The Mediating Role of Product Familiarity in Consumer Animosity

Abstract

Consumer animosity relates to individuals' negative feelings toward a specific foreign country product, so it implies the antipathy toward a country and its people. But several factors have an influence on perceived animosity and willingness to buy foreign products. This research's aim is two-fold; one is to focus on the relationship between (Country of Origin) COO, animosity and consumer ethnocentrism; to test whether they are distinct concepts, and to determine the precedence and consequence of concepts. Second is to test the moderating role of product familiarity in the US consumers' willingness to buy Turkish product taking into consideration effect of country of origin, ethnocentrism, and animosity. Findings showed that consumer ethnocentrism and animosity are related concepts and animosity is the antecedent of consumer ethnocentrism whereas COO and animosity aren't related, and COO has no effect on willingness to buy the foreign product. The results showed that product familiarity has a moderating effect on consumer animosity and buying the foreign product.