A Country-of-Origin Perspective on Climate Change Actions: Evidence from France,Morocco,and the United States

Abstract

Country-of-origin (COO) research cites the influence of country-level actions on consumers’ attitudes but does not specify how such actions might influence the COO image, particularly in a climate change context. However, various countries adopt different climate change actions, with notable potential implications for products associated with the nations’ images; therefore, it is vital to understand the relationship between climate change actions and consumers’ attitudes toward their country. This study, which solicits responses from 1,389 consumers in France, Morocco, and the United States, investigates whether and how climate change actions influence each COO image and consumers’ attitudes toward it, which vary with consumers’ level of climate change concern. Such climate change actions also exert distinct effects that are moderated by the cultural context. Therefore, this study extends the COO literature to a climate change context and provides relevant implications for policy makers and marketing managers aiming to improve their COO image.

Keywords

climate change country attitudes country of origin culture institutional theory

Many governments and companies are increasingly adopting various strategies and related actions to combat climate change, which can be costly, demanding substantial investments from these actors (Kolk and Pinske 2004). For example, in the United States, Nevada aims to attract investors and green energy companies by offering tax incentives and a low cost of living. Morocco, which has adopted ambitious sustainable energy targets, has built the largest concentrated solar plant in the world in its attempt to create job opportunities, cheaper energy, and energy independence. France’s government supports economic investments to reduce the cost of renewable energies and encourages innovations to create value and opportunities for economic growth. Beyond their environmental benefits, these actions likely affect consumers’ attitudes, although their precise impacts are unclear; international marketers have not addressed the question of how countries and companies might benefit in this regard. Another managerial issue that has not been addressed is whether it is a competitive advantage and an efficient marketing approach for companies that rely on their country of origin (COO) to communicate about their country’s actions to combat climate change.

Prior studies about the COO effect in the international context have shown its impacts on consumers’ decision making and attitudes (for reviews, see Carneiro and Faria [2016], Pharr [2005], and Roth and Diamantopoulos [2009]). Furthermore, there is a growing body of literature dealing with climate change from a globalized and international perspective (Hall 2018). However, few academic works bridge the COO literature and climate change. This study aims to contribute to the international marketing literature by considering the relationships among a country’s climate change actions, COO image, and consumers’ attitudes toward their country.

First, prior research remains somewhat limited with regard to identifying the antecedents of a COO image or consumers’ attitudes toward their country (Papadopoulos, El Banna, and Murphy 2017). In particular, arguably, climate change actions should affect COO image, and this influence must be addressed by marketing and consumer behavior research (Hall 2018). Therefore, we explore how a country’s climate change actions affect its COO image and consumers’ attitudes toward their own country.

Second, the prior COO literature has accounted for the moderation of culture (Talay et al. 2019); however, it has failed to account for COO images at a macro level (Carneiro and Faria 2016). Both institutional and cultural contexts are particularly relevant in determining consumers’ cognitive (COO image) and affective (attitudes) evaluations toward climate change actions (Aasen and Vatn 2018). Furthermore, institutional theory and culture are particularly useful for investigating individual attitudes and behaviors in cross-cultural research (Diallo et al. 2018).

Our research also accounts for environmental concern as a relevant factor of environment-related behaviors. However, few empirical studies have considered environmental concern as a moderator, particularly in the climate change context (Newman et al. 2012). This research adds to our current knowledge of the role of environmental concern in COO studies.

Therefore, we investigated the effect of national climate change actions on consumers’ attitudes toward their country across three countries that have distinct institutional and cultural contexts: France, Morocco, and the United States. These countries hold distinct institutional policies about climate change. These countries also differ in their history related to climate change. Furthermore, France, Morocco, and the United States present distinct cultural contexts (Hofstede 2001, 2020). These cultural differences may affect how consumers’ evaluations (cognitive and affective) of their country are shaped.

Thus, overall, this study examines the impact of a country’s climate change actions on its COO image and consumers’ attitudes toward their country as well as the moderating effects of the cultural context and consumers’ climate change concerns. To frame this effort, we consider three main research questions:

How do countries’ climate change actions affect consumers’ attitudes across countries?

How does COO image mediate the relationship between a country’s actions and consumers’ attitudes toward their country?

How do culture and consumers’ climate change concerns directly and indirectly moderate the relationship between a country’s actions and consumers’ attitudes toward their country?

Relying on COO and institutional theory as well as conceptual insights from the climate change literature, we propose that a country’s climate change actions will positively influence consumers’ attitudes toward their country. Furthermore, we expect COO image to have a positive mediating effect in this relationship. Finally, considering differences in the cultural context at the macro level and climate change concern at the micro level, we expect significant differences in consumers’ responses toward a country’s climate change actions. The cultural context directly and indirectly moderates the relationship such that the effect of a country’s climate change actions on attitudes toward the country is stronger in Morocco than in the United States and France. In addition, the direct and indirect relationship between a country’s climate change actions and attitudes toward the country is stronger for individuals displaying high climate change concerns than for those with lower climate change concerns.

We build on institutional and cultural theories, as well as prior COO research, to address the identified gaps and contribute to the international marketing literature. First, by drawing on institutional and cultural theory, we contribute to the limited extant COO research that examines specific country cues as antecedents of COO image (Roth and Diamantopoulos 2009) by highlighting the importance of climate change actions on consumers’ responses.

Second, institutional and cultural theory (Hofstede 2001; Scott 2001) informs our efforts to specify how the effects of a country’s climate change actions on consumers’ attitudes toward the country differ across France, Morocco, and the United States. This clarification is critical in a climate change context wherein cultural differences might affect consumers’ perceptions (Neher and Miola 2016) of their own countries. In addition to addressing the antecedents of COO effects prior to consumers’ evaluations (Laroche et al. 2005; Papadopoulos, El Banna, and Murphy 2017), we acknowledge the individual differences that might explain country perceptions (Ahmed and D’Astous 2008) and clarify the conditional direct and indirect effects of consumers’ climate change concerns.

Beyond the implications for the COO and climate change literature, our findings offer important managerial implications for international practitioners. To establish these implications for the prior literature, the next section details the theoretical foundation for our study using institutional and cultural frameworks as well as the COO research that serves as a basis for our conceptual model. After detailing the method, we present the results. The final section outlines some theoretical and managerial implications along with guidelines for further research.

Theoretical Framework and Research Hypotheses

Institutional and cultural contexts are important to examine diversity across countries (Scott and Amarante 2016). In particular, the cultural distinction among countries (Hofstede 2001) induces varying perceptions and attitudes among consumers from distinct countries. We first review institutional and cultural theories, and we then present the literature on the COO effect.

Institutional Theory

Institutional theory has generally been used to examine consumers’ reactions and actions to institutional contexts (Zanette and Scaraboto 2019) and, more specifically, in international settings to examine the impact of the institutional context on consumers’ attitudes (Diallo et al. 2018). Institutional theory also provides a solid framework to address climate change challenges (Barlett, Tywoniak, and Newton 2009; Jordan and O’Rian 1999) by focusing on the structures at the macro level (i.e., country level) that guide individuals in their relationship with the environment.

