have been counter arguments that it is dangerous to assume that consumers are as well globalizing as companies, and that there is neo-nationalism that resists the globalism in buying behaviors (Belk, 1996; Keillor and Hult, 1999; Schütte and Ciarlante, 1998; Thomas, 1991). Schütte and Ciarlante (1998) argue that globalization will not obliterate cultural differences and standardize consumer behavior around the globe. However, the argument against the simple generalization of the impact of globalization on consumer behaviors lacks empirical evidence. The current literature has yet to address how distinctively the consequences of globalization directly and indirectly influence consumers’ attitudes and behaviors among the various cultures. Further investigation of the different impacts of globalization among different cultures on buyers’ attitudes and behaviors should be brought into the research agenda. The starting point of this study, accordingly, is on the thought that different timings and dissimilar processes of globalization between countries may defy the notion of worldwide, unified effects of globalization on consumers in various cultures. As globalization must be rather a human process more than just a technical process, the unique culture and psychology of a particular country may determine the distinctive characteristics of the processes and consequences of globalization of the country (Schütte and Ciarlante, 1998). Further, this study deals with the cross-cultural difference in the impact of buyers’ globalized mind-sets, which are operationalized as global openness reflecting a self-conscious level of globalization, on their ethnocentric tendencies and buying behaviors. More specifically, assessed here will be how different U.S. and Korean samples impact the effect of global openness on consumer

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ethnocentrism and reluctance to buy foreign-made products. To this end, we propose and test a path model centered on reluctance to buy foreign products. We expect that the two samples with different cultural background and nationality will show distinguishing relationships among the constructs in the model. The detailed purpose of this study is threefold. First, this study attempts to examine the roles of globalization in buying behaviors using a path model. The path model incorporates global openness, consumer ethnocentrism, and product judgment as the influencers on reluctance to buy foreign products. Second, this study adopts reluctance of buying foreign products, defined as perceived guiltiness and tendency to avoidance in buying foreign-made products, as the core construct. The framework would be quite meaningful and challenge because, until now, there is almost no research addressing factors determining consumers’ reluctance to buy a foreign product. This “reluctance-to-buy” construct is selected instead of “willingness-to-buy” in order to clearly show the influence of globalization on consumer behavior. It may take more specific research setting with a specific product as attitude target to explain the positive change in a proactive buying behavior (i.e., willingness to buy foreign products). A decrease in a passive behavior (i.e., reluctance to buy foreign products), on the other hand, is relatively easy to be induced when a particular product name is not mentioned. Meanwhile, it should be clarified that “reluctance-to-buy” is a distinctive construct from “willingness-to-buy”. Third, conducted is a cross-cultural comparison in product choice between buyers in a Western country and buyers in an Eastern country. This study is a response to the call for cross-cultural studies that provide practical implications for international business and marketing. The remainder of this article is as follows. First, research hypotheses are presented with associated theories. The main hypothesized model illustrated in Figure 1 consists of four

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constructs and their relationships. In the model, the relationship between consumers’ global openness and their reluctance to buy foreign products are mediated by their ethnocentric tendencies. Product judgment is another construct influencing reluctance to buy. The logic behind the assumption of dissimilarity between reluctance and willingness to buy foreign products is introduced after the main hypothesized model. The subsequent following section offers study methods and results. Finally, findings and implications are discussed. In conclusion, limitations of study and implications for future studies are outlined. [Insert Figure 1 about here]

Global openness and ethnocentric tendencies Previous studies have introduced few antecedents of consumer ethnocentrism. For instance, Sharma et al. (1995) tested the correlations between consumer ethnocentrism and social-psychological factors such as conservatism, patriotism, openness to foreign cultures, and collectivism/individualism. We, however, focus our study on the social-psychological result of globalization, assessed by global mind-set or openness, and its effect on ethnocentric tendencies. Globalization refers to the processes by which the world is being made into a single place with systemic properties (Robertson and Lechner, 1985). Yet, it is often said without evidence that globalization has resulted in homogenization in buying behavior across the countries (Belk, 1996). Massive waves to deregulation and free trade have created a new environment for consumers all over the globe wherein the purchase of a foreign product becomes easier than ever before (Walker, 1996). On the other hand, a counter argument has emerged to the globalization in culture of consumption. For instance, Belk (1996) argues that the growing globalism has energized debate as well as resistance including localism, ethnogenesis, and the neo-nationalism.

