Does consumer ethnocentrism impact international shopping? A theory of social class divide

Abstract

Abstract Research on international shopping has the potential of elucidating collective issues such as the eminence of protectionist discourse. Concomitantly, the authors propose a Theory of Social Class Divide (SCD) that explains how the judgments of a consumer segment diverge from classical predictions. The theory received support in an international shopping context, showing that the behavior of lower‐class shoppers diverges from the prediction of consumer ethnocentrism theory. In the two studies, which comprised different methods (cross‐sectional and experimental), measures of social class (objective and subjective), and samples (US and Canadian), lower‐class consumers were notably less affected by their ethnocentrism than upper‐class consumers. Lower‐class consumers generally showed, regardless of their ethnocentrism, low attitudes, and shopping intentions toward foreign retailers. The results underline the ramifications of a widening divide in social class on international marketing, and have potential implications in germane fields such as political science.

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