Institutional theory analyses the processes and mechanisms by which structures, patterns, and habits become guidelines for social attitudes and behaviors among social groups, firms, or industries (Scott 2001). It asserts that a homogeneous set of practices appears as the outcome of a combination of pressures emanating from institutional contexts. We aim to understand how consumers’ attitudes are affected by their institutional structure. Thus, we allow for a dialogue between the micro (consumers’ attitudes) and the macro (country’s actions) approaches of institutional theory (Scott and Amarante 2016).

Institutions are the “rules of the game of a society” (North 1992, p. 4). They include formal rules (e.g., statutes, common law, regulations), informal restrictions (e.g., conventions, norms of behavior, self-imposed rules), and the applications of both (North 1992). Thus, together, formal and informal rules form the basis of social systems and represent one of the reasons for differences among countries (Williamson 2000). In turn, consumers’ attitudes and behaviors vary across distinct institutional contexts such that they tend to comply with the specificities of local rules for three main reasons. First, they are rewarded for doing so; second, they believe that they are morally required to do so; and third, they conform with what they think important others would do in a similar situation (Scott 2001). These three reasons in turn establish three pillars of support for any particular institutional order, which are referred to, respectively, as regulative, normative, and cultural-cognitive pillars of support. The regulative pillar refers to rule setting, monitoring, and sanctioning activities (e.g., regulations, contracts, actions). The normative pillar emphasizes rules that specify legitimate means to pursue valued ends (e.g., socially shared expectations of appropriate behaviors, social exchange processes). The cultural-cognitive pillar entails shared conceptions that constitute the nature of social reality and creates a shared understanding of phenomena (e.g., creating frameworks to bridge differences in values). Such institutions in turn influence individual attitudes and actions in various domains, including specific areas such as climate policies.

COO Effects

Country of origin refers to the country in which “‘corporate headquarters of the company marketing the…brand is located,’ regardless of the place in which the brand in question is produced” (Balabanis and Diamantopoulos 2008, p. 41). Most of the COO research relies on attitudinal measures as outcome variables (Magnusson et al. 2014) and demonstrates how COO affects product evaluations, purchase intentions, or purchases (Balabanis and Diamantopoulos 2008, 2011; Papadopoulos, El Banna, and Murphy 2017). Three important constructs capture these COO effects (Magnusson et al. 2014). First, the COO image “refers to the overall impression of a country present in a consumer’s mind as conveyed by its culture, political system and level of economic and technological development” (Desborde 1990, p. 44)—that is, how COO image influences images of a country and its evaluations by consumers (Papadopoulos, El Banna, and Murphy 2017; Pharr 2005). This definition captures cognitive beliefs about a country, which are distinct from the affective evaluations of a country (Roth and Diamantopoulos 2009). Balabanis and Diamantopoulos (2011) demonstrate that a positive (vs. negative) COO image has positive (vs. negative) effects on consumers’ responses to related products. This conceptualization considers COO image at a macro level, independent of how consumers evaluate products from a given country (Carneiro and Faria 2016). Second, product-country image has been less extensively investigated (Roth and Diamantopoulos 2009); however, the available research generally “focuses on the image of countries in their role as origins of products” (Roth and Diamantopoulos 2009, p. 727). This perspective relates to images of countries and their products. Third, product image refers to the images of products from a country (Roth and Diamantopoulos 2009). While this concept is often confused with COO image, it clearly focuses on products and not countries. These last two conceptualizations of COO adopt a micro-level approach that comprises concepts such as the country of manufacture’s influence on brand and product evaluations (Allman et al. 2016). In this research, we center on COO image from a macro-level perspective and argue that differences in COO image (cognitive evaluations) may affect consumers’ attitudes toward a country (affective evaluations of their country). Our research captures the cognitive evaluations of COO image while accounting for the cognitive beliefs about a country (Lee, Lockshin, and Greenacre 2016; Roth and Diamantopoulos 2009). Prior research further establishes the conceptual difference between COO image and attitudes such that attitudes are responsive to COO images (Brijs, Bloemer, and Kasper, 2011; Brodie and Benson Rea 2016; Rojas-Méndez 2013). Brijs, Bloemer, and Kasper (2011) empirically support the positive influence of the cognitive elements related to COO image on consumers’ affective evaluations of their country. We aim to contribute to COO research by accounting for countries’ climate change actions as a possible antecedent of their COO image.

Key Theoretical Constructs

Climate change actions

Most countries display a range of climate change actions that are embedded in top-down communication strategies focused on companies and consumers; these strategies endeavor to encourage behavioral changes related to greater sustainability (Casado-Asensio and Steurer 2014; Lee et al. 2015). Two main strategies, mitigation and adaptation, are relevant here. Climate change mitigation aims to limit increases in global temperatures to less than 2° C by reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Such strategies usually target high-emitting industries such as energy and transportation. Adaptation instead seeks “adjustments of natural and human systems in response to climate change” (Casado-Asensio and Steurer 2014, p. 438). Such strategies are mostly top-down, emerging from governments and local authorities that frame actions for consumers and citizens. These strategies involve a large number of actions that might be context-specific, related to, for instance, sustainable production processes, a particular sector of activity, or individual practices. In the current study, we aim to understand consumers’ perspectives on their country’s actions related to fighting climate change. We acknowledge that the range of possible actions is very large. Organizational studies and consumer research on corporate social responsibility provide a fruitful theoretical perspective for measuring consumers’ perceptions of companies’ environmental actions and, by extension, a country’s actions related to environmental issues such as climate change (Alvarado-Herrera et al. 2017). As examples of actions, countries might engage in recycling, protecting the environment, carrying out programs to reduce pollution, or allocating resources to offer services compatible with the environment. Such climate change actions are concrete manifestations of countries’ mitigation and adaptation strategies. We therefore define a country’s climate change actions as the set of actions deriving from the mitigation and adaptation strategies implemented by countries to combat climate change.

COO image

Although we acknowledge that COO image can be an antecedent of product beliefs (e.g., Pharr 2005), we focus on COO image as a general image of countries (Carneiro and Faria 2016; Roth and Diamantopoulos 2009). This conceptualization refers to a global assessment of country image (Laroche et al. 2005) that is unrelated to any specific product category. This is the most abstract level of COO image, independent of consumers’ evaluation of a country’s products (Carneiro and Faria 2016). Desborde’s (1990) definition supports consideration of a wider spectrum of the characteristics underpinning COO image (Lee, Lockshin, and Greenacre 2016), and it is consistent with our focus on a country’s climate change actions, which are actions implemented in a culture by a political system and associated with economic and technological development opportunities. Therefore, given the focus of this study, investigating the general image of the country with the COO image construct (Carneiro and Faria 2016; Roth and Diamantopoulos 2009) is a suitable approach.

