Effects of Individual and Product‐specific Variables on Utilising Country of Origin as a Product Quality Cue Available to Purchase

This article advances the country of origin research stream by addressing some of the theoretical and methodological issues given as limitations in past studies. A conceptual model based on the cue paradigm was developed to investigate the relative impact of country of origin as a quality indicator in a causal framework. Results indicate that the country of origin cue is indeed a significant indicator of product quality; however, its relative effect varies by product category as well as by certain individual and product variables.