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While globalization is sometimes perceived as a synonymous word with the integration of world economy, it generally means the long-term effort to integrate the global dimensions of life into each nation’s economics, politics, and cultural systems. The economic globalization, the first step of globalization, leads to political and cultural globalization, and finally involves a psychological process, a spiritual process, a process of deepening consciousness and increasing sensitivity to other people and cultures (Schütte and Ciarlante, 1998). Thus, people globalized in full extent may be open to other cultures. They may be interested in other cultures, aware of much knowledge about individual nations, sensitive to different points of view based on other cultures. Our model assumes that people’s globalized mind-sets are the consequences of successful globalization processes in a culture. That is, consumers’ cultivated openness to foreign cultures (globalized mind-sets) is incorporated in the model as indirectly affecting the reluctance to buy foreign products by decreasing the level of their ethnocentric tendencies. Given that global consumers are considered to be individuals whose cultural and national differences do not affect their buying behavior, it is reasonable to assume that as the level of importance that an individual attaches to ethnocentric tendencies decreases, the more that individual could be viewed as a globally open consumer (Keillor et al. 2001, p. 8). However, the results from previous empirical studies are not consistent. While Sharma et al. (1995) found that “cultural openness” was negatively related to consumer ethnocentric tendencies and, Crawford and Lamb (1982) also found that “worldmindedness” positively affected professional buyers’ willingness to buy foreign products, other recent studies failed to generally support the concept of global consumer (e.g., Balabanis et al., 2001; Keillor et al., 2001). The conflicting results may be due to the following two reasons. First, globalization processes affecting global mind-sets of consumers vary culture by culture. The unique culture

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and psychology of a particular country may determine the distinctive characteristics of the processes and consequences of globalization of the country. As a result, global mind-sets of consumers are in a sense independent from the level of economic globalization. For example, in Korea where globalization has been mainly achieved through the government’s intervention and coordination in a collectivist’s manner, consumers’ global mind-sets might be less effective in making consumers open to foreign-made products although their self-conscious level of globalization would be relatively high. On the other hand, U.S. consumers who have been globalized mainly through their own experiences and self-awakening by an individualistic way (Schütte and Ciarlante, 1998) may show decreased ethnocentric tendencies for foreign products. Although there is no study supporting this argument, Balabanis et al. (2001) reported implicit evidence. According to them, internationalism does not appear to have an impact on consumer ethnocentrism either in the two developing nations: Turkey or the Czech Republic (Balabanis et al., 2001). Second, a measurement issue matters in the various results. An instrument that can validly measure a global mind-set cultivated by globalization needs to be developed to prove the presence of global-minded consumers and the reason for their emergence. It might be distinctive from the traditional ones measuring either a “psychological predisposition” with which consumers are open to foreign cultures or a “political worldview” favoring internationalism with or without the impact of globalization. In previous studies, the different viewpoints and meanings between the measures might have brought the different results. In Sharma and his colleagues’ work (1995), “cultural openness” merely implies a passive exposure and acceptance or no rejection of foreign culture and people. And, in Balabanis and his colleagues’ study (2001), although “internationalism” takes a more active stance focusing on international sharing and

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welfare, and reflects empathy for people of other countries (Kosterman and Feshbach, 1989), it is still unsatisfactory since it can be independent from the impact of globalization. Reflecting these discussions so as to go forward from the conflicting results of the previous studies, the present study adopts “global openness”, the construct incorporating the impact of globalization and thus reflecting a self-conscious level of globalization as a process of deepening consciousness and increasing sensitivity to other people and cultures. Based on this measure, presented is a set of hypotheses based on the argument that the trend of “global homogenization” resulting from globalization and the trend of “local ethnocentrism”, old or new, will compete with each other and make the dynamics in modern consumers’ buying behavior in a particular cultural and social environment. That is, consumers in Korea where globalization has been aimed mainly at the economic level by the government in a collectivistic pattern, consumers’ global mind-sets may be relatively not effective in making consumers less ethnocentric. On the other hand, in the U.S. where consumers have been globalized by an individualistic way mainly through their own experiences and self-awakening at their consciousness level may show less-ethnocentric tendencies. Hypothesis 1, accordingly, is formed based on these arguments. H1a: American consumers’ global openness will negatively affect their consumer ethnocentrism. H1b: Korean consumers’ global openness will not significantly affect their consumer ethnocentrism.

