How is the internet influencing country of origin? moderating by website information

The global nature of the Internet has made it possible for people worldwide to visit any website and to participate online shopping on a relatively equal basis (Huggins, Holloway & White, 2011). However, there still exists country stereotype on the product quality from browsing the e-retailer’s website homepage. It has been generally agreed that consumers evaluate a product on two information cues: intrinsic cues (e.g., design, performance) and extrinsic cues (e.g., price, brand name, warranty, country-of-origin (COO)) (Han, 1989; Han & Terpstra, 1988; Verlegh et al. 2005). Therefore, this paper tries to answer the question, “Does the Internet have the capacity to alter the belief related to COO of a product when manipulated? If so how and why? If not, why not?

This study uses experimental design, followed by structural equation modeling to analyze the aforementioned issue. The anticipated results of this study are (1) the COO effect on attitude/purchase intention has positive effect toward e-retailer; (2) the moderator role of product category (i.e., Socially consumed product vs. Privately consumed product) on COO and purchase intention exist; (3) e-WOM has moderating role on the relationship between COO and attitude/purchase intention toward the e-retailer; (4) the Website graphic/Website information could dilute the negative effects of COO on e-retailer attitude and purchase intention; (5) consumer self-identity and consumer patriotism will influence COO and in turn influence consumer purchase intention.