Culture and cultural contexts

Consistent with prior consumer behavior research, we assume that culture imposes implicit rules across distinct institutional contexts (Diallo et al. 2018). Culture is one of the three institutional pillars (Scott 2001). Culture refers to the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterize an institution and a collective programming of the mind (Hofstede 2001). The research on national culture (Paul, Roy, and Mukhopadhyay 2006) often distinguishes consumers according to the six cultural dimensions proposed by Hofstede (2001, 2020), namely, collectivism versus individualism, uncertainty avoidance, femininity versus masculinity, power distance, long-term orientation versus short-term orientation, and indulgence. Collectivism refers to a preference for a tightly-knit social framework in which members can expect support and care from their community. Uncertainty avoidance pertains to how a society deals with an unknown future. A masculine society is more competitive, whereas a more feminine society expresses preferences and care for the quality of life and cooperation. Power distance refers to the distribution of power in a society. In a society with a long-term orientation, members take a pragmatic view and encourage efforts to prepare for the future. Finally, indulgence refers to a society that encourages members to enjoy life and have fun.

In line with the empirical research into culture and climate change (Adger et al. 2013), we propose that cultural contexts shape people’s attitudes toward climate change and cooperative efforts to overcome the related collective action challenges. Similarly, cultural differences across countries may affect how consumers integrate their country’s climate actions in developing COO images and their attitudes toward their country.

Climate change concern¹

Climate change concern derives from the construct of environmental concern. Kinnear, Taylor, and Ahmed (1974) define environmental concern as the overall interest of individuals in the natural environment. Since this seminal work, a large body of research has aimed to conceptualize and operationalize environmental concern (e.g., Fransson and Gärling 1999; Hackett 1993). Among the prominent attempts to theorize and operationalize environmental concern, the notable work of Dunlap and Van Liere (1978) captures environmental concern in the new environmental paradigm (NEP). The NEP appears to contradict the dominant social paradigm, which reflects beliefs about abundance and progress as well as about science and technology. In contrast, the NEP aims to account for the fragile balance of nature and rejects the idea that “nature exists solely for human use” (Dunlap and Van Liere 1978, p. 10). In other words, environmental concern reflects a new way of thinking about the natural environment. According to the review conducted by Fransson and Gärling (1999, p. 370), environmental concern “may refer to both a specific attitude directly determining intentions, or more broadly to a general attitude or value orientation.” In the current research, and in line with the conceptualization of Newman et al. (2012), we adapt the concept of environmental concern to the issue of climate change. Climate change is embedded in larger issues associated with the environment (Robinson and Herbert 2001). As such, we define climate change concern as a general value orientation toward climate change—that is, a general predisposition toward climate change–related issues. In line with the prior COO literature that accounts for relevant moderators to explain COO effects (Ahmed and D’Astous 2008), we argue that climate change concern might be a relevant moderator in the climate change context in the direct and indirect relationships between a country’s climate change actions and attitudes toward the country.

Attitudes toward the country

An attitude refers to the favorable or unfavorable evaluation of an object as determined by one’s cognitive beliefs about the attributes of the object under consideration (Ajzen 1991). Although attitude is usually a three-dimensional construct comprising cognitive, affective, and conative elements that refer to predispositions related to a product, an idea, an organization, or people (Bagozzi et al. 1979), numerous works focus on its affective dimension (Andéhn, Nordin, and Nilsson 2016; Lee, Rodriguez, and Sar 2012; Wagner, Lutz, and Weitz 2009). In the present study, we consider attitudes toward the country as the affective evaluations that consumers have toward their country.

Hypotheses

Direct effect of climate change actions on attitudes toward a country

Empirical evidence has been found in the literature on tourism, institutional theory, and business that attitude toward a country encompasses the affective predispositions that consumers have toward their country (Lee, Rodriguez, and Sar 2012; Wagner, Lutz, and Weitz 2009), which suggests that these attitudes stem directly from countries’ actions. For example, in the tourism literature, Lee, Rodriguez, and Sar (2012) note a positive impact of tourism logo designs on consumers’ attitudes toward their country, and Manrai et al. (1997) suggest that attitudes might be determined by how countries communicate about their green actions. Leveraging institutional theory, Aasen and Vatn (2018) also show that when informationally induced, institutional contexts positively influence consumers’ attitudes in an environmental context. In the business literature, Kolk and Pinske (2004) specifically suggest that countries’ climate change actions positively influence corporate responses and suggest a positive influence on individual responses to climate change, although they did not test this empirically. The prior literature thus provides a set of arguments suggesting that a country’s climate change actions positively influence attitudes toward a country. However, this direct link has not been empirically established in the climate change context. Therefore, we postulate the following:

H₁ : A country’s climate change actions have positive effects on attitudes toward the country.

Mediating effect of COO image

Institutional theory suggests that actions performed by an institution have a direct influence on the institution’s image (Bouilloud et al. 2020). Prior COO research further establishes the direct impact of COO image on consumer attitudes (e.g., Laroche et al. 2005). However, the specific mediation of COO image in the relationship between a country’s climate change actions and consumer attitudes toward the country has not received empirical attention. Given that COO image is an important factor revealing consumer cognitive evaluations of the country and influencing consumer affective evaluations, we contend that COO image is central in reinforcing the relationship between a country’s climate change actions and consumer attitudes toward the country.

First, institutions are constantly evolving and are not stable by nature, which has impacts on their image (Bouilloud et al. 2020). The seminal works in line with institutional theory show that economic and political actions as the regulatory and normative pillars of COO influence on consumers’ appreciation of a country (Wang and Lamb 1983). Lim and O’Cass (2001) demonstrate that a country’s economic actions, which are aspects of the regulatory pillar, affect consumers’ attitudes and behaviors. Therefore, we suppose that a country’s climate change actions, such as its economic or technological advancements, may positively affect the COO image.

Second, the prior COO literature establishes that a positive COO image, related to the three institutional pillars, exerts a positive impact on consumers’ attitudes toward products (Herz and Diamantopoulos 2017; Laroche et al. 2005). Prior research argues that consumers derive attitudes toward the country from the COO image (Brodie and Benson Rea 2016; Rojas-Mendés 2013). Recently, Carneiro and Faria (2016) showed that COO image influences consumer evaluations. In line with the previous discussion, we anticipate that COO image positively mediates the relationship between a country’s climate change actions and consumer attitudes toward the country.

H₂ : COO image positively mediates the effect of a country’s climate change actions on attitudes toward the country.

Conditional direct and indirect effects of cultural context

The research into the relationship between climate change and culture often relies on the cultural dimensions proposed by Hofstede (2001) because culture influences a society’s propensity to address issues related to collective climate change actions (Neher and Miola 2016). Ashraf et al. (2017) and Diallo et al. (2018) recommend using dimensions that are pertinent for the purpose of the study. Of the six cultural dimensions, individualism–collectivism, uncertainty avoidance, and indulgence are likely relevant for this study. The country scores based on Hofstede’s (2020) analysis are as follows: the United States scores high on individualism (91) compared with Morocco (46) and France (71); the United States scores lower on uncertainty (46) than France (86) and Morocco (68); and the United States scores higher on indulgence (68) than Morocco (25) and France (48).

