Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied Copyright 1996 by the American Psychological Association, Inc.

1996, Vol. 2, No. 1,17-30 107fr«l8X/96/$3.00

Experimental Analysis of Nationalistic Tendencies

in Consumer Decision Processes:
Case of the Multinational Product
Irwin P. Levin and J. D. Jasper
University of Iowa

Participants evaluated pairs of hypothetical hybrid products varying in the

percentage of American workers employed in manufacturing each product
(50% vs. 80%) and the company nationality (American vs. Japanese, German,
or Taiwanese). For each pair, participants indicated a preference and reasons
for their preference. Employing American workers was an important factor in
the preferences of all participants across all products (automobiles, personal
computers, and clothing). However, preference for American companies was
significant in most cases only for those scoring high on a scale of nationalism,
as mediated by greater concern for supporting America and the American
economy and lesser concern for perceived quality differences. Results are
discussed in terms of theories of consumer ethnocentrism and ways of
marketing multinational products.

Would you be more apt to buy a product from a
company that employs mostly American workers
or from a company that employs mostly foreign
workers? For most of us, this would be a simple
question, but what if the company employing
mostly American workers is a foreign-based com-
pany and the one employing mostly foreign work-
ers is an American-owned company? These are
exactly the kinds of questions that consumers face,
at least implicitly, in today's global marketplace. In
the experiments reported in this article, we explic-
itly posed such questions and addressed them with
the methods of experimental psychology.
Traditionally, as a number of studies will attest
(Bilkey & Nes, 1980; Gaedeke, 1973; Han, 1988;
Hong & Wyer, 1989, 1990; Levin & Jasper, 1995;
Levin, Jasper, Mittelstaedt, & Gaeth, 1993; Levin,
Johnson, & Jasper, 1993; Obermiller & Spangen-
Irwin P. Levin and J. D. Jasper, Department of
Psychology, University of Iowa.
We thank Gary Gaeth for helpful comments and
Wendy Forbes, Shelly K. Stein, Cheryl Nelson, and Scott
Perlman for help in collecting and scoring data.
Correspondence concerning this article should be
addressed to Irwin P. Levin, Department of Psychology,
University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa 52242. Electronic
mail may be sent to irwin-levin@uiowa.edu.
berg, 1989; Schooler, 1971), consumers have had
relatively little trouble when using simple country-
of-origin cues as sources of information to differen-
tiate among and to make decisions about domestic
and foreign alternatives. For example, it might be
easy to assume that an American brand automo-
bile was designed, engineered, manufactured, and
assembled almost entirely in the United States.
However, with the advent of hybrid or multina-
tional products, that "pure" relationship has been
somewhat obscured. Automobiles and other expen-
sive and complex products are now often designed
and engineered in one country and built in an-
other, thereby confusing their nationalistic identi-
ties. In fact, some foreign automakers have nur-
tured this lack of national clarity to sell cars in the
United States by advertising that they are made by
American workers. Not to be outdone, of course,
American manufacturers of automobiles have used
similar tactics to develop and market domestic
brands like Geo and Saturn (Ettenson & Gaeth,
1991).
The question that needs to be addressed through
research, but has thus far been largely ignored,
concerns what effect these multiple country-of-
origin cues have on consumer choice. The present
study was designed to investigate this issue by
independently manipulating two nationalistic cues:

