Do you like the people from Trudekistan? Country names impact perceptions of a country and its citizens

Two preregistered experiments showed that even without additional information, a country's name can evoke stereotypes about its people (e.g., warmth, competence, morality, and threat) and the country itself (e.g., repressiveness, individualism, or caring values). Study 1 (N = 150) used a within-subjects design to test non-Western-evocative (STAN) vs. Western-evocative (LAND) suffixes. German respondents attributed more negative traits to countries with STAN suffixes. Study 2 (N = 320) demonstrated that these attributions were linked to how countries were perceived. Perceiving a country as less Western predicted less favorable stereotype evaluations, partly because it reduced perceived intergroup similarity. Specifically, perceived non-Western location and lower intergroup similarity serially mediated the association between country name and stereotypes. In addition, perceiving the country as majority-Muslim mediated the association between country name and stereotypes, but not the association between country name and intergroup similarity. These findings show how subtle linguistic cues tied to place shape group perceptions and highlight the importance of spatial context in stereotype activation, offering methodological recommendations for studies using fictional country names.