We predict varying impacts of a country’s climate change actions on consumers’ cognitive beliefs (i.e., COO image) and affective predispositions (i.e., attitudes) according to the individualism–collectivism dimension. Neher and Miola (2016) note that exposure to natural hazards, including climate change, is strongly negatively correlated with individualism. They further demonstrate that individualistic cultures are more resilient to climate change. Moreover, collectivist cultures tend to cooperate more closely with collective actions that favor the collective well-being of society (Carter and Maluccio 2003). Because collectivist cultures are less resilient to climate change and more cooperative with collective actions against climate change, we posit that the effect of a country’s climate change actions on COO image and consumers’ attitudes should be stronger in Morocco (collectivist) than in France or the United States (more individualistic).

Uncertainty avoidance relates to how cultures view and respond to uncertainty and risk such that people in cultures with high uncertainty avoidance scores tend to minimize the unknown and prefer to implement rules and regulations. Because climate change constitutes a significant risk for consumers and companies (Thistlethwaite and Wood 2018), countries that score higher on uncertainty avoidance, such as Morocco and France, should tend to value actions designed to combat climate change more. Therefore, the effects of a country’s climate change actions on COO image and consumers’ attitudes should be stronger in cultures with high uncertainty avoidance (Morocco and France) than in cultures with low uncertainty avoidance (United States).

Finally, the influence of the country’s climate change actions on COO image and consumers’ attitudes should reflect the three countries’ scores on the indulgence dimension. Cultures with low indulgence scores tend to be more pessimistic; therefore, people may be more critical of their country’s actions. We posit that the effect of actions to combat climate change on COO image and consumers’ attitudes toward their country is stronger in Morocco, which scores low on this dimension, than in France and the United States.

In summary, we expect that a country’s climate change actions and cultural context interact in influencing COO images and attitudes toward the country, such that the direct and indirect effects of a country’s climate change actions on attitudes are stronger in collectivist, high-uncertainty-avoidance, and low-indulgence countries.

H₃ : The (a) direct and (b) indirect effects of a country’s climate change actions on attitudes toward the country are stronger in collectivist, high-uncertainty-avoidance, and low-indulgence countries (Morocco) than in individualist, low-uncertainty-avoidance, and high indulgence countries (United States).

Conditional direct and indirect effects of climate change concern

In the climate change context, little research details the moderating influence of the climate change concern, with the notable exception of Newman et al. (2012). Consumers may develop varying levels of concern about climate issues and might develop low concerns because of, for instance, climate change skepticism, uncertainty, political orientation, or lack of knowledge (Capstick and Pidgeon 2014). For individuals with low climate change concerns, prior research shows a positive correlation with doubts about communication related to climate change (Capstick and Pidgeon 2014). The cultural pillar of institutional theory also plays an important role in defining climate change perceptions because individualists tend to develop low climate change concerns, in contrast to individuals with an egalitarian perspective, who develop high climate change concerns (Leiserowitz et al. 2013). In contrast to low-concern individuals who tend to be averse to communication about climate change, as shown by Newman et al. (2012), high-concern individuals tend to be more careful when evaluating the climate change actions undertaken by their country and value their country while developing a positive COO image (i.e., cognitive beliefs) and positive attitudes (i.e., affective predispositions) toward it. In line with this discussion, we expect that a country’s climate change actions and climate change concerns interact in influencing COO images and attitudes toward the country, such that the direct and indirect effects of a country’s climate change actions on attitudes are stronger for individuals scoring high on climate change concerns.

H₄ : Climate change concerns positively moderate the (a) direct and (b) indirect effects of a country’s climate change actions on attitudes toward the country.

Figure 1 graphically depicts the conceptual model.

Figure 1.

Conceptual model.

Methodology

Context

Climate change is a global issue with critical environmental, social, and economic consequences for both developed and less developed countries. Beyond environmental consequences, climate change might have severe implications for economic growth and for social aspects such as poverty and migration (Tol 2018). However, various countries differ in their beliefs about climate change as well as in their actions to fight it (Tjernström and Tietenberg 2008). Although 184 of 193 governments signed the Kyoto Protocol in 1997, several nations, including the United States, have complained about the negative economic consequences of this protocol for their countries (Nordhaus 2007). The distinct approaches to climate change provide a motivation for our study.

For the empirical study, we first investigate France, Morocco, and the United States for their institutional differences with regard to climate change. First, institutions in the three countries under investigation have different regulative and normative pillars related to climate change. For instance, each nation plays a significant role in relation to international climate change agreements. In 2015, France hosted the Conference of Parties 21 (COP 21), during which the Paris Agreement was negotiated among 196 attending parties. That agreement calls for efforts to keep global warming from rising 2° C above preindustrial levels by reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The following year, Morocco hosted the Conference of Parties 22 (COP 22) in Marrakech to discuss implementation plans for the Paris Agreement and to derive solutions for climate change. Then, to the dismay of environmentalists and government officials from several states, in 2017, President Trump announced the United States’ withdrawal from the Paris Agreement. Overall, France has a long history of environmental action, while Morocco and the United States have only relatively recently engaged in environmental protection. Over the period from the 1980s to the 1990s, France initiated a series of energy policy measures that diminished greenhouse gas emissions. France tends to reduce its dependence on fossil energy and aims to rely on biomass, which is produced by the forestry industry, because of its lower carbon emissions (ADEME 2015). Prior to the 2000s, the French institutional context of environmental and climate change was supported by a form of “mesocorporatism” involving public institutions and economic actors but with little involvement of civil society (Szarka 2011). This institutional context showed favorable outcomes once an international climate regime had been brokered (Szarka 2011).

Moroccan institutions have a relatively recent concern for climate change; however, they have established a strong program to combat it. Morocco’s National Plan Against Global Warming was presented at COP 15 in 2009. Morocco’s 2011 constitution enshrines sustainable development as a right for Moroccan citizens. It ranks second on the climate change performance index (UN Environment 2018) and leads the African continent in the fight against climate change through mitigation strategies and related actions. It is home to the world’s largest solar farm, which is situated in southern Morocco; provides electricity to 650,000 people; and is anticipated to export power supplies to Europe, Africa, and the Arab world. Furthermore, Morocco has set a national greenhouse gas emission reduction target for 2030 to be achieved through measures in all sectors of the economy. Adaptation strategies listed in its National Adaptation Plan include building infrastructure that is resilient to climate change and establishing protections for the most vulnerable populations.