17
18 LEVIN AND JASPER
company nationality (e.g., American or Japanese)
and percentage of American workers employed
(50% or 80%) in the manufacture of a particular
brand. We selected specific paired comparisons
that varied (a) the company nationality while
holding the percentage of American workers con-
stant, (b) the percentage of American workers
while holding the company nationality constant,
and (c) both factors either congruently or incongru-
ently. Of the 16 possible ways of pairing the four
distinct product descriptions formed by combining
two company nationalities and two percentages,
only 12 had the properties of interest. Six of these
were redundant with the other 6, leaving the 6
shown in Table 1. In each case, participants were
asked to indicate their degree of preference be-
tween the two products and to provide a written
reason for their preference. Of particular interest
to us were those comparisons that created conflict
for consumers and required a tradeoff between
cues such as the American company employing
fewer American workers than the foreign com-
pany.
What is unique about this methodology is that it
allowed us to gain a detailed understanding of the
processes underlying such decisions. Asking partici-
pants to give reasons for their preferences pro-
vided one vehicle for this understanding. However,
our knowledge would probably have been incom-
plete without also considering individual differ-
ences, the most appropriate of which may be
consumer nationalism or ethnocentrism. As intro-
duced and defined by Shimp and Sharma (1987),
consumer ethnocentrism represents "the beliefs
held by American consumers about the appropri-
ateness, indeed morality, of purchasing foreign
made products" (p. 280). Shimp and Sharma
developed a scale to measure this construct
(adapted for the present study) and, along with
others, provided empirical evidence that country-
of-origin information was more important in the
purchase considerations of those scoring higher on
their scale.1 We wanted to know why and we also
wanted to discover whether consumers high on
ethnocentrism were more sensitive to all country-
of-origin cues? As useful as this construct may be
in providing a theoretical underpinning for examin-
ing individual differences in country-of-origin ef-
fects, we decided that a more microscopic analysis
was needed.
By separating company nationality from employ-
ment of American workers and obtaining concur-
rent data on reasons for choice, we were able to
determine rather specifically how highly nationalis-
tic individuals differed from the rest. Furthermore,
by including across experiments several different
foreign countries and products, we were able to
examine the extent to which country-of-origin
effect's depend on perceived quality differences
between products made by American and foreign
companies and the extent to which they depend on
perceived threats to American employment posed
by different countries.
Experiment 1
Participants in Experiment 1 were asked to
choose between automobiles made by American
and Japanese companies. Given recent media
attention to the ongoing economic battle between
these two countries, particularly in relation to car
manufacturing and sales, we thought that the
choice was quite appropriate. The main hypoth-
eses were that participants scoring high on a scale
of ethnocentrism would be (a) more sensitive to
American employment needs; (b) more concerned
with supporting American companies; and (c)
more apt to perceive that American products are
of superior quality.
Method
Paired comparisons. Sixty-three university stu-
dents (31 women and 32 men, virtually all Ameri-
can-born) participated in the experiment as part of
a course requirement. The initial cover story given
to participants read as follows:
Assume in each of six different situations that you
are making a choice between two automobiles to
purchase. Assume that the two cars within each
choice pair are of comparable price and size and
have comparable features. The two differ only in
the nationality of the company making the car
(either American or Japanese) and the percentage
1
The scale and the research using it, including the
present study, deal specifically with American ethnocen-
trism or nationalism. Our assumption is that comparable
results would be obtained if analogs of this study were
done in other countries.
 NATIONALISM IN CONSUMER DECISIONS
Table 1
Six Paired Comparisons of Car Selection Choices
Choice A
Company American
Comparison no. nationality workers (%)
1 American
2 American
3 American
4 Japanese
5 American
6 American
of American workers employed in manufacturing
and/or assembling the car. You will find that this
percentage varies from car to car because of the
global nature of today's automobile industry. Some
parts of a car may be manufactured in one country,
other parts in another, and they might all be
assembled in yet a third country.
The six paired comparisons are shown in Table
1. The first two pairs varied the company national-
ity while the percentage of American workers was
held constant; the next two pairs varied the percent-
age of American workers while company national-
ity was held constant; and the last two pairs varied
both factors. Participants received the pairs in a
random order, each pair on a different page of the
response booklet, and were asked to indicate their
preferences by circling one of the numbers on a
6-point scale as illustrated below: "For Choice I (a
Japanese company with an 80% American work-
force) versus Choice J (an American company with
an 80% American workforce), the options are as
follows: 1—much prefer I, 2—somewhat prefer I,
3—slightly prefer I, 4—slightly prefer J, 5—some-
what prefer J, 6—much prefer J."
Across participants, the left-right positions of
the two choices within a pair were counterbal-
anced. For purposes of standardization, responses
on the 6-point scale were scored such that a low
number was associated with preference for an
American company over a Japanese company, or,
when company nationality was constant, a low
number was associated with preference for 80%
over 50% American workers employed. Use of a
numerical scale allowed us to assess the degree of
preference for one type of car over another.
Reasons for choices. In addition to choosing
one of the two cars in each pair, participants were
19
Choice B
Company American
nationality workers (%)
80 Japanese 80
50 Japanese 50
80 American 50
80 Japanese 50
80 Japanese 50
50 Japanese 80
required to indicate in their own words the main
reason or reasons for their choice. Responses were
classified by three judges according to the follow-
ing categories:
(1) Employ Americans. Participants stated that
their choice employed or would employ more
American workers than the alternative.
(2) American economy. Participants mentioned
that their choice would keep more money in the
United States and/or help the economy.
(3) Japanese [American] quality. Participants
stated that their choice of a Japanese [American]
car was superior in quality to an American [Japa-
nese] alternative.
(4) American [Japanese] made (no further justi-
fication). Participants simply acknowledged that
their choice was American [Japanese] made and/or
originated from an American [Japanese] company.
No further justification was offered.
(5) American made (support America). Partici-
pants acknowledged that their choice was Ameri-
can made and stated that it was important to
support one's own country.
(6) Company/worker match. Participants ar-
gued that their choice represented a match be-
tween company nationality and worker "majority,"
which might lead to a better product.
(7) Employment diversity. Participants stated
that their choice of an equal mix of American and
non-American workers was better for everyone in
a global economy.
(8) Idiosyncratic. Participants gave a reason that
was rare or uncategorizable.
We classified the reasons without knowledge of
the participants' level of nationalism (see below).
Average interjudge agreement between three inde-
pendent judges was 80%. Disagreements were
20 LEVIN AND JASPER

