The effects of unethical beliefs and counterfeit attitudes on purchase intention of non-deceptive counterfeit luxury brands: A cross-culture comparison between United States and Taiwan.

摘要

The global trade in counterfeit goods is rising on a grand scale and faster than most people think. Among all product sectors, branded luxury goods are highly likely to be counterfeited due to a lucrative market of increasing demand and high profits for counterfeiters. Taiwan is a major source of counterfeits and has the world's fifth largest luxury market. And on their doorstep, they have the Chinese, avid consumers of luxury goods. Until now, Taiwan was the undisputed world capital of counterfeiting and illegal copying. However, there are still no empirical works that investigate the cross-culture differences between Taiwan (with its collectivist culture) and the United States (with its individualist culture) and systematically examine them in an integrated model.;Therefore, in order to prevent consumers from buying counterfeits of luxury brands in advance, this study wants to first understand the characteristics of those consumers from the viewpoint of their personality and social-psychological factors. This study sets out to examine a proposed model of the applicability of the theory of reasoned action (TRA). This model predicts buying behavior of counterfeit luxury brands. It also provides an in-depth understanding of American and Taiwanese consumers' types of attitudes (social benefit of dissemination, anti-big-business sentiment, and social costs) toward counterfeits of luxury brands and reinforces the mediation role between consumers' ethical beliefs and purchase intentions. The findings indicate that consumers' unethical beliefs play an important antecedent role and influence Americans' attitudes towards the social benefit of dissemination and social costs of luxury-brand counterfeits. For the Taiwanese, consumers' unethical beliefs toward luxury-brand counterfeits are a determined variable of the social benefit of dissemination and anti-big business sentiment. It was found that the higher the interdependent self-construal of the Taiwanese, the more willing they are to buy luxury counterfeits. It was also found that the more Americans perceive status consumption, the more willing they are to buy luxury counterfeits. Finally, the results indicate that only the Taiwanese with lower interdependent self-construal who buy luxury counterfeits (unethical behavior) view it is a way to act against big business.;Accordingly, the perspectives of luxury-brand counterfeiting depend on the cultural differences between the United States and Taiwan. Policymakers, marketing managers, or owners of these original luxury brands may execute various communication strategies and persuade consumers to start buying their products based on the findings and implications of this study.;Keywords: counterfeiting, luxury brand, unethical beliefs, attitude toward counterfeiting, social-benefit of dissemination, anti-big business sentiment, social costs, interdependent self-construal, status consumption, mediation role, moderation effect, confirmatory factor analysis, and structural equation modeling.