In contrast, the United States relies predominantly on production fueled by highly polluting coal (Szarka 2011). In the United States, climate change is a relatively new topic among institutions. For instance, it has only recently become acceptable to discuss climate change in public forums (Black et al. 2013). Nevertheless, governors of 23 states and Puerto Rico have joined the U.S. Climate Alliance and pledged to uphold the agreement and its goals. Among the 50 states, California is a climate change leader, having adopted various mitigation and adaptation strategies and related actions. For example, it aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 40% below 1990 levels by 2030 by increasing renewable electricity production to 50%, reducing petroleum use by 50% in vehicles, reducing gas emissions from natural and working lands, and doubling energy efficiency in existing buildings (https://www.climatechange.ca.gov). In the transportation sector, the Corporate Average Fuel Economy program promotes reduced energy consumption through increased fuel economy for cars and light trucks and stricter fuel efficiency standards.

The choice of France, Morocco, and the United States for this study was also motivated by how consumers across the three countries relate to their institutions in terms of climate change. The French people are very concerned about climate change, especially air pollution, and they tend to believe that institutions, companies, and public authorities should act to combat climate change (Ethicity 2016). Mitigation strategies and related actions receive great support in France, particularly those that target transportation, agriculture, and industry. However, the French also often express a lack of trust in French institutions, which might produce a “social trap” that keeps individuals from taking action themselves or supporting institutional actions (Ethicity 2016).

In Morocco, 93% of the population is aware of climate change (HCP 2016); 37% of Moroccans associate climate change with changes in local temperature, and 25% associate it with changes in rain levels. However, Moroccan consumers are very skeptical about their institutions: 67.8% lack trust in the government, and 57.5% do not believe in the effectiveness of their parliament (Institut Marocain d’Analyse des Politiques 2019). Moroccans are mainly concerned about climate change because they perceive weaknesses in local infrastructures and access to drinkable water. However, in the United States, 70% of people concur that climate change is happening, although the sheer size of the population means that opinions vary widely, often depending on where people live (Marlon et al. 2018). Climate change is a highly politicized issue, prompting polarized views.

Data Collection

We used convenience sampling in each country to collect the data. The targeted informants included relatives, acquaintances, students, and unknown respondents intercepted in diverse public places such as malls, supermarkets, universities, or offices. In Morocco, a professional researcher conducted the survey in person; in France, one of the authors did so; and in the United States, the survey was administered online. The data collection methods were tailored to reflect local traditions in sampling and surveys (De Leeuw 2005). In all three contexts, the informants had to be at least 18 years of age to participate, and they came from various cities. We explained the purpose of the study and guaranteed anonymity; the respondents participated voluntarily and could withdraw at any stage of the study. They needed approximately ten minutes on average to complete the questionnaire. Of the 1,389 respondents, 675 (48.6%) were men, and 714 (51.4%) were women. Their ages ranged between 18 and 83 years (M = 32 years, SD = 11.4), with a generally balanced age distribution. Table 1 details the sample characteristics, overall and in each country.

Table 1.

Demographic Characteristics of the Sample (N = 1,389).

Categories	Overall(N = 1,389)	France(N = 579)	Morocco(N = 350)	United States(N = 460)
Gender
Men	48.6%	43.9%	55.4%	49.3%
Women	51.4%	56.1%	44.6%	50.7%
Age (Years)
18–25	46.1%	52.3%	8.3%	67.2%
26–34	27.9%	23.7%	37.4%	25.9%
35–49	11%	9.2%	22.6%	4.6%
>50	15%	14.9%	31.7%	2.4%

Variable Measurements

The survey instruments relied on well-established items from the previous literature with standard scales. In line with previous recommendations (Douglas and Craig 2007), we first translated the items into French and Arabic to ensure clear understanding of the questionnaire in France and Morocco. Then, two professional translators back-translated the questionnaire into English. The comparison of their translation with the original scales enabled us to assess their conceptual equivalence. We pretested the questionnaire with 15 respondents in each country to ensure overall clarity, fluency, and conceptual equivalence. During the pretest, the authors in each country listened carefully to the informants’ comments and modified the questions for clarification. To assess conceptual equivalence, we further asked seven experts (university professors and managers of multinational companies in France, Morocco, and the United States) to comment on the questionnaires. The items were measured on five-point Likert scales (1 = “strongly disagree,” and 5 = “strongly agree”; see Web Appendix A).

We gauged a country’s climate change actions with six items from the environmental dimension of the corporate social responsibility ConsPerScale, which Alvarado-Herrera et al. (2017) introduced to measure consumers’ perceptions of sustainability actions by different entities, including public authorities. This scale refers to actions that countries might implement to limit greenhouse gas emissions. For COO image, we used six items from Lee, Lockshin, and Greenacre (2016), which refer to cognitive evaluations of the country with regard to its technological and economic development. The measure of attitudes toward the country, related to affective evaluations of the country, consisted of four items that we adapted from Wagner, Lutz, and Weitz (2009). To measure climate change concern, we used five items from Kilbourne and Pickett (2008) and Newman et al. (2012). Finally, the questionnaire included informants’ characteristics (age and gender).

Analysis and Results

Measurement Scales’ Psychometric Properties

Prior to testing the structural model, a confirmatory factor analysis (maximum likelihood estimation) in AMOS 24 helped reveal the final structure of the measurement model (Gerbing and Anderson 1988). The overall measurement model indicated satisfactory model fit (χ² = 430.09, d.f. = 98, p = .000; root mean square error of approximation [RMSEA] = .049; confirmatory fit index [CFI] = .98; Tucker–Lewis index [TLI] = .97; χ²/d.f. = 4.39). The measurement models were also acceptable for France (χ² = 200.91, d.f. = 98, p = .000; RMSEA = .043; CFI = .98; TLI = .98; χ²/d.f. = 2.05), Morocco (χ² = 222.63, d.f. = 98, p = .000; RMSEA = .060; CFI = .94; TLI = .93; χ²/d.f. = 2.27), and the United States (χ² = 293.03, d.f. = 98, p = .000; RMSEA = .066; CFI = .97; TLI = .96; χ²/d.f. = 2.99) separately.

We checked for construct reliability as well as convergent and discriminant validity. The composite reliability values of the individual scales (ρ) exceeded the critical value of .7 in the overall sample (Hair et al. 2010). The constructs’ internal consistency is thus satisfactory. The items’ reliability and significance, together with the average variance extracted (AVE) values, also indicate convergent validity. That is, the item loadings exceeded the critical value of .5 (with the exception of image 2 in the Moroccan context), and all were significant at p < .001 (Bagozzi and Yi 1988). The AVE values exceeded .5 (Fornell and Larcker 1981), with the exception of the COO image scale, which falls just slightly below that threshold (.48) (Table 2). Appendix A reveals that the AVE for each construct, overall and for each country, is greater than the square of the interconstruct correlations, which supports discriminant validity (Fornell and Larcker 1981).

Table 2.

Measurement Properties (N = 1,389).

