Special Session Summary Images, Impulses and Attitudes

ABSTRACT - This session presents three papers representing recent advances in the study of consumer images, impulses, and attitudes. The three studies fit nicely with the Asia-Pacific focus of the conference by including the results of empirical work carried out in Australia, Singapore, India, the USA, and Korea.||The image of a country has been suggested to have a separate influence to the image of the products of that country on purchase intentions. (Mort, Ettenson, Papadopoulos and Heslop 1995). This research goes further and examines the influence on purchase intentions of four key constructs: image of the country, image of its people, knowledge of the country and similarity perceptions. These are hypothesised to affect image of the products from a country. Two intervening variables are tested: perceived threats and the need for closer ties. Three product classes are examined: material goods and two types of services, tourism and education.

Citation:

Richard Ettenson (1996) ,"Special Session Summary Images, Impulses and Attitudes", in AP - Asia Pacific Advances in Consumer Research Volume 2, eds. Russel Belk and Ronald Groves, Provo, UT : Association for Consumer Research, Pages: 134.

Asia Pacific Advances in Consumer Research Volume 2, 1996      Page 134

SPECIAL SESSION SUMMARY

IMAGES, IMPULSES AND ATTITUDES

Richard Ettenson, Bond University, Australia

ABSTRACT -

This session presents three papers representing recent advances in the study of consumer images, impulses, and attitudes. The three studies fit nicely with the Asia-Pacific focus of the conference by including the results of empirical work carried out in Australia, Singapore, India, the USA, and Korea.

The first study extends the emerging consumer literature assessing marketplace reaction to external political events and the issue of consumer boycotts. Specifically, the Animosity Model of Foreign Product Purchases is proposed and tested in the context of Australian consumers’ reaction to France’s recent nuclear tests in the South Pacific. The results indicate support for the model.

The second study blends the research literature in personality, specifically the Myer-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), with the consumer behaviour literature on impulse buying. The results provide cross-national support for the notion that personality has a key role to play in understanding impulse buying.

The third study extends the extant country of origin literature by testing various models of foreign product purchase, specifically assessing country image, image of its people, knowledge of the country, and product images from that country. The relationship between Korean consumers’ purchases intentions and the above concepts are assessed across a range of product classes-material goods and two types of services-and a range of importing countries.

 

FRENCH NUCLEAR TESTING AND AUSTRALIAN CONSUMERS’ ATTITUDES TOWARD FRENCH PRODUCTS: A TEST OF THE ANIMOSITY MODEL

Jill G Kein, Northwestern University, USA

Richard Ettenson, Bond University Australia

This study provides a further test of the Animosity Model of foreign product purchase proposed by Klein, Ettenson and Morris (1996). Considering recent consumer (n=225) animosity towards France, we hypothesize that it will negatively affect purchase behaviour independently of judgements of quality for French products. Furthermore, it is hypothesised that consumers’ animosity toward France will affect buying, even when beliefs about the morality and appropriateness of purchasing foreign products are held constant. Results from regression and LISREL tests generally support the mdel, showing that animosity can be an important determinant of consumer behaviour.

 

CONSUMER TEMPERAMENT AND IMPULSE BUYING

Sudhir H Kale, Bond University

Temperament theory has a rich mythological tradition dating back at least 2,500 years. Keirsey and Bates (1978) operationalisation of the temperament concept links this traditional construct to the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) the most widely used personality test in the world. This framework delineates people into four distinct temperaments: The Dionysian Temperament (SP), the Epimethean Temperament (SJ), the Promethean Temperament (NT) the Apollonian Temperament (NF).

Impulse buying is a pervasive phenomenon in buyer behaviour. Bellenger, Robertson and Hirschmann (1977) have estimated that between 27% and 62% of department store purchases fall into the impulse category. This research looks at the relationship between consumer temperament to impulse buying in three countries. Empirical studies in three countries-India, the United States and Singapore suggest that temperament is an accurate predictor of the frequency of impulse buying in all three societies. This research also substantiates the external validity of the impulse-buying scale developed by Rook (1987).

 

IMAGE OF COUNTRY INFLUENCES ON PREFERENCES FOR GOODS AND SERVICES

Gillian Mort, Deakin University Geelong

Hume Winzar, Murdoch University

C. Min Han, Hang Yang University, Seoul

The image of a country has been suggested to have a separate influence to the image of the products of that country on purchase intentions. (Mort, Ettenson, Papadopoulos and Heslop 1995). This research goes further and examines the influence on purchase intentions of four key constructs: image of the country, image of its people, knowledge of the country and similarity perceptions. These are hypothesised to affect image of the products from a country. Two intervening variables are tested: perceived threats and the need for closer ties. Three product classes are examined: material goods and two types of services, tourism and education.

This research tests three alternative models. The first model includes only image of goods related to purchase intention. The second model links the proposed antecendent variable, image of the country, image of its people, knowledge of the country and similarity perceptions to purchase intention. The third model places image of goods as intervening variables between the proposed antecedent variables and purchase intentions. It is hypothesised that the effect of the country, people, knowledge of country and similarity perceptions will have a greater influence for services than for goods. Structural equation modelling is used to examine the proposed model using data collected in South Korea on Korean perceptions and preferences for products of four other countries: Hong Kong, Japan, the US and Australia.

----------------------------------------