Two paths to “reluctance-to-buy”: product-irrelevant and product-relevant In our model, reluctance to buy foreign products is hypothesized to be affected by two related but different constructs: consumer ethnocentrism and product judgments. The former is product-irrelevant, while the latter is a product-relevant attitude. We expect that the relative

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importance of each construct in terms of the impact on reluctance to buy may be not the same in the two different cultural contexts. First of all, previous research has examined a network of relationships involving consumer ethnocentrism and various product attitude measures (Durvasula et al., 1997; Netemeyer et al., 1991; Shimp and Sharma, 1987). Since consumer ethnocentrism has been known as one of the antecedents strongly influencing attitude measures of foreign products including general product beliefs and willingness to buy, we accordingly predict that the construct will significantly affect reluctance to buy foreign products, but positively in this case. Particularly for the effect on reluctance to buy, the magnitude might be stronger because the dependent variable (reluctance) is rather a passive form of attitude, which is relatively easier to be influenced and changed than a proactive attitude (e.g., willingness). In sum, consumer ethnocentrism is proposed to be as influencing general product beliefs and reluctance in buying decisions of foreign products. Hypothesized path from consumer ethnocentrism to general product beliefs, here named as product judgments, is supported by previous results (e.g., Durvasula et al., 1997; Netemeyer et al., 1991). On the other hand, although no evidence of literature support , the hypothesized path to reluctance to buy foreign product seems less doubtful in terms of the significance for the reason discussed above. Accordingly, the following two hypotheses are offered for testing. H2: Consumer ethnocentrism will negatively affect buyers’ general judgments on foreign products. H3: Consumer ethnocentrism will be positively correlated with consumers’ reluctance to buy foreign products. In the meantime, general beliefs toward foreign products, or product judgments, could be used here as a representative construct for product-related attributes influencing buying decision

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of foreign products (Han, 1988). This approach over an alternative approach to using a specific product from a foreign country can be rationalized by the following two thoughts. First, as ratings of product attributes may differ by product (Han and Terpstra, 1988), it would be less appropriate to use a specific product in the model in order to construct a general model for reluctance to buy a foreign product. Second, because evaluation of product attributes is sometimes difficult, purchasers frequently use extrinsic cues such as country-of-origin in their decisions (Nebenzahl et al., 1997; Li and Wyer, 1994; Maheswaran, 1994; Wall et al., 1991; Hong and Wyer, 1989; Ettenson et al., 1988). Relative to beliefs toward a specific foreign product, the general product judgments used here are linked more to such extrinsic cues. In the context of judgments on general product rather than on a specific product, product judgments are not likely to generate a strong impact on reluctance to buy foreign products. Rather, reluctance to buy foreign products will be more strongly influenced by emotional attributes like consumer ethnocentrism as proposed. This propensity may be shown more apparently for Korean consumers than for U.S. consumers. Consumers in Western countries might be understood as more involved in cognitive attributes in product judgment (Hong and Yi, 1992; Tanaka, 1993). Accordingly, product judgments will have a significant impact on reluctance to buy foreign products only for the U.S. sample. The following two hypotheses, thus, will be tested: H4a: General product judgments will negatively affect American consumers’ reluctance to buy foreign products. H4b: General product judgments will not significantly affect Korean consumers’ reluctance to buy foreign products.