Constructs	Item Codes	Item Loadings (λ)				Reliability and Validity: Overall (France; United States; Morocco)
Constructs	Item Codes	Overall	France	Morocco	United States
Country’s climate change actions	Action 1	.79	.81	.63	.88	ρ = .90 (.92; .81; .93)AVE = .63 (.69; .46; .71)
	Action 2	.81	.83	.70	.87
	Action 3	.83	.85	.75	.87
	Action 4	.81	.87	.68	.84
	Action 5	.74	.79	.64	.76
COO image	Image 2	.65	.63	.28	.70	ρ = .73 (.68; .58; .72)AVE = .48 (.42; .34; .46)
	Image 4	.70	.61	.64	.62
	Image 5	.72	.69	.73	.71
Attitudes toward the country	Att 1	.90	.92	.80	.90	ρ = .95 (.96; .90; .96)AVE = .82 (.86; .70; .87)
	Att 2	.92	.95	.86	.96
	Att 3	.92	.94	.84	.94
	Att 4	.89	.92	.84	.92
Climate change concern	Concern 2	.76	.60	.69	.82	ρ = .86 (.76; .81; .92)AVE = .61 (.44; .52; .75)
	Concern 3	.86	.73	.79	.91
	Concern 4	.76	.67	.68	.88
	Concern 5	.74	.66	.71	.86

Measurement Invariance

Because the respondents were from different cultures, we tested measurement invariance to ensure valid comparisons of the latent variables (Steenkamp and Baumgartner 1998). To assess measurement invariance, we performed configural and metric invariance tests (Campbell et al. 2008; Steenkamp and Baumgartner 1998). First, to assess configural invariance, we checked whether the informants from the three countries conceptualized the constructs in the same way. Second, to assess whether the relationships between the factors and items were the same in the three countries, we checked for metric invariance. In support of configural invariance, the measurement model showed good fit indices in the three countries, as reported in the previous section. To test for metric invariance, we performed a multigroup analysis and compared an unconstrained model (freely estimated) with one in which the loadings were constrained to equality. Differences emerged between the two models (Δχ²/d.f. = 55.43 (24), p < .05). As full measurement invariance is unlikely to appear in practice (Milfont and Fischer 2010), we further performed a partial metric invariance (Vandenberg and Lance 2000). Partial metric invariance was satisfied without the variable COO image (Δχ²/d.f. = 29.34 (20), p = .081). Overall, these results indicate that the model remains the same across the three countries but should be tested in each country to analyze the measurement properties (see Table 2).

Common Method Variance

We followed the confirmatory factor analysis marker technique developed by Williams, Hartman, and Cavazotte (2010) to check for the contamination of the empirical estimates of the relationships among the substantive variables by shared variance associated with our measurement method. We chose city image (leisure dimension; Gilboa et al. 2015) as a marker variable. We compared the confirmatory factor analysis and the baseline, method-C (constrained), method-U (unconstrained), and method-R (restricted) models to investigate for the presence of common method variance (CMV) bias (Web Appendix B).

The comparison between the method-C and method-R models (p > .05) indicated that there are no CMV bias effects of the marker variable on substantive relations; in other words, CMV is not a threat in our study. Furthermore, although CMV is not a threat in this study, we quantified how method variance affects the measurement of latent variables. We followed Williams, Hartman, and Cavazotte’s (2010) procedure to decompose a reliability measure into substantive and method variance components (total, substantive, and method reliability). The results show adequate overall reliability of the latent variables (Web Appendix C). The decomposition values indicate that none of the substantive variables was particularly affected by method variance.

Structural Model and Hypotheses Tests

First, we introduced consumer characteristics (age and gender) as control variables. As covariates in the model, they improve the fit indices of the hypothesized partial mediation model, and they affect attitudes toward the country in the overall sample (age γ = −.06, p < .05; gender γ = −.07, p < .01) and in the United States (age γ = −.12, p < .01; gender γ = −.18, p < .001). However, they have no effect in the French or Moroccan samples (p > .05). The model offers a good fit to the data overall (χ² = 325.52, d.f. = 71; p = .000; RMSEA = .051; CFI = .98; TLI = .97; χ²/d.f. = 4.59) and in each country. According to Chin (1998), these predictors thus explain acceptable variance in the dependent variable, in the overall sample (R² = .25) and in each country (France R² = .18, Morocco R² = .29, United States R² = .30).

Second, we relied on AMOS 24 to test three alternative models (Bajaj, Robins, and Pande 2016): the hypothesized partial mediation model (Model 1), a direct model (Model 2), and a full mediation model (Model 3). A chi-square difference test with the direct Model 2 (i.e., no mediation, all factors directly affect attitudes toward the country) indicates the better fit of Model 1 (Δχ²(d.f.) = 111.15 (1); p < .01). Furthermore, a comparison of the hypothesized Model 1 with the full mediation Model 3 (i.e., everything mediated from COO image to attitudes toward the country) confirms the superiority of Model 1 (Δχ²(d.f.) = 810.71 (2); p < .01).

Third, we tested the hypotheses. The analyses establish a positive effect of a country’s climate change actions on attitudes toward the country (γ = .33, p < .001) in support of H₁. With a bootstrap approach (Cheung and Lau 2008), we also investigated the specific mediating effect of COO image. These analyses indicate a positive effect of the country’s climate change actions on COO image (γ = .34, p < .001), which then significantly affects attitudes toward the country (γ = .27, p < .001). The product of these effects is significant (γ = .09, p < .001, confidence interval [CI] = [.066, .126]—22% of the total effect), as we predicted in H₂. The mediation effect is partial; a country’s climate change actions have a significant effect on attitudes toward the country.

To assess the conditional direct and indirect effects of the cultural context, we performed a multigroup analysis in AMOS 24 (Diallo and Seck 2018). The model offers a good fit for each group. Next, we compared the focal (unconstrained) model with a model in which the structural parameters were constrained to equality. The Δχ test reveals that the two models differ significantly overall (Δχ = 585.38, d.f. = 52, p < .001). We further analyzed each individual path of interest to determine whether it was moderated and to establish the significance of the difference across the three cultural contexts. In accordance with H_3a, the effect of a country’s climate change actions on attitudes is significantly stronger in Morocco (γ = .50, p < .001) than in the United States (γ = .33, p < .001) or France (γ = .23, p < .001) (Web Appendix D), revealing a conditional direct effect of the cultural context.

Furthermore, the results show that cultural context has a moderating effect in the first stage of the mediated path (i.e., conditional indirect effect) for the three countries (Web Appendix D). In accordance with H_3b, the effect of a country’s climate change actions on COO image is stronger in the Morocco sample (γ = .40, p < .01) than in the France and United States samples (respectively, γ = .29, p < .001 and γ = .32, p < .01). In addition, we observe a total effect moderation of the cultural context in the mediated path in the France and United States samples (p < .01) but not in the Morocco sample (p > .05) (Web Appendix D).

