Religiosity and nationality

Abstract

Religiosity, or the degree to which the members of a religion accept the major beliefs of their religion, and its effect on consumer behavior has rarely been investigated, although religion is one of the basic elements of culture. This study tests four hypotheses concerning the relationship between religiosity, nationality, and consumer behavior on samples of American Protestant and Japanese consumers. Because of the unified nature of Japanese religion, the Japanese respondents were considered members of the same religion. In the case of nationality, it was found, as anticipated, that Japanese and Americans differed significantly in some aspects of consumer behavior. In regard to religiosity, there were no significant differences between the consumer behavior of the devout and casually religious Japanese, whereas the devout American Protestants had considerably different consumer behavior than the casually religious Protestants. Thus, the research findings suggest that further study of these factors holds promise for greater insight in the development of international marketing strategies.