Dissimilarity between reluctance and willingness

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Reluctance to buy foreign products, defined here as perceived guiltiness and tendency to avoidance in buying foreign-made products, is the core construct in our model because a less ethnocentric consumer may be characterized as less reluctant in buying foreign-made products rather than as more willing in buying foreign-made products. One, however, might raise a question that the reluctance and willingness are theoretically and statistically convergent. This study argues “reluctance” to buy foreign products to be a distinctive construct from “willingness” to buy foreign products particularly when they are measured in the general product level of a country. Yet, since the construct has never been previously used, it may be important to justify “reluctance” as a construct distinct from “willingness”, a seemingly related construct previously used in research. The justification for separating these two constructs can be argued both theoretically and statistically. First, theoretically, if “reluctance” is a different construct than “willingness”, it should be possible for a consumer to be both reluctant and willing, or neither reluctant nor willing to buy the same object. While it is not unrealistic to assume these scenarios, a consumer may have experienced a moment of conflict when he or she not only wanted to buy a foreign product, but also had a reluctant or guilty feeling in doing so. And, at a different situation, consumers can be neither willing nor reluctant in buying foreign products if they think that it is somewhat unlikely for them to buy a particular foreign product and that the very producing country is not perceived as a competitor of their own country. Second, statistically, “reluctance to buy” is not a reversed form of “willingness to buy”. For instance, it has been reported that reliability coefficient among measure items tends to be consistently lower when negatively worded or reversed worded (e.g., “reluctance to buy”) are combined with the positively worded items (e.g., “willingness to buy”) than when only positively worded items are used

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(Parasuraman et al., 1991). If the two groups of items are theoretically significantly distinguishable, they should be treated separately because each group of items might explain a different construct. Although the non-homogeneity problem in a measure is often created by measurement artifact, this study argues that the expected two-dimension structure reflects the reality. The assumption of use of “reluctance” to buy foreign products in our model is that the construct makes a different dimension than “willingness” to buy foreign products, since, in some contexts, buyers’ willingness to buy a foreign product is not so highly correlated with their reluctance to buy the same product. Therefore, we hypothesize that, particularly in assessing attitudes toward foreign products in general level, reluctance to buy foreign products has a heterogeneous structure differentiated from willingness to buy foreign products. We, using a covariance structure modeling, will show that the reluctance is not statistically synonymous with the willingness in a buying situation. H5: The construct, reluctance to buy foreign products, will be statistically distinctive from willingness to buy foreign products in both the U.S. and Korean samples.

Study Methods Country-of-Origin Germany was selected to be the producing country in the study. The respondents were asked to evaluate the perception of the general quality of products produced in Germany and assessed their reluctance to buy German products. Germany was selected as the country-oforigin in this study, because German products are familiar both to American and Korean consumers. Japan was initially considered, but deleted because of expected Korean consumers’ strong animosity toward Japan due to the Japanese occupation of Korea for over 30 years during

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the first half of the twentieth century. Animosity toward a foreign nation affects consumers’ buying behaviors (Klein et al., 1998). Survey Instruments Prior to the main study, we conducted a pilot test with 42 undergraduates and graduate students. The results from this pilot study provided us with the research direction. The final instrument was administrated for this study. Originally developed in English, the questionnaire had to be translated into Korean in order to use it for the Korean sample. Therefore, a bilingual expert translated the questionnaire into Korean and then another bilingual expert back-translated it to English to ensure consistency with the original and cross-cultural equivalence of measures (Douglas and Craig, 1983; Berry, 1980). All items in the questionnaire were randomly mixed in order to prevent a reference bias. The questionnaire was administered in each country in their native language during class time with instructors assisting participants, if needed. Samples The samples were drawn from university students majoring in business in Korea and the United States to enhance the homogeneity of respondents across cultures (Douglas and Craig, 1983). All samples were freshmen or sophomores in universities majoring in business. The U.S. sample initially consisted of 132 undergraduate students attending business courses at a midwestern university. Twelve returns were deleted due to incomplete information leaving 120 usable returns for analysis. From undergraduate students majoring in business at a southern university in Korea, 136 samples were collected. Eight questionnaires were deleted due to incomplete information leaving 128 usable samples for analysis. Samples consist of 47.5 percent of female for the U.S. samples and 48.4 percent for the Korean sample.