later resolved in each case by discussion among the
three judges.
Nationalism scale. At the end of each experi-
mental session participants were given an attitude
survey designed to measure their nationalism-
ethnocentrism. Nine of the 10 items in the survey
were taken from the 17-item scale of Consumers'
Ethnocentric Tendencies (CETSCALE) devel-
oped by Shimp and Sharma (1987). These nine
items correspond to numbers 1, 3, 5, 8, 11,13, 15,
16, and 17 of the original scale. A 10th item, extent
of agreement or disagreement with "Buy America
first" (used by Levin, Jasper, Mittelstaedt, &
Gaeth, 1993), was also included in the survey. The
sum of all 10 items defined our nationalism score;
scores could range from 10 to 70. Cronbach's alpha
measured for this index was .91.
In an earlier application (Levin, Johnson, &
Jasper, 1993), this derived scale was validated for a
population comparable to the present one by
showing that the nationalism score was signifi-
cantly higher for owners of American cars than for
owners of foreign cars. In fact, the same relation-
ship held for Canadians when the appropriate
substitution of the word Canadian for American
was made on all scale items.
For the purposes of the present experiment,
participants were divided into three groups on the
basis of nationalism score. Scores for the low
nationalism group (n = 20) ranged from 18 to 34;
scores for the medium nationalism group (n - 22)
ranged from 35 to 45; and scores for the high
nationalism group (n = 21) ranged from 46 to 67.
Results
The main data are the preference ratings for
each paired comparison. These ratings were ana-
lyzed statistically to determine whether each nation-
alism group had a significant preference for one of
the alternatives in a pair (i.e., their ratings differed
from neutral, 3.5, the midpoint on our scale) and
to assess whether the three nationalism groups
differed from each other. Table 2 gives the mean
preference rating for each choice shown separately
for low, medium, and high nationalism groups.
Table 3 provides counts of the most frequently
reported reasons for making choices and helps
explain the pattern of preference ratings observed
in Table 2.
We can draw two important conclusions from
the preference data. The first is that participants at
all levels of nationalism were equally responsive to
the percentage of American workers employed,
strongly favoring companies that employed a
greater percentage of American workers. This is
clearly shown in the two comparisons where com-
pany nationality was constant and percentage of
American workers varied. In each choice situation,
the mean preference rating for each group was

Table 2
Mean Paired Comparison Preference Ratings for Each Nationalism Group
in Experiment 1
Type of Nationalism group
comparison Low Medium High
% Americans constant and country variable
80% American vs. 80% Japanese 3.00 2.95 1.52**
50% American vs. 50% Japanese 3.20 3.05 1.88**
% Country constant, Americans variable
80% American vs. 50% American 1.78** 2.00** 1.67**
80% Japanese vs. 50% Japanese 1.90** 2.09** 1.79**
i Country and Americans variable
80% American vs. 50% Japanese 2.55* 2.41** 1.33**
50% American vs. 80% Japanese 4.65** 4.50** 3.33
Note. Ratings were scored from 1 to 6, with lower numbers representing preference for the brand
listed first in each comparison. Neutral rating = 3.5 on scale.
*p < .05 when compared with neutral. **p < .01 when compared with neutral.
 NATIONALISM IN CONSUMER DECISIONS 21

Table 3
Most Common Reasons for Choices in Experiment 1
American Japanese American American American American
(80%) vs. (80%) vs. (80%) vs. (50%) vs. (80%) vs. (50%) vs.
American Japanese Japanese Japanese Japanese Japanese
Response (50%) (50%) (80%) (50%) (50%) (80%)
category LN MN HN LN MN HN LN MN HN LN MN HN LN MN HN LN MN HN
Employ Americans 16 17 19 19 20 21 0 0 0 0 0 0 12 15 17 15 16 6
American made (no
further justification) 0 1 0 0 0 0 6 7 7 8 8 7 5 3 9 2 1 4
American made
(support America) 0 0 1 0 0 0 3 5 9 0 3 5 0 3 1 0 0 2
American economy 1 3 1 2 0 4 3 1 7 4 4 10 4 3 4 4 1 6
Japanese quality 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 7 0 5 5 0 4 2 0 3 5 0
Note. Some respondents indicated two reasons for a choice. Both reasons were included in the above tabulation. LN = low
nationalism; MN = medium nationalism; HN = high nationalism.

