topic

Comparative, cross-cultural,
and cross-national research
A comment on good and bad practice
 purpose
• The paper seeks to provide guidance for those
who have data from multiple countries and
are considering writing a comparative or cross-
cultural/national research paper.
 IMR
• International marketing review
 Problems with cross-cultural/cross-
national research
• These papers are often desk
• rejected. The core issue is that:
• . the research objectives of the studies revolve around assessing
how nation-level
• variables of interest (e.g. aspects of national culture such as
individualism,
• collectivism, and so on, or economic factors such as level of
economic
• development) differentially drive certain beliefs, attitudes, and
behaviors in
• customers or individuals/groups in organizations; and yet
• . the researchers only test their theories using samples from two or
three countries.
• These researchers often draw conclusions from their studies regarding the
role that
• nation-level variables (such as culture) may have as antecedents to the
beliefs,
• attitudes, and/or behaviors under scrutiny.
• Yet, as Franke and Richey (2010, p. 1 and 2) demonstrate, samples of two
or three
• countries are not adequate for answering questions of this kind:
“Comparing small
• numbers of countries will actually often fail to reflect a trend that applies
to countries
• in general, even when the overall trend is strong, and may falsely suggest
a positive or
• negative trend, even when the relationship between variables is weak”.
• theory testing is not appropriate.