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Measures Global openness was measured with four 5-point Likert-type items: (1) It is necessary to make an effort to understand other cultures’ perspectives and integrate them into my own way of thinking. (2) Living and working in a foreign country may be an influential developmental experience of my own life. (3) I have a real interest in other cultures or nations. (4) I enjoy being with people from other countries to learn their unique views and approaches. Acceptable levels of reliability were achieved in both samples (in the U.S. sample, coefficient alpha = .79; in the Korean sample, coefficient alpha = .73). This instrument is constructed to measure a consumer’s interest in other cultures and sensitivity to different points of view based on other cultures. It is thus reflecting a self-conscious level of globalization as a process of deepening consciousness and increasing sensitivity to other people and cultures. The seven-item version recommended by the authors of CETSCALE (Shimp and Sharma, 1987) was used in order to measure consumer ethnocentrism. The reliability coefficients were .88 for the U.S. sample and .70 for the Korean sample. Product judgments, which represent belief measures on assessing the general quality of products of a country (Durvasula et al., 1997; Netemeyer et al., 1991), were measured on four 7point semantic differential scales (i.e., good/poor value for money, technically backward/ advanced, low/high quality, unreliable/reliable). The alpha coefficients were .89 for U.S. sample and .84 for Korean sample. Reluctance to buy foreign products was measured by a two-item scale: (1) Whenever possible, I avoid buying German products, (2) I would feel guilty if I bought a German product. The alpha coefficients were .72 for the U.S. sample and .85 for the Korean sample. Additionally, willingness to buy foreign products was measured in order to test Hypothesis 5 by a two-item

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scale: (1) Whenever possible, I would prefer to buy German products, and (2) I like the idea of owning German products. The alpha coefficients were .78 for the U.S. sample and .80 for the Korean sample. These two measures were adapted from the previous studies using willingness to buy foreign products (e.g. Darling and Arnold, 1988; Darling and Wood, 1990; Klein et al., 1998; Wood and Darling, 1993).

Results [Insert Table 1 and Figure 2 about here] Analysis for the Proposed Path Model The proposed two path models for each sample were estimated with the four composite variables. AMOS 4.0 was used for analysis (Arbuckle and Wothke 1995). The path model for the U.S. sample indicated a good level of fit (χ2 [2] = .42, p = .81) The Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA = .00) is well below the cut-off value of 0.08. Other pertinent statistics are also well within the recommended thresholds of 0.9; Comparative Fit Index (CFI = 1.00); Normal fit Index (NFI = .99); and Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI = 1.00) for the U.S. sample. The path model for the Korean sample also achieved a good level of fit (χ2 [2] = 1.23, p = .54; RMSEA = .00; CFI = 1.00; NFI = .97; and TLI = 1.00). Both samples showed no violation of the multivariate normality assumption. The results including standardized path coefficients and squared multiple correlations (R2), for both the U.S. and the Korean samples, are shown respectively in Figure 2a and 2b. The descriptive statistics and correlations between constructs are shown in Table 1. The four hypotheses (Hypothesis 1 through 4) were tested by examining each path coefficient in the path models. Table 2 shows the results of the hypotheses testing. Hypothesis 1, proposing the negative relationship between global openness and consumer ethnocentrism for the

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U.S. sample and the non-significant relationship for the Korean sample, is apparently supported. For the U.S. sample, a statistically significant negative relationship was noted between global openness and consumer ethnocentrism (t = -5.79, p < .001), while, for the Korean sample, the path weight is negative but not significant (t = -1.04, p > .05). It was suggested in the second hypothesis that consumer ethnocentrism significantly affect product judgments. Our findings indicate that consumer ethnocentrism negatively affects product judgment only for the Korean sample (t = -2.29, p < .05) and not significant for the U.S. sample (t = -.98, p > .05). Hypothesis 2 is, therefore, supported only for the Korean sample. Hypothesis 3 stipulating positive relationship between consumer ethnocentrism and reluctance to buy foreign products is supported for both two samples (U.S. sample: t = 6.06, p < .001; Korean sample: t = 5.44, p < .001). As expected, the impact of consumer ethnocentrism on reluctance to buy a foreign product was generally higher than that of product judgments. Also, when incorporated with the results of Hypothesis 1, it seems to be reasonable to conclude that consumer ethnocentrism acts as a mediating role between global openness and reluctance to buy foreign products in the U.S. sample. As to Hypothesis 4 proposing general product judgments will negatively affect American consumers’ reluctance to buy foreign products, and not significantly affect Korean consumers’ reluctance to buy foreign products, the results in Table 2 indicates that Hypothesis 4 is well supported (U.S. sample: t = -3.55, p < .01; Korean sample: t = -.16, p > .05). Product judgment appears to have a significant impact on reluctance to buy foreign products for the U.S. sample, but not to significantly affect reluctance to buy foreign products for the Korean samples as shown in Table 2. [Insert Table 2 about here]