significantly different from neutral in the direction
of preference for the higher percentage of Ameri-
can workers, and the groups did not differ signifi-
cantly from each other. Moreover, "employ Ameri-
cans" was cited as a reason often and with equal
regularity by all three nationalism groups.
The second conclusion is that those participants
classified as high on nationalism were more respon-
sive to American companies in their choices than
were those medium and low on nationalism. As
seen in Table 2, the high nationalism group was the
only group to show a significant preference, a
preference for American companies, when percent-
age of American workers was constant and com-
pany nationality varied. The ratings for this group,
in fact, were significantly different from those
of the medium and low nationalism groups
combined, both when percentage of American
workers = 80 and when percentage of American
workers = 50, F(l, 61) = 22.18 and 26.52, respec-
tively,/? < .01, in each case.
The reasons for these choices also differed
among groups. "Japanese quality" was mentioned
22 times by the low and medium groups and not
once by the high nationalism group. Instead, indi-
viduals high on nationalism were concerned about
supporting the United States and keeping money
out of the hands of foreign competition. "Ameri-
can made" and "American economy," as indicated
in Table 3, were cited much more frequently by
this group than by the other two groups. Interest-
ingly, "American quality" was seldom mentioned
as a reason in these or, for that matter, in any of
the choices.
Thus far, we have discussed only those compari-
sons that varied one cue while holding the other
constant. The same effects identified above were
also evidenced in the remaining choice pairs where
participants were forced to weight and integrate
the two cues. When the cues were "congruent," in
that the American company employed a higher
percentage of American workers than the Japa-
nese company, all groups (but especially the high
nationalism group) preferred the American brand
and cited "employ Americans" as the most com-
mon reason. However, when the cues were "incon-
gruent," in that the American company employed
the lower percentage of American workers, the
high nationalism group was the only group not to
prefer the Japanese brand and was the only group
to cite "American economy" and "American-
made" as often as "employ Americans." The
difference between the ratings of these partici-
pants and those medium and low on nationalism
combined in both situations was again statistically
significant, F(l, 61) = 18.15 and 12.89, respec-
tively,/) < .01, in each case.
While interesting in their own right, the above
results can be aggregated at a more formal level.
Information integration theory (Anderson, 1981)
provides a model-based analysis of how national-
ism influenced the tradeoffs that were made be-
tween company nationality and the percentage of
American workers employed. The procedure is
22 LEVIN AND JASPER
relatively simple and involves estimating the impor-
tance assigned to the two cues by each nationalism
group. As described more fully in the Appendix
and as shown in Table 4, its results can be
summarized as follows: (a) The weight given to
percentage of American workers was large and
approximately equal across the three nationalism
groups, (b) For those individuals high on national-
ism, the two cues, percentage of American workers
and company nationality, were of about equal
importance, (c) For those low and medium on
nationalism, company nationality was of little or no
consequence.
Discussion
The unique feature of Experiment 1 is that
country-of-origin information, long thought to be
important to consumers but heretofore considered
as unidimensional, was divided into likely compo-
nents reflecting the character of today's multina-
tional or hybrid product. Our experimental design
and analyses allowed us to separate and assess for
the first time the independent effects of company
nationality and employment of American workers
and to compare the effects for individuals differing
on consumer nationalism-ethnocentrism. Asking
participants to give reasons following each choice
provided us with additional insights into these
matters.
We had anticipated that those respondents scor-
ing high on nationalism would be more sensitive to
American employment needs than those scoring
low. This was indeed the case in earlier work
(Levin & Jasper, 1995) when percentage of Ameri-
can workers was combined with additional price
and quality cues; in fact, we found that for high
nationalism respondents, and only for these respon-
Table 4
Comparison of Effect Sizes Across Nationalism
Groups in Experiment 1
Nationalism group
Effect Low Medium High
Company nationality
(Equation A3) 0.20 0.09 2.34
Percentage of American
workers (Equation A4) 2.10 2.09 2.00
Note. Appendix provides detailed description of how entries
were derived.
dents, percentage of American workers became
more important as they progressed from a large
number of purchase options to a final choice.
Nevertheless, in Experiment 1, when percentage
of American workers was pitted directly against
company nationality and no other cues were of-
fered, employing American workers was an impor-
tant factor in the preference ratings of respondents
across all levels of nationalism.
Our second conjecture was that those scoring
high on nationalism would be more responsive to
American companies. This assertion was sup-
ported. Interestingly, high nationalism respon-
dents not only assigned greater importance to the
company nationality cue than did other respon-
dents, but they were also at least as responsive to
the distinction between American and Japanese
brands as they were to a change between 50% and
80% American workers. This was especially evi-
dent in the two choices varying both factors.
Company nationality "added to" percentage of
American workers in one case and "canceled out"
percentage of American workers in the other.
Finally, we hypothesized that those high on
nationalism would be more likely to acknowledge
"American quality" as a reason for preferring
American brands. Clearly this was not the case.
American quality was rarely mentioned; rather,
those high on nationalism were motivated in their
choices by a desire to support America and the
American economy as well as American workers
and were apt to cite "American made" as the
reason for their choices without need for further
justification. "Japanese quality," on the other hand,
was apt to be given as a reason for choices by low
nationalism respondents.
Experiment 2
Of course, several questions naturally arose
concerning the generality of results found in Experi-
ment 1. For example, would the effects of company
nationality and percentage of American workers
on consumer preference be the same for products
other than automobiles and company nationalities
other than American and Japanese? Also, would
American consumer nationalism as measured by
our scale play the same role with other products
and with other countries? To answer these ques-
tions, additional countries and products represent-
ing varying levels of departure from American
 NATIONALISM IN CONSUMER DECISIONS
versus Japanese automobiles were selected and
used in Experiment 2.
Specifically, participants were asked to choose
between American and Japanese personal comput-
ers, American and German automobiles, or Ameri-
can and Taiwanese clothing. Thus, the American-
Japanese comparison was extended to a new
product, the American-foreign car comparison
was extended to a new country, and, finally, a less
developed country was introduced in a realistic
product setting. On the basis of the findings from
Experiment 1, we hypothesized that across all
comparisons low and high nationalism respon-
dents would be equally sensitive to American
employment needs, but that high nationalism re-
spondents would be more concerned than low with
supporting American companies. In addition, on
the basis of earlier work showing more favorable
evaluations of products from countries with greater
economic development (Bilkey & Nes, 1982; Gae-
deke, 1973), we hypothesized that for both low and
high nationalism respondents perceived differ-
ences in quality would favor American companies
in American-Taiwanese choices more than in
other choices. We thought, for example, that
participants in this condition might be more apt to
mention "American quality" as a reason when
choosing an American over a Taiwanese company.
Method
A different group of participants from the same
population as Experiment 1 served as participants
for each product-country combination: n = 40 for
American versus Japanese personal computers
(PCs); n = 37 for American versus German auto-
mobiles; and n = 39 for American versus Taiwan-
ese clothing. For each group of participants, the
tasks, procedure, and instructions were exactly the
same as in Experiment 1, except for appropriate
substitution of product and country names.
Selection of participants varying in consumer
ethnocentrism, however, was different in Experi-
ment 2 than in Experiment 1. Our scale was
administered to 758 students from elementary
psychology courses in a group testing session that
included a variety of other scales and surveys.
Students who scored in the upper or bottom thirds
on the nationalism scale were later recruited for
the experiment. These constituted our high and
low nationalism groups; the middle level was not
23
included in Experiment 2 because responses in
Experiment 1 by low and medium level partici-
pants were not appreciably different.2
Results
Table 5 shows the mean preference rating for
each choice in Experiment 2, as well as the
preference ratings for the high and low national-
ism groups from Experiment 1. This allows a
comparison between the various products and
countries from both experiments. As in Experi-
ment 1, the preference data were analyzed statisti-
cally to determine whether each nationalism group
had a significant preference for one of the alterna-
tives in a pair and to assess whether the high and
low nationalism groups for each product-country
combination differed from each other.
The results shown in Table 5 can be summarized
as follows: (a) Preference for companies employ-
ing a higher percentage of American workers was
found for all products, all country pairings, and for
participants scoring both high and low on the
nationalism scale (but more so for those scoring
high), (b) Preference for American companies was
found primarily in the high nationalism group, but
was also significant for the low nationalism group
considering American versus Taiwanese clothing,
(c) Consumer nationalism had its greatest impact
on preferences for American companies over Japa-
nese companies; in particular, only in the American-
Japanese car condition was there a significant
difference between high and low nationalism groups
when considering the tradeoff between an Ameri-
can company employing a lower percentage of
American workers and a non-American company
employing a higher percentage of American workers.
Paralleling Experiment 1, a comparison was also
made of effect sizes across groups following the
derivations in the Appendix. The relevant values
2
We recognize that the different ways of classifying
participants in Experiments 1 and 2 could lead to
differential arousal of nationalistic feelings that in turn
could affect scores on the scale. In Experiment 1, the
nationalism scale is given after participants make choices
between American and Japanese cars; in Experiment 2,
the scale is given several weeks before the experimental
task. Nevertheless, as we will show, the two experiments
produce similar results that do not appear to be affected
by whether the scale was administered first or last.
24 LEVIN AND JASPER