To assess the conditional direct and indirect effects of the climate change concern, we followed well-established procedures to create a latent moderator (Frazier, Tix, and Barron 2004). This variable is continuous, as is the climate change concern (MacCallum et al. 2002). To aid the interpretation, we mean-centered the variables used in the interaction terms (Echambadi and Hess 2007; West, Aiken, and Krull 1996). The results reveal that the moderation term between a country’s climate change actions and climate change concern is significant and positive (γ = .08, p < .01) (Web Appendix E), revealing a conditional direct effect as predicted in H_4a. However, the results show that the climate change concern has no moderating effect in the mediated path (i.e., no conditional indirect effect) for the overall sample (p > .05), in contradiction with H_4b. As an additional analysis, we tested the moderation of the climate change concern across countries. Specifically, we find a significant moderating effect in the Moroccan and U.S. contexts (respectively, γ = .14, p < .05 and γ = .15, p < .01) but a nonsignificant moderating effect in the French context (γ = .02, p > .05) (Web Appendix E).

A regression analysis conducted in SPSS24 following Preacher and Hayes’s (2008) recommendations provides further validation and confirms our main results. We applied Preacher, Rucker, and Hayes’s (2007) procedure (Model 8) and computed bias-corrected bootstrap confidence intervals using COO image as a mediator and climate change concern as a moderator. The results support the results provided by the structural equation modeling analyses, such that we observe a conditional direct effect (p < .001) but no conditional indirect effect of the climate change concern (index of moderated mediation = −.003; CI = [−.019, .014]; see Web Appendix F).

Robustness Check

To confirm the robustness of the results, we performed a final check to examine whether the main results remained similar without COO image (cognitive evaluations) as a mediator in the conceptual model. The main results held without COO image as a mediator in the conceptual model, such that the analyses establish a positive effect of a country’s climate change actions on attitudes toward the country (γ = .36, p < .001), in support of H₁. In the same vein, the conditional direct effect of the climate change concern remains the same, as do the conditional direct and indirect effects of cultural context.

Conclusion and Discussion

Implications for the COO and Climate Change Literature

This study helps bridge the international marketing, COO, and climate change literature by establishing how climate change actions developed at the national level affect consumers’ attitudes toward their countries. We advance the existing knowledge by uncovering the direct and indirect effects of a country’s climate change actions on consumers’ attitudes toward their country. Second, this study establishes the moderating impacts of culture in these relationships.

First, although the extant COO research has provided insights related to consumer evaluations and intentions to purchase a product (Balabanis and Diamantopoulos 2008, 2011; Koschate-Fischer et al. 2012; Pharr 2005), few studies have adopted a macro-level perspective on country image (Carneiro and Faria 2016; Laroche et al. 2005). We contribute to this literature by demonstrating that climate change actions at the national level are an antecedent to COO image and consumer attitudes toward the country. To help demonstrate these influences, we relied on institutional theory (Scott and Amarante 2016). That is, consumers are sensitive to the climate change actions adopted by their country’s institutions. It is thus relevant and of importance to account for the institutional antecedents related to climate change to capture the COO effect at a macro level (Carneiro and Faria 2016). Moreover, we highlight institutional influences on individual attitudes (Williamson 2000). The institutional pillars have an important role in shaping consumers’ attitudes toward their country in the specific context of climate change, and the variations observed in the overall sample and across the three countries demonstrate that the effects differ across countries. Institutional positions toward climate change thus appear to influence people’s attitudes toward their country; for example, in Morocco, the effect of climate change actions is stronger than it is in the United States or France. Moroccan institutions strongly communicate their involvement in climate change efforts to citizens, including their strong, specific rules and norms (regulative and normative pillars), as exemplified by the COP 22 in Marrakesh, the implementation of the largest solar plant, and a zero-plastic-bag agenda. Moroccans also share a strong understanding (cultural-cognitive pillar) of the impact of climate issues on agricultural production, which is a major resource for the Moroccan economy.

Second, we account for individual differences at the micro level (Ahmed and D’Astous 2008) and national cultures at the macro level (Hofstede 2001; Talay et al. 2019) that might explain country perceptions. We distinguish from prior COO research that has mostly considered moderators related to country products such as product-country familiarity, shopping behavior (Ahmed and D’Astous 2008), or involvement with products (Pharr 2005). We also differ from COO studies that accounted for culture as a moderator (Talay et al. 2019) and specifically focused on climate change. To the best of our knowledge, this study is the first to explore the impacts of culture on the relationships between climate change actions and consumers’ attitudes toward their country in three distinct nations across three continents, including Africa.

Our findings provide evidence that national cultures (Hofstede 2001) inform the relationship between countries’ actions to combat climate change and consumers’ attitudes, revealing local specificities. Accounting for cultural specificities, our results uncover the conditional direct and indirect effects of the cultural context. In particular, the direct relationship is stronger for Morocco than France or the United States. Moroccans, who are more collectivist and less indulgent consumers, attribute more importance to their country’s climate change actions in developing their COO image perceptions and attitudes toward their country. Although France scores high on uncertainty avoidance, the effect of its marketing actions is lower than the effects of marketing actions in Morocco and the United States, which suggests the potential influence of institutional factors. Notably, Morocco and the United States have strong sociocultural pillars in relation to their shared understanding of governmental decisions. In contrast, French consumers display a stronger tendency to negotiate norms and regulations and to reject decisions made at the national level, as exemplified by the gilets jaunes protests that began in early November 2018 against the country’s transition to green energy. Consumers in Morocco instead tend to care about and agree with the climate change actions proposed by the national government.

In our aim to bridge the COO research and the climate change literature, we also examined climate change concerns. The findings show that these concerns moderate the direct link between a country’s actions and consumers’ attitudes. Consumers with stronger climate change concerns tend to more carefully evaluate the climate change actions undertaken by their countries. However, the conditional indirect effect is not supported. That is, climate change concern does not moderate the mediated path. This result suggests that the level of climate change concern does not shape COO image (i.e., cognitive beliefs about a country). Our findings also show that consumers in Morocco and the United States express greater climate concerns than people in France; in turn, the moderation effect is significant in these two countries but not in France. This result is in line with the cultural dimension scores of the three countries under investigation (Hofstede 2001). Indeed, people in countries that score low on long-term orientation, such as Morocco and the United States, also reveal a significant moderating effect of climate change concerns. In addition, during the last decade, consumers in these countries have experienced notable climate effects, such as droughts in Morocco and hurricanes or wildfires in the United States. Therefore, U.S. and Moroccan consumers may be more sensitive to the short-run outcomes of climate issues than French consumers. Thus, this finding adds to our knowledge of the effect of the climate change concern on consumers’ attitudes in an international context. In summary, this study advances our understanding of the moderating impact of national cultures in the context of international actions related to climate change while highlighting how cultural differences affect consumers’ perceptions of their country (Neher and Miola 2016).