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Analysis for Hypothesis 5 The structural equation models to test Hypothesis 5 are shown in Figure 3. With no violation of the multivariate normality assumption, each model indicates a good level of fit. For each model, the chi-square estimate was not significant (for U.S. model: χ2 = .70, df = 1, p = .40; for Korean model: χ2 = .04; df = 1; p = .85). Other pertinent statistics such as CFI, NFI, and TLI were all above the recommended thresholds of .9 (for U.S. model: CFI = 1.00; NFI = .98; and TLI = 1.00; for Korean model: CFI = 1.00; NFI = .99; and TLI = 1.00). The Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) was well below the cutoff value of 0.08, thus acceptable (.00 for both models). As expected in Hypothesis 5 and shown in Figure 3, the coefficient estimates between reluctance and willingness to buy foreign products were relatively low (-.25 in U.S model; .23 in Korean Model), and were not statistically significant in both samples (U.S model: t = -1.46, p > .05; Korean model: t = 1.55, p > .05), which suggests that the two constructs can be considered distinctively different. Another interesting finding here is the difference in extent of the two estimates (negative relation for U.S. sample and positive relation for Korean sample). Shown in Table 3, the correlations between the four items also confirm the same result of the dissimilarity. For example, it was shown that the higher correlations between the two items within the “same” measures (greater than .56) and lower correlations between the “different” measures (i.e., between the reluctance item and the willingness item; all less than .22). This result verifies convergent validity between the items of each construct and discriminant validity between the constructs by multitrait-multimethod approach (Campbell and Fiske, 1959). Additionally, the positive correlation between the two constructs in the Korean sample (.23) suggests that the Korean consumers were neither reluctant nor willing to buy German products (Mean of

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reluctance = 2.13; Mean of willingness = 1.83), which coincide with our theoretical scenario for the “reluctance” construct. [Insert Figure 3 and Table 3 about here]

Findings and Discussion As argued in our samples, reluctance to buy foreign products is a distinctive construct from willingness to buy foreign products at least when they are assessed in general product level, even though we may need more evidence with different samples hopefully from another culture in order to substantiate this hypothesis. With the assumption of independent structure of reluctance to buy foreign products from willingness to buy foreign products, we examined the relationships among global openness, consumer ethnocentrism, product judgments, and reluctance to buy foreign products in a cross-cultural context. Our results show that global openness does significantly affect consumers’ ethnocentric tendencies in a certain cultural context (i.e., U.S.). And, in the same context, the impact of global openness on reluctance to buy is mediated by consumer ethnocentrism. Consumer ethnocentrism generally plays an important role in determining the magnitude of reluctance to buy a foreign product, and product judgments also play a part but only in a Western culture (i.e., U.S.), where consumers’ reluctance to buy foreign products might have been decreased by perceived product quality, lowering consumer ethnocentrism, and indirectly developing global openness. However, in a different culture such as Korea, a decrease in consumer ethnocentrism appeared to be an only way to reduce the reluctant propensity of consumers. It appears that the reluctant propensity can hardly be diminished with improved perceived quality alone. To make it even harder, the consumer ethnocentrism tends to be not changed so much by globalization in that cultural context. For

