The role of consumer ethnocentrism and country of origin effect on purchase decision

The purpose of this study is, to test the country of origin and consumer ethnocentrism concepts on Turkish consumers; that have been studied little in Turkey but vastly in the international literature. The aim is to put a cultural diversity to the country of origin and consumer ethnocentrism literature globally. In the first part of the study, the country of origin concept; and in the second part, the consumer ethnocentrism concept is examined and presented vastly with examples of the related literature. With reference to this, consumer ethnocentrism is a concept that discusses the appropriateness of purchasing foreign products and gives motivation of purchasing domestic products. Country of origin effect can be described as ?the positive or negative effect of a country that a product belongs to, over the consumers? decision and purchase behaviors.? In the third part of the study, the results of the application, that was accomplished on the members of Çukurova University, is presented. It has been found that, different from the students, the administrative personnel and the academics show a higher ethnocentric tendency among the university members. The relation between the levels of ethnocentrism and the demographic characteristics has been found supporting the literature. Namely, the women, the elders and the lower earners have been found higher ethnocentric. The results generally support the expectations deriving from the literature; however, some unexpected findings are encountered. Keywords: Country of Origin Effect, Consumer Ethnocentrism, Nationalism, Purchase Decision