Shopping East and Shopping West—Chinese Consumer Behavior in Two Worlds

ABSTRACT

In today's China, consumers not only have the chance to sample products and services from around the world, but to experience cultural influences from a vast range of countries. In particular, Western products and services—and cultural values—have become increasingly popular. Consumers now shift between different worlds (Chinese and Western) with seeming ease. This research identifies the factors that encourage consumers to shift between these different worlds—and values. The factors include the situation and context (of the shopping experience), peer influence and dynamics, the role of conversation at or near the time of purchase, and the nature of the product and service. The role of “time,” “chance,” and “intuition” in the shopping experience and cultural shifts are also examined. What emerges from the study is a changeable, mobile, and flexible community quite capable of shifting between different sets of values (and consumer attitudes) easily and often very quickly. For companies, the key to success (at least to some degree) is to place their goods and services in a context that helps to create a complementary, integrated, and supportive image of the world they wish to create in the minds of their Chinese consumers.     

Ethical Perceptions of Business Students: Differences Between East Asia and the USA and Among “Confucian” Cultures

This paper reports the results of a survey of 842 undergraduate business students in four nations – the United States of America (the USA), the Peoples’ Republic of China (the PRC), Japan, and the Republic of Korea (the ROK). This survey asked students to respond to four scenarios with potentially unethical business behavior and a string of questions related to the importance of ethics in business strategy and in personal behaviors. Based on arguments related to differences in recent historical experiences, the authors suggest that student responses may be as different within the East Asian (Confucian) environment as they are between this environment as a whole and the USA. Survey results indicate a greater perception of ethical problems and more importance placed on ethics per se in business practices, as well as less of an emphasis on social harmony (a key distinguishing characteristic of Confucian values identified in prior research) on the part of USA students. At the same time, substantial national differences in response are also witnessed within the set of East Asian students. A priori expectations as to the manner in which these East Asian responses should vary based on differences in recent historical experiences are partially, but not fully, supported. The authors argue that the key value of the reported research rests on a demonstration that national differences within a common cultural (e.g., East Asian or Confucian) area can be as great as differences across cultural (East vs. West) areas and that practitioners of global business must fine-tune their expectations as to acceptable business and personal actions to accommodate specific national historical experiences to be effective. Professors Chung and Eichenseher are professor of accounting at their respective universities. Professor Taniguchi's primary field of study is economics.     

“Where the East Kisses the West”: Marketing Convergence and Divergence in the New Europe Editorial to the Special Section

This special section contains articles based on selected papers presented during the 7^th EMAC Regional Conference hosted by the School of Economics and Business, University of Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina in 2016. Following the double-blind review process, 14 best articles qualified for publication in this special section. Apart from the articles tackling the issues in emerging markets, a broad range of different topics, ranging from consumer journey and international branding to strategic issues are also included in this special issue.     

Hand in Hand East and West to Build a Glorious Gansu——Talk on the cooperation between the East and West of China by Mr.Cui Zhenghua,vice governor of Gansu Province

To implement the CPC CentralCommittee's strategy of slanting theeconomic construction to the Midand West of China and to further promote thedevelopment and cooperation of economyand trade between the East and West, theEast-West Business and Trade Talks wereheld by the China Council for the Promotionof International Trade (CCPIT). At theconference, Mr. Cui Zhenghua, vice governorof Gansu Province and concurrently chairmanof the Gansu Subcouncil of the CCPIT,delivered a speech on the economiccooperation and development between theEast and West of China.     

Selling to the urban Chinese in East Asia: Do CSR and value orientation matter?

Most multinationals have a presence in the East Asian region and target the urban Chinese population. In an effort to win over the loyalty of consumers, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) has been used increasingly as a marketing strategy. This paper explores how personal values influence the attitude and behavior towards CSR among Chinese consumers. By collecting data from three major East Asian cities — Hong Kong, Shanghai and Singapore, and employing factor, cluster, conjoint and correspondence analyses, the authors demonstrate that Confucian value orientation can be a powerful antecedent of CSR support.     

Questionable Language in ‘Help Wanted’ Advertising: A Comparison of the Practices of Small and Large Newspapers

For 25 years the US Congress and the courts have expanded employment protection for workers. Despite such actions ‘help wanted’ (i.e., situations vacant) advertisements in newspapers utilize phrases and words which are questionable or overtly discriminatory. Previous studies have analysed the type and rates of incidence of such advertisements in large metropolitan areas. The present study expands earlier research by contrasting the practices of small and large newspapers. Recommendations are made regarding actions to provide fairer employment practices.     