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example, the standardized path coefficient between global openness and consumer ethnocentrism in Korea is only -.09 as oppose to -.47 in U.S. It is concluded, therefore, that consumers in a different culture, who are fundamentally different in their tastes and preferences, perceptions, ordering of needs and motivations to consume, are still sufficiently different even after being exposed to the enormous wave of globalization. Based on our study, one of such differences was shown in the relationship between consumers’ globalized minds and their ethnocentric tendencies. Consumers in a Western culture, where it took centuries to develop the attitudes, conditions, and mechanisms supportive of free markets, might have decreased ethnocentric tendencies mainly cultivated by the globalization process. On the other hand, consumers in an Eastern culture such as Korea, where globalization is being achieved in a more rapid fashion and mostly by governmental leadership, may have a different kind of global mind-set, which is cultivated by a distinctive way and less related to behavioral consequences. Alternatively, a cultural difference can be offered as an alternative explanation. The difference in the results might be induced from one of the most promising dimension of cultural variation, collectivism vs. individualism. Consumers in a collectivistic society (e.g., Korean) are likely to demonstrate strong ethnocentric tendencies (Sharma et al., 1995; Triandis et al., 1988). In Korean sample, this construct might have explained significantly more variance than global openness. Patriotism is another candidate related to the unexplained variance (Adorno et al., 1950; Catton, 1960; Shama et al., 1995). This cultural dimension, however, is also interwoven in the different processes of globalization between the two nations. While the individualistic way of globalization (i.e., in the U.S.) has fully cultivated the global mindsets of people, the collectivistic one, which is relatively more forced and rushed by law

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enforcement authority (i.e., in Korean), might have made the global mindsets less successful to reach an embodied and influencing level. In general, our findings suggest that, for the model for cross-cultural consumer behaviors, we should construct different frameworks for different cultural contexts (e.g., Western vs. Eastern) rather than a general framework spanning all the cultural contexts. The findings also suggest that sellers of foreign goods should adopt different strategies in different countries in order to be successful in inducing the reluctant consumers to purchase their products. If consumers are reluctant to buy foreign goods solely due to perceived poor product quality judgment and become globalized through their own initiatives, the market penetration may become relatively easier.

Conclusion The contribution of this study is as follows. First, this study attempted to examine the roles of globalization in buying behaviors in the conceptual model incorporating global openness, consumer ethnocentrism, and product judgments as the influencers on reluctance to buy foreign products. Some views on globalization take it for granted that globalization entails homogenization in one’s mind and behavior (Thomas, 1991). Often, this view would be easily generalized to consumer behavior theories with no counter argument that the result of globalization is not so much as a homogenization and obliteration of cultures marching under the banner of multinational brands (Belk, 1996). Accordingly, this study as a second contribution sought to examine the different role of consumers’ globalized mind-sets on their buying behaviors between the two different cultures. Third, since this study used “reluctance to buy” as a core variable rather than “willingness to buy”, we tested and supported the assumption that “reluctance to buy” is a unique construct theoretically and statistically differentiated from

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“willingness to buy”. Even though these two constructs would be used in the same measure of willingness to buy (e.g., Klein et al., 1998), it has been recognized by researchers that reversed items in a measure may form a distinctive factor from other non-reversed items in the same measure (e.g., Parasuraman et al., 1991). More studies, however, will be needed to confirm this argument. The main limitation of this study lies on the use of student sample. It has been noted by some researchers that studies using student sample suffer from a lack of external validity (e.g., Sears, 1986). Even though concerns about representative samples may be sacrificed in favor of addressing threats to internal validity in research designed for theory testing (Calder et al., 1981), it is hoped that testing should deal with samples from life stages other than late adolescence. According to recent trend in marketing research, external validity concerns require more attention in theoretical research (Winer, 1999; Lynch, 1999). Nevertheless, using student samples in this study can be plausibly rationalized. We expect the differences in results between the two countries to be more pronounced using the general populations of the two countries. The college-age group, which represents the samples of our study, is identified as a viable global segment with homogeneous attributes in which consumers are likely to exhibit similar buying behavior (Kumar and Nagpal, 2001). Therefore, if we had included broader age groups in our samples, the inflated heterogeneity in characteristics between the samples from the two countries might have resulted in clearer differences in results. Several studies can be extended from the findings of this study in the future. First, since this study did not exhaustively address the source of the variations between the two national samples, more refined and focused questions should be included as to what factors may make the different results. Some of the research questions may include the level of consumer