Table 5
Mean Paired-Comparison Preference Ratings in Experiments 1 and 2 for Cars,
Personal Computers (PCs), and Clothing
American-Japanese American-Japanese American-German American-Taiwanese
cars PCs cars clothing
Type o f L N H N L N H N L N HN LN HN
comparison (n = 20) (n = 21) (n = 20) (« = 20) (n = 18) (n = 19) (n = 20) (n = 19)
% American constant, country varies
American (80%)-
Non-American (80%) 3.00 1.52* 3.00 1.85* 3.56 2.05* 2.50* 1.74*
American (50%)-
Non-American (50%) 3.20 1.88* 2.85 2.10* 3.78 237* 2.85* 1.68*
Country constant, % Americans varies
American (80%)-
American (50%) 1.78* 1.67* 2.60* 1.70* 2.22* 1.95* 2.32* 1.68*
Non-American (80%)-
Non-American (50%) 1.90* 1.79* 2.40* 2.30* 3.22 2.00* 2.60* 1.84*
Both country and % Americans vary
American (80%)-
Non-American (50%) 2.55* 1.33* 2.80 1.70* 3.22 1.95* 2.20* 1.67*
American (50%)-
Non-American (80%) 4.65* 3.33 4.00 3.30 3.94 3.89 3.85 3.95
Note. Bold type indicates significant difference between high and low nationalism groups,/) < .05. Neutral rating = 3.5. LN = low
nationalism; HN = high nationalism.
*p < .05 when compared with neutral.