Managerial Implications

These results also offer key insights for international managers. First, a country’s climate change actions affect COO image and consumers’ attitudes toward the country. International managers should therefore identify key external cues, such as climate policies, and then develop positioning that is consistent with such policies for their products and services. Consumers who have positive attitudes toward their country are willing to pay more for products made there (Koschate-Fischer et al. 2012), and our findings in turn suggest that countries that invest in strong actions to combat climate change could improve their consumers’ attitudes and encourage them to accept higher prices for the products made in those countries. International managers could then emphasize the key attributes related to climate change and their COO in positioning their products and services as well as align those positioning efforts with the country’s climate change actions. For example, France’s public train system SNCF, in accordance with France’s climate change strategies, highlights its efforts in support of energy transition, renewable energies, the circular economy, and eco-conceptions. Recent communications to consumers cite a carbon-free emissions goal. Thus, SNCF managers spread information and awareness about climate change in their marketing strategy, and those positions reflect their country’s overall positioning. Similar managerial practices could be adopted by companies in both the public and private sectors. Alternatively, managers could provide details about the consumption and use of their companies’ products to highlight the amount of carbon saved or the social benefits gained (e.g., social rehabilitation). Consumers might be willing to pay higher prices for such responsible products (Trudel and Cotte 2009).

Second, managers should acknowledge the moderating effect of cultural backgrounds. In Morocco, major banks such as Société Générale Maroc or Credit du Maroc financially support national actions to help villagers in remote areas during cold snaps in winter and dry periods in summer. They also publish annual reports of their actions against climate change. However, they rarely communicate such actions more widely; the reports are the main communication channel, targeting specific segments such as highly educated urban customers or business partners (Société Générale Maroc 2019). Our findings suggest that national banks, as well as other companies in Morocco that support actions to combat climate change, should communicate those actions to a mass audience because broader communications about climate change actions can support their COO strategies and exert positive impacts among customers. Similarly, in California, brands should communicate about the actions they take against climate change to enhance their COO strategies. Safeway was the first retail grocer to join the California Climate Action Registry, which supports projects to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and it engages in consistent marketing campaigns that highlight its climate change initiatives, targeting both customers and other stakeholders. More U.S. companies that want to leverage their COO could detail their efforts to fight climate change.

Third, international marketers can target specific consumers according to their varying, country-specific climate change concerns. As our results show, the effect of a country’s climate change actions on consumers’ attitudes is especially strong among engaged consumers in Morocco and the United States but not in France. Therefore, Moroccan and U.S. managers should display information primarily for these highly concerned consumers, whereas they should rely less on such communications to initiate change among less engaged consumers. For example, they might develop claims that reinforce the relationship between a country’s climate change actions and people’s attitudes and thereby encourage engaged consumers to sustain their behaviors using phrases such as “You love your country, so help it achieve its climate change objectives.” National reward programs might even assign value to consumers’ good climate deeds.

Limitations and Directions for Further Research

This research suggests several important avenues for researchers interested in COO effects (Magnusson et al. 2014). First, we show that consumers attribute stronger importance to a country’s climate change actions than its COO image when devising their attitudes toward their country. The impact of climate change strategies on product evaluations and purchase intentions thus needs deeper investigation. Future research could thus consider the product-image dimension in the evaluation of COOs. In addition, further research could investigate additional cognitive attributes that would fully reflect affective evaluations of the country. Second, the prior COO literature provides evidence of reverse COO effects such that product beliefs can influence COO image (Lee, Lockshin, and Greenacre 2016). In extending our research, continued studies could examine how consumers’ attitudes toward a country influence the climate change actions adopted at the national level. Third, prior research suggests effects due to various individual differences (Ahmed and D’Astous 2008); however, we focused specifically on climate change concerns. Further research might examine political orientation or individual status as other potential moderators of COO image. Fourth, although we investigated three countries, representing Europe, the Americas, and Africa; additional research could include other diverse settings and account for national differences with Asian countries. Fifth, to clarify the impact of countries’ actions in more detail, future research could explore the effectiveness of these actions. Further experimental research might assess the influences of countries’ actions on both attitudes toward the country and product evaluations. Different marketing strategies (adaptation vs. mitigation) and distinct country branding strategies could result in unique outcomes with regard to consumers’ evaluations. Sixth, a longitudinal study could explore how actions to fight climate change and COO image evolve in consumer perceptions to uncover whether COO image or a country’s climate change actions affect attitudes toward the country. Finally, we recommend that researchers who are interested in institutional theory investigate the logics of community and evaluate the impact of consumer agencies on their institutional systems regarding climate change policies and actions.

Supplemental Material

Supplemental Material, JIM.19.0150.R4_Web_Appendix_PDF - A Country-of-Origin Perspective on Climate Change Actions: Evidence from France, Morocco, and the United States

Supplemental Material, JIM.19.0150.R4_Web_Appendix_PDF for A Country-of-Origin Perspective on Climate Change Actions: Evidence from France, Morocco, and the United States by Marie Schill, Delphine Godefroit-Winkel and Mine Üçok Hughes in Journal of International Marketing

Footnotes

Appendix A.

Means, Correlation Matrix, and Discriminant Validity Assessment

Constructs	Means (SD)	AVE and Correlations Between Constructs Overall (France; Morocco; United States)
		1	2	3	4	5
1. Country’s climate change actions	3.23 (.90)	.63 (.69; .46; .71)
2. COO image	3.51 (.91)	.34 (.29; .39; .31)	.48 (.42; .34; .46)
3. Attitudes toward the country	3.49 (1.06)	.42 (.32; .53; .41)	.37 (.37; .28; .40)	.82 (.86; .70; .87)
4. Climate change concern	3.97 (.89)	.07 (.05; .23; −.10)	.35 (.20; −.11; .34)	.09 (.05; .17; −.03)	.61 (.44; .52; .75)
5. Marker variable (city image – leisure dimension)	3.17 (.87)	.13 (.10; .18; .13)	.19 (.21; .11; .19)	.17 (.19; .13; .22)	.11 (.04; .18; .08)	.41

Notes: For discriminant validity, the AVE values on the diagonal in bold must be greater than the squared correlations between constructs, which was the case for all constructs (Fornell and Larcker 1981). We also assessed discriminant validity in each country sample and found it to be satisfactory.

Associate Editor

Amir Grinstein

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Online supplement:

Notes

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Supplementary Material

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A Country-of-Origin Perspective on Climate Change Actions: Evidence from France,Morocco,and the United States

Abstract

Keywords

Theoretical Framework and Research Hypotheses

Institutional Theory

COO Effects

Key Theoretical Constructs

Climate change actions

COO image

Culture and cultural contexts

Climate change concern 1

Attitudes toward the country

Hypotheses

Direct effect of climate change actions on attitudes toward a country

Mediating effect of COO image

Conditional direct and indirect effects of cultural context

Conditional direct and indirect effects of climate change concern

Methodology

Context

Data Collection

Variable Measurements

Analysis and Results

Measurement Scales’ Psychometric Properties

Measurement Invariance

Common Method Variance

Structural Model and Hypotheses Tests

Robustness Check

Conclusion and Discussion

Implications for the COO and Climate Change Literature

Managerial Implications

Limitations and Directions for Further Research

Supplemental Material

Supplemental Material, JIM.19.0150.R4_Web_Appendix_PDF - A Country-of-Origin Perspective on Climate Change Actions: Evidence from France, Morocco, and the United States

Footnotes

Associate Editor

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

Funding

Notes

References

Supplementary Material

Climate change concern¹