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enlightenment through economic development (e.g., developed countries vs. less-developed countries), true cultural differences in buying behavior, and other contextual variations country by country. Future studies should be based on a more exhaustive model that includes all the social-psychological factors reflecting uniqueness of each cultural context. Second, a refined question could be raised on the construct of reluctance to buy foreign products. Is it still distinguishable with willingness to buy a foreign product when they are assessed with specific product? Or, are they identical in different settings other than the condition where they are evaluated in general product level? Although we assumed and tested that they represents different variations, additional studies are needed for confirmation. As globalization is an on-going process, the results of this study may hold true at the time of study. Definitely, consumers in the future will be more accepting of foreign products as globalization is accelerated around the globe. However, each culture’s distinctive processes and dynamics in globalization will still resist the automatic, uniform application of the global market concept. Attention of international marketing researchers, thus, should be continuously given to the social and cultural differences newly constructed by the dynamics and structures in on-going processes of globalization.

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Figure 1 The Hypothesized Path Model

Consumer Ethnocentrism

Reluctance To Buy Foreign Products

Global Openness

Product Judgments

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Table 1 Descriptive Statistics and Correlations

U.S. Sample (N = 120) 1. Global Openness (GO) 2. Consumer Ethnocentrism (CE) 3. Product Judgment (PJ) 4. Reluctance to Buy (RB) 5. Willingness to Buy (WB)

Mean 3.95 2.40 5.17 1.74 2.48

S.D. .65 .71 .85 .57 .61

Korean Sample (N = 128) 1. Global Openness (GO) 2. Consumer Ethnocentrism (CE) 3. Product Judgment (PJ) 4. Reluctance to Buy (RB) 5. Willingness to Buy (WB)

Mean 3.75 2.52 4.80 2.13 1.83

S.D. .46 .49 .90 .61 .57

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1

2

3

4

-.47 .09 -.25 .09

-.09 .49 -.27

-.31 .04

-.19

1

2

3

4

-.09 .03 -.13 -.09

-.20 .44 .09

-.10 -.12

.19

Figure 2 The Path Coefficients and Squared Multiple Correlations a) U.S. Sample

2e .22

CE 1e

-.47

.46 .31 -.09

GO

RB -.27 .01

PJ

3e

b) Korean Sample

2e .01

CE 1e

-.09

.44 .20 -.20

GO

RB -.01 .04

PJ

3e

GO: Global Openness PJ: Product Judgments

CE: Consumer Ethnocentrism RB: Reluctance to Buy Foreign Products

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Table 2 Maximum Likelihood Estimates for Testing Hypotheses

U.S. Sample Hypotheses

Unstd.

S.E.

Global Openness Æ Consumer Ethnocentrism

-.51

.09

Consumer Ethnocentrism Æ Product Judgments

-.11

.11

-.98

Consumer Ethnocentrism Æ Reluctance to Buy

.37

.06

6.06***

-.18

.05

-3.55**

Product Judgments Æ Reluctance to Buy

* p < .05 ** p < .01 *** p < .001

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t-value

Korean Sample Unstd.

-5.79*** -.10

S.E.

t-value

.09

-1.04

-.37

.16

-2.29*

.56

.10

5.44**

-.01

.06

-.16

Figure 3 Heterogeneous Structure between Reluctance and Willingness a) U.S. Sample

.53

R1

.73

Reluctance to Buy

1e

.61

.78

2e

R2 -.25 .46

W1

.68

Willingness to Buy

3e

.91

.95

4e

W2

b) Korean Sample

.60

R1

.78

Reluctance to Buy

1e

.92

.96

R2

2e

.23 .49

W1

.70

Willingness to Buy

3e

.91

.95

W2

4e

R1= whenever possible, I avoid buying German products R2 = I would feel guilty if I bought a German product W1 = whenever possible, I would prefer to buy German products W2 = I like the idea of owning German products

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Table 3 Correlations between the Measure Items (Reluctance versus Willingness)

U.S. Sample R1

R2

W1

Korean Sample W2

R1

R2

W1

.75 .12 .17

.16 .21

.67

R1 R2 W1 W2

.57 -.10 -.11

-.16 -.19

.65

R1= wherever possible, I avoid buying German products R2 = I would feel guilty if I bought a German product W1 = whenever possible, I would prefer to buy German products W2 = I like the idea of owning German products

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W2