The Leader–Member Exchange Theory in the Chinese Context and the Ethical Challenge of Guanxi

Journal of Business Ethics - The leader–member relationship has been identified as a key determinant of successful working relationships and business outcomes in China. A high-quality...     

Global competitiveness,consumer choice and ‘country of origin’ effect: an exploratory East–West study

As protectionist sentiments rise in many countries in light of the 2008–2009 financial crisis, it is more important than ever to understand the potential role of homophily on the country of origin (COO) effect in consumer purchases and how it can impact trade and investment. This study examines these attitudes using a sample of 139 university students from different ethnic backgrounds in Vancouver (Canada), one of the most culturally diverse cities in North America. The results confirm the importance of ethnicity in affecting attitudes toward different countries, including the impact of political/cultural ties and current/historical events on their formation. Variations among different ethnic groups were found, however.     

Do Variations in the Strength of Corporate Governance Still Matter? A Comparison of the Pre- and Post-Regulation Environment

Corporate scandals brought the issue of corporate governance to the forefront of the agendas of lawmakers and regulators in the early 2000s. As a result, Congress, the New York Stock Exchange, and the NASDAQ enacted standards to improve the quality of corporate governance, thereby enhancing the quantity and quality of disclosures by listed companies. We investigate the relationship between corporate governance strength and the quality of disclosures in pre- and post-regulation time periods. If cross-sectional differences in corporate governance policies affect the quality of financial disclosures, the quality of information available to analysts varies with such policies. Specifically, higher quality disclosures, produced as a result of strong corporate governance, should lead to more accurate and less dispersed analysts’ forecasts. Our analysis suggests that voluntary implementation of stronger corporate governance enhanced the quality of disclosures in the pre-regulation period; however, exceeding current corporate governance standards does not appear to result in higher quality disclosures post-regulation. These results suggest that SOX and the stronger regulations enacted by U.S. exchanges were effective in reducing variation in the quality of financial information available to investors.     

Option trading and the cross-listed stock returns: Evidence from Chinese A–H shares

We empirically investigate the effects of option trading on the cross-listed stock returns. Using dual-listed stocks in mainland China (A) and Hong Kong (H) stock exchanges, we show that option order imbalance (OI) positively and significantly predicts daily stock returns for both markets, controlling for risk factors and firm characteristics. Informed trading rather than price pressure better explain the predictability. High OI stocks have higher trading volume and present lottery-like properties. Three important events significantly affect the predictive power of OI, consistent with the improved market quality and the episode of speculative trading. Robustness checks support the main findings.     

Banks,Institutional Constraints and the Limits of Central Banking: Monetary Policy in Britain and West Germany, 1950–52

This paper analyses the anti-inflationary policies which were pursued in Britain and West Germany during the Korean War boom. It argues that the institutional relationships between the government, the central bank and the banking system can have considerable impact on the implementation of policy. The war brought a major shift in raw material prices and a consequent rise in bank lending in both countries to finance the increased import bill. The German independent central bank (BdL) used technical measures to restrain short-term lending, but was frustrated by the willingness of the Landeszentralbanken (regional central banks) to discount the bills of their local banking system. In addition, the banks themselves, because they operated in a competitive system, sought ways to circumvent the restrictions. The BdL took steps to tighten these loopholes and introduce a much stronger and more well defined policy transmission mechanism. Shifts in the terms of trade reduced inflationary pressure but the BdL retained tighter control over the banking system.

In Britain, the Bank of England was nominally controlled by the government, although it was able to exercise a degree of independence. Both parties had clear ideas of how inflationary pressure could be controlled in the economy; but these ideas differed significantly and neither one was able to impose their preferred option on the other. The result was a mixture of quantitative restrictions on the banks' balance sheets and qualitative guidelines to the banking system on the nature and extent of lending. The shift in raw material prices in 1952 largely solved the problem which it had created in 1951. The authorities, however, felt that their policies had been successful in constraining inflation and they failed to improve the monetary policy transmission mechanism as the Germans had done.     

