Ethnocentric Tendencies of Consumers towards Domestic Products and their Relationship with Social Identity:

Over the past years, there has been great interest in how to improve the image of the domestic products and identifying the factors that can be employed to influence citizens’ attitudes towards them, whether in developed or less developed countries.
Many studies have appeared that focus on new approaches linked to psychological motives that affect the public’s preferences toward domestic products and their purchasing behaviors, including ethnocentrism tendencies of consumers and their preferences to buy the domestic products versus the tendency of some consumers to view themselves as global citizens who are open to diverse cultures more than being locals"Cosmopolitanism". Researchers found another variable related to the psychology of ownership according to which citizens feel that local products are “our-ness” and that they express their identity and sense of belonging.
The importance of this study lies in identifying how media organizations can combine their efforts to transform the social identity of the citizens into a national identity that supports the domestic products to buy? How can we create what is known as consumers’ nationalism and encourage them to refer to the domestic products as “mine” and influence preferences as a responsible consumer-citizen? The study relied on the social identity theory developed by Tajfel in 1978 with the aim of developing a proposed communication model to influence the public’s preferences for the domestic products. The proposed communication model demonstrated the necessity of integrating and synergizing the communication activities of many institutions and companies that can support the domestic products, the most important of which are the Ministry of Industry, national companies, and media institutions, which must produce and promote communication content that supports the local industries by referring to the international products that are manufactured in Egypt, and the relationship between purchasing domestic products and developing the national economy and how this benefits the citizens.
The model also emphasized the importance of creating a responsible citizen who prefers the local product, supporting and consolidating the slogan “Made in Egypt” in the minds of the publics, and highlighting the successes of domestic products in local markets, exhibitions, and foreign countries. It also focused on the importance of corporates communication with employees and having a unified media and advertising strategy among different industries and sectors regarding the style, content, and advertising medium so that the message can be delivered successfully.