from Experiment 1, as well as the values from
Experiment 2, are given in Table 6. Results,
supplementing those from Table 5, can be summa-
rized as follows: Although the effect of percentage
of American workers was generally high across all
country and product comparisons, differences be-
tween the high and low nationalism groups on the
size of the effect were greatest for American-
German cars and least for American-Japanese
cars and PCs. In contrast, differences between the
high and low nationalism groups on the size of the
company nationality effect were greatest for Ameri-
can-Japanese comparisons. Among high national-
ism respondents, only those considering American-
Japanese products gave at least as much weight to
company nationality as to percentage of American
workers.
Again, the reasons for choices help explain the
data in Tables 5 and 6. Table 7 provides frequency
counts of the most common reasons given by each
group for each paired comparison in Experiment
2, and Table 8 summarizes the reasons data for

Table 6
Comparison of Effect Sizes Across Nationalism Groups in Experiments 1 and 2 for Cars,
Personal Computers (PCs), and Clothing
American-Japanese American-Japanese American-German American-Taiwanese
cars PCs cars clothing
LN HN LN HN LN HN LN HN
Effect (n = 20) (n = 21) (n = 20) (n = 20) (n = 18) (n = 19) (n = 20) (n = 19)
Company nationality 0.20 2.34 0.20 2.00 0.16 1.17 0.95 1.38
American workers (%) 2.10 2.00 1.20 1.60 0.72 1.94 1.65 2.28
Note. LN = low nationalism; HN = high nationalism.
 NATIONALISM IN CONSUMER DECISIONS 25

Table 7
Most Common Reasons for Choices in Experiment 2
American Japanese American American American American
(80%) vs. (80%) vs. (80%) vs. (50%) vs. (80%) vs. (50%) vs.
American Japanese Japanese Japanese Japanese Japanese
Response (50%) (50%) (80%) (50%) (50%) (80%)
category LN HN LN HN LN HN LN HN LN HN LN HN
American vs. Japanese personal computers
Employ Americans 14 19 13 17 0 0 0 0 13 15 8 9
American made (no further
justification) 0 6 0 0 4 11 5 9 3 14 2 4
American made (support
America) 0 0 0 0 3 1 4 2 1 1 1 2
American economy 3 2 3 0 3 5 2 5 3 1 3 4
Japanese quality 0 0 1 1 3 1 4 1 3 1 4 1
American German American American American American
(80%) vs. (80%) vs. (80%) vs. (50%) vs. (80%) vs. (50%) vs.
American German German German German German
(50%) (50%) (80%) (50%) (50%) (80%)
LN HN LN HN LN HN LN HN LN HN LN HN
American vs. German cars
Employ Americans 9 17 12 18 0 0 0 0 6 12 7 14
American made (no further
justification) 1 4 0 0 4 8 2 9 2 8 3 3
American made (support
America) 0 0 0 0 1 5 3 4 2 4 0 1
American economy 3 2 1 2 0 3 1 3 2 4 1 5
German quality 0 0 3 0 9 1 8 1 8 0 7 1
American Taiwanese American American American American
(80%) vs. (80%) vs. (80%) vs. (50%) vs. (80%) vs. (50%) vs.
American Taiwanese Taiwanese Taiwanese Taiwanese Taiwanese
(50%) (50%) (80%) (50%) (50%) (80%)
LN HN LN HN LN HN LN HN LN HN LN HN
American vs. Taiwanese clothing
Employ Americans 17 19 16 17 0 0 0 0 15 15 15 13
American made (no further
justification) 1 1 0 0 8 11 9 10 5 9 2 3
American made (support
America) 0 0 0 0 1 4 2 6 1 2 0 1
American economy 5 3 0 2 5 4 4 4 5 2 1 5
Note. LN = low nationalism; HN = high nationalism.

both experiments. Together these data show that
"employ Americans" was the most frequently
given reason for choices followed in order by
"American made," "American economy," and
"American made (support America)." With a few
notable exceptions, these reasons were given more
often by those scoring high on the nationalism
scale than by those scoring low. On the other hand,
"foreign quality" was cited more often by low
nationalism participants than by high, as was
"American quality," even though this was not a
high frequency response for any group. Quality
was mentioned only once in the American-
Taiwanese clothing condition.
26 LEVIN AND JASPER