Consumers’ value perception and value construction: the case of bottled water in the Middle East

This study illustrates how consumers realize the concept of value creation when making quick selections for a commodity in the Saudi market. Data were collected through a self-administered survey to customers; 1,045 completed and usable responses were received and analysed. The proposed model was tested through structural equation modelling using AMOS 22. Results indicate that product design and brand trust affect electronic word-of-mouth (e-WOM), and product design, brand trust, and e-WOM influence consumers’ value creation. However, e-WOM does not mediate the relationship between product design and consumer value nor does it mediate the relationship between brand trust and consumers’ value creation. This study focused on one product (bottled water). Caution must be exercised in generalization of the results to other products/countries. Theoretically, this study extends the perception of value creation on a commodity and the influence of trust on perceived value. Although this study is based on a sample of Saudi Arabian consumers that is oversampling the age group of young consumers, it extends the rare empirical evidence base on the perception of value creation in the bottled water market, and the influence of trust on perceived value. The results suggest that firms could benefit from altering the design of their bottled water products to create higher perceived value and higher brand trust, differentiating themselves further from competition. The study contributes to the existing literature on consumers’ perceptions of bottled and branded water, taking into account e-WOM communication, and providing rare evidence on brand trust from outside of Europe and North America.     

Business and Government Ethics in the “New” and “Old” EU: An Empirical Account of Public–Private Value Congruence in Slovenia and the Netherlands

This article studies how financial investors respond to firms’ corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance in terms of their investing behaviors, and how such behaviors change contingent on an event that provokes their attention and concerns to CSR. Using the melamine contamination incident in China as a natural experiment, it is found that neither the individual investors’ nor the institutional investors’ behaviors are influenced by firms’ CSR performance before the incident. Nevertheless, in the post-event period, institutional investors’ behaviors are significantly influenced by firms’ CSR performance that exceeds a certain threshold. Furthermore, such an effect diminishes for a better CSR performance. In comparison, the authors do not find any effects of CSR performance on individual investors, either before the event or after the event. Finally, firms’ performance and investors’ behaviors jointly affect firms’ stock returns after the event but not before the event. This article reconciles the mixed findings in the literature on the effect of firms’ CSR performance on their financial performance by showing that such an effect exists in a contingent manner. Furthermore, the authors show that a too low or a too high CSR performance could lead to undesirable responses from investors. Therefore, managers should pay attention to optimizing firms’ CSR activities.     

What characterizes Chinese consumer behavior? A cross-industry analysis of the Chinese diaspora in Japan

In order to profit from China??s enormous business opportunities, international firms need to know Chinese consumer preferences. To learn more about intrinsic Chinese consumer preferences and their distinction from other Asian consumer preferences, this study analyzes differences in the formation of customer satisfaction, repurchase intent, and word-of-mouth intent between Chinese-born and locally born consumers in Japan. Verifying culture-based hypotheses, cross-industry analyses show that Chinese-born consumers pay less attention to the public brand image and risk-related switching costs, but more attention to quality expectations, perceived value, experienced usefulness, and financial switching costs than Japanese consumers. Marketing strategies should account for these preference structures.     

Linking Culture and Ethics: A Comparison of Accountants’ Ethical Belief Systems in the Individualism/Collectivism and Power Distance Contexts

This study uses accounting professionals from an international setting to test the individualism and power distance cultural dimensions developed by Hofstede [Culture’s Consequences (Sage Publications, Beverly Hills, CA) 1980]. Six countries, which appropriately represented high and low values on the Hofstede dimensions, were chosen for the survey of ethical beliefs. Respondents (n = 249) from the six countries were requested to supply their agreement/disagreement with eight questionable behaviors associated with the work environment. Each of these behaviors contained an individualism and/or power distance cultural component for the responding accountants to consider. The results of the cultural analysis indicated significance on five of the eight survey items. Results lend support for the presence of the individualism cultural element in the ethical responses of the accountants surveyed.     

Individualism–Collectivism, Private Benefits of Control, and Earnings Management: A Cross-Culture Comparison

Using private benefits of control and earnings management data from 41 countries and regions, we provide strong evidence that cultures, together with legal rules and law enforcement, play a critical role in shaping corporate behavior. More specifically, we find that private benefits of control are larger and earnings management is more severe in collectivist as opposed to individualist cultures, consistent with the argument that agency problems between corporate insiders and outside investors are severe in collectivist culture. These results are robust to the inclusion of controls for country wealth, economic heterogeneity across countries, and international differences in ownership concentration.     

Away from “Unified Nostalgia”: Conceptual Differences of Personal and Historical Nostalgia Appeals in Advertising

Studies suggest that nostalgia can be split into two distinct forms: Personal and Historical nostalgia. This research explores these varieties of nostalgic appeal and, based on literature, proposes differing effects these variations may have on the important consumer behavior responses of cognition, emotions, attitudes, and purchase intentions. A review of the literature suggests that significant differences will exist dependent on the type of nostalgic appeal being used. The call for scales to test these appeals independently of one another is also made. Finally, this evidence suggests that treatment of nostalgia as a “unified” concept may be inaccurate in predicting true consumer responses and future studies should treat the two types as separate appeals if rigor is to be suggested.