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LN = low natio
Response
category
 NATIONALISM IN CONSUMER DECISIONS
A convenient way of seeing how the reasons help
to elucidate the choices, especially when they
differ across conditions, is to compare the sum-
mary of effect sizes (see Table 6) with the summary
of reasons data (see Table 8). This comparison
leads to a number of intriguing observations. First,
the fact that the percentage of American workers
effect was generally larger than the company
nationality effect is mirrored by the fact that
"employ Americans" was the most frequent rea-
son for choices in all groups. Second, the percent-
age of American workers effect was generally
greater for high nationalism than for low national-
ism respondents, with the exception that it was as
large for low as for high nationalism respondents
considering American-Japanese cars. "Employ
Americans" as a reason for choices follows a
similar pattern (except for American-Taiwanese
clothing). Third, the company nationality effect
was greater for high than for low nationalism
respondents in all conditions. This parallels the
fact that "American made" and "American
economy" were cited much more frequently by
high than by low nationalism respondents. How-
ever, there were of course a few exceptions.
Finally, the company nationality effect exhibited
by low nationalism respondents was generally quite
low, except in the American-Taiwanese clothing
condition. This was also the only condition in
which low nationalism respondents failed to cite
foreign quality as a reason for their choices. Thus,
where company nationality has a reduced effect, it
seems to be due in part to the perception of
superior quality of the products made by foreign
companies.
Discussion
Experiment 2 was conducted largely to test the
generality of the results from Experiment 1, across
variations in country and product comparisons. In
general, Experiment 2 replicated Experiment 1,
and, for the most part, the hypotheses were sup-
ported. For all country and product comparisons,
those scoring high on the nationalism scale were
more apt than those scoring low to favor American
over foreign companies and to cite "American
made" and "American economy" as their reasons.
Also, across groups there was a reliable tendency
to prefer companies that employed a higher per-
27
centage of American workers and to give "employ
Americans" as the most frequent reason for choice.
However, unlike Experiment 1, Experiment 2
revealed differences between high and low nation-
alism respondents in the size of the percentage of
American workers effect. Although the size of the
percentage of American workers effect was the
same for high and low nationalism respondents
choosing between American and Japanese cars, it
was greater for high nationalism respondents than
for low nationalism respondents in other condi-
tions. One likely reason for this is that mass media
attention to foreign competition for jobs has cen-
tered particularly on American- versus Japanese-
made cars, thus sensitizing even low nationalism
individuals to this issue.
Finally, the reasons data show a difference
between American-Taiwanese and other compari-
sons. Whereas low nationalism respondents were
apt to cite superior foreign quality for American-
Japanese and American-German comparisons,
such was not the case for American-Taiwanese
comparisons. These results are consistent with
Hong and Wyer's (1989) observation that a coun-
try's reputation can greatly affect inferences of
product quality. However, it should be noted that
although persons in the American-Taiwanese con-
dition did not cite superior foreign quality, they
also did not cite superior American quality.
General Discussion
Previous research in this area has demonstrated
that as a unified cue country-of-origin plays an
important role in consumer choice. In hybrid
products, however, country-of-origin is itself a
multicomponent factor. In this study, we focused
on two likely components: company nationality
and the employment of American workers. By
asking participants to choose between products
varying on these cues, we were able for the first
time to separate and assess their independent
effects. By using different country and product
combinations across experiments and by asking
participants to provide reasons for their choices,
we were able to achieve a deeper understanding of
nationalistic tendencies in consumer decision pro-
cesses.
In general, our results support the contention of
Shimp and Sharma (1987) that American con-
sumer ethnocentrism is an important construct
28 LEVIN AND JASPER
underlying responsiveness to country-of-origin cues.
However, differences in response as a function of
consumer nationalism or ethnocentrism depend
on whether company nationality or the employ-
ment of Americans is mentioned, and they also
vary across countries and, to a lesser extent, across
products. For example, media attention to compe-
tition from Japan, especially in the automobile
industry, appears to have brought out increased
concern for the plight of the American worker
when choosing between American and Japanese
products. In a similar vein, concern among some
consumers about the superiority of foreign prod-
ucts applies to Japanese and German but not to
Taiwanese products. Shimp and Sharma's conclu-
sion that consumers scoring high on their scale are
more sensitive to country-of-origin information is
thus subject to the caveat that there may be
differences in consumer choices and the reasons
for those choices as a function of the specific
products and countries being compared.
We also found that the reasons for specific
choices vary as a function of the type of cue
manipulated within choice options. When the
options within a pair differ in percentage of Ameri-
can workers employed, reasons for choice center
around the desirability of employing Americans.
When the options within a pair differ in company
nationality, reasons for choosing American or
non-American companies depended on the particu-
lar non-American country. In the American-
Japanese and American-German comparisons, for
example, reasons for choosing the American com-
pany relate to supporting the American economy
while reasons for choosing the foreign company
relate to perceived quality differences. This was
not the case for American-Taiwanese compari-
sons where the perception of superior foreign
quality was absent.
Of course, it can be argued that participants in
the present study were making only hypothetical
choices with unrealistic information. Interestingly,
however, since we started this line of research,
laws have been enacted to provide new car buyers
with more complete information about the multina-
tional character of the product being considered.
Furthermore, we now have evidence that scores on
our nationalism-ethnocentrism scale are related
to both hypothetical and real choices (Levin,
Johnson, & Jasper, 1993) and to choices with
varying numbers of cues (Levin & Jasper, 1995),
thus lending credence to the present findings.
Taken together, these findings seem to suggest that
current practices that inform potential consumers
that a product, even one from a foreign company,
was made by a high percentage of American
workers are extremely effective and, from a market-
ing standpoint, should continue.
At a more general level, the present results have
implications for all forms of communication in
which considerations of nationalism may play a
role, including political messages as well as con-
sumer reports. For example, politicians wanting to
promote "buy American first" should stress both
the choice of American companies and the employ-
ment of American workers, and they should be
aware that appeals have different effects on differ-
ent segments of the population.
In closing, we must emphasize that methodolo-
gies that include additional measures beyond pure
choices, rankings or ratings appear to provide a
more complete understanding of consumers' pref-
erences and decisions. By including in our design
both the concurrent generation of reasons for each
preference and an a priori measure of individual
differences, we were able to gain insight into the
processes and motives underlying consumers' reac-
tions to new hybrid, multinational products.
References
Anderson, N. H. (1981). Foundations of information
integration theory. New York: Academic Press.
Bilkey, W. J., & Nes, E. (1982). Country-of-origin effects
on product evaluation. Journal of International Busi-
ness Studies, 13, 89-99.
Birnbaum, M. H., Wong, R., & Wong, L. K. (1976).
Combining information from sources that vary in
credibility. Memory & Cognition, 4, 330-336.
Ettenson, R., & Gaeth, G. (1991). Consumer percep-
tions of hybrid (bi-national) products. Journal of
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Gaedeke, R. (1973). Consumer attitudes toward prod-
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Han, C. M. (1989). Halo or summary construct? Journal
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 NATIONALISM IN CONSUMER DECISIONS
edge of a product's country of origin and information
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Levin, I. P., & Gaeth, G. J. (1988). How consumer are
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Appendix follows on next page.
29
Levin, I. P., Kim, K. J., & Cony, F. A. (1976). Invariance
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30
The following averaging model assumes that
each respondent assigns separate subjective scale
values to American companies and Japanese com-
panies (vamer and Vj pn , respectively) and to compa-
nies that employ 80% American workers and 50%
American workers (vgo and v50, respectively). In
evaluating a brand described by both its national
origin and the percentage of American workers
employed, the integrated impression R is de-
scribed as
w%v%
R=
w%
where vm and v% represent the subjective scale
values for company nationality and the percentage
of American workers, respectively, and wm and w%
represent the importance weights assigned to the
two cues.
The model can be applied to each of the six
comparisons employed in the experiment by taking
the difference between the average ratings for the
two options in a pair. The comparisons in which
both factors vary are illustrated below. For Ameri-
can (80%) versus Japanese (50%),
_ "Warner + H^VgQ _ WmV'№n + W%V50
-w% W co
~ VJPn)
For American (50%) versus Japanese (80%),
+ W%V80
~ Vipn) ~ V80)
. (A2)
By adding Equations Al and A2, the term for
LEVIN AND JASPER
Appendix
Averaging Model
percentage of American workers cancels out, and
we obtain
^ '
By subtracting Equations Al and A2, the term
for company nationality cancels out and we obtain
2w%(v80 - v50)
(A4)
WC
In the present case, a weighted sum model
(Equations Al and A2 without the denominator
terms) would have served the same purpose as the
weighted average model used here. However, we
chose the averaging form because of previous
support of averaging over adding in similar situa-
tions that included formal model tests (Anderson,
1991; Birnbaum, Wong, & Wong, 1976; Levin &
Gaeth, 1988; Shanteau, 1988; Troutman & Shan-
teau, 1976). In either form of the model, the actual
importance of a factor is the product of its weight
and the difference in scale values across levels of
that factor (Levin, Kim, & Corry, 1976). Equation
A3 is a constant times the importance of company
nationality; Equation A4 is the same constant
times the importance of the percentage of Ameri-
can workers. Thus, Equations A3 and A4 provide
the means with which to compare the relative
importance of each factor across the three nation-
alism groups. The results are shown in Table 4 with
the data from Table 2 expressed as absolute differ-
ences from the neutral value on the rating scale.
(Al) For example, consider the data in the bottom
two rows of Table 2 for the high nationalism group.
RI + R2, expressed as deviations from 3.5, the
neutral point on the scale, equals (3.5 - 1.33) +
(3.5 - 3.33), which equals 2.34. /?t - R2, also
expressed as deviations from 3.5, equals
(3.5 - 1.33) - (3.5 - 3.33) which equals 2.00.
Because the unit of this scale is arbitrary, the
proportionality constant can be assigned the value
of 1, and the above resultants can be taken as the
desired effect sizes.
Received October 14,1994
Revision received July 21,1995
Accepted August 11,1995 •