The Twin Landscapes of Waitomo: Tourism Network and Sustainability through the Landcare Group

This paper examines the management and coordination of a tourism destination stakeholder group, the Waitomo Caves Landcare Group. The Waitomo Caves destination context is unique in that its images and attractions occur underground and yet its long-term sustainability depends upon the aboveground land practices that occur within the broader catchment area. The Waitomo Caves Landcare Group was formed to protect and conserve this critical resource upon which the community is economically dependent. This paper illustrates network theory, offering an alternative perspective for understanding interdependent stakeholder groups. It focuses specifically on the informal coordination mechanisms that structure networks. The structure of the network, relational connections, and structural embeddedness are illustrated as key propositions that contribute to this process.     

Environmental consciousness and green customer behavior: An examination of motivation crowding effect

The motivation crowding effect suggests that external money intervention weakens intrinsic motivation. The purpose of this study is to examine whether the motivation crowding effect occurs during the process where consumers try to be environmentally friendly. Thus, this study will first investigate the effect of environmental protection consciousness on green customer behavior, and then investigate the effect that incentive mechanisms have on environmental protection consciousness and green customer behavior. 458 hotel guests are used as research subjects. The results show that environmental protection consciousness positively affects green consumer behavior. Cash discount incentives have no effect on the choice of hotel guests to reuse their bed sheet or towels; on the contrary, environmental protective alternatives are great incentives for hotel guests to maintain environmentally friendly behavior. Regarding the demographics of hotels guests, female and younger guests are more inclined to be environmentally friendly. The contribution of this paper is proof of the existence of motivation crowding through an empirical analysis of hotel guests, which enlightens the hospitality industry on how to introduce environmentally friendly strategies in order to respond to motivation crowding.     

Internet and Tourism—Part XXIV: PinpointTravel

This study examines the moderating impact of consumers' time styles on their emotional reactions and evaluations of waiting time in crowded and non-crowded environments. A quasi-experimental design was used to test our hypotheses. Our results indicate that waiting in a crowded environment results in negative emotions. In addition, people who scored high on economic time style reported significantly less satisfaction with their choice of airlines when they waited in crowded conditions. These results extend the literature on crowding and waiting time, and add to our understanding of consumer emotions in service environments.     

Examining the Differential Impact of Human Crowding Versus Spatial Crowding on Visitor Satisfaction at a Festival

Human crowding at a festival can affect visitor satisfaction differently to spatial crowding. Festival visitors perceive human crowding as a situation in which the festival is full of people. Spatial crowding, on the other hand, is perceived as restricting movement. We hypothesized that human crowding affects visitor satisfaction in a positive way (by increasing positive affect and decreasing negative affect), whereas spatial crowding affects visitor satisfaction in a negative way (by decreasing positive affect and increasing negative affect). We tested these hypotheses using data collected through an on-site survey at the 2012 Seoul Lantern Festival in South Korea: 423 visitors attending the festival completed the survey. The survey results supported the hypotheses. Managerial implications of the findings are also discussed.     

Tourist Perception of Crowding and Management Approaches at Tourism Sites in Xi'an

Tourism crowding management is an important part of sustainable development at tourist attractions. This study seeks to recognize visitors' perceptions of crowding and then identify tourism crowding management approaches for tourism sites in Xi'an, western China. Three kinds of study, which were designed using quantitative and qualitative techniques, were undertaken in Xi'an. In the first two studies the actual numbers of visitors at component parts of five tourist attractions were recorded. Next, visitor responses to these kinds of levels of crowding were assessed. In the third study senior managers were interviewed and asked to explain their approaches to crowding management. Taken together, the information collected from the three studies helped build a model that plots the driving forces shaping tourism crowding at tourism sites.     

Perceived crowding in recreation settings: An urban case study

Abstract

Research on crowding in recreation areas has focused primarily on back‐country settings. This study tests some of the axioms developed from this research and from studies conducted in non‐recreation settings using data from a case study in an urban park. The actual number of visitors present was found to be the most important individual predictor of perceived crowding in this setting. Results suggest that more developed parks, in more urban contexts, may elicit different images and expectations about visitor density. The implications of these findings, as they relate both to studies of perceived crowding and the social definition of parks in general, are discussed.     

Celebrity endorsements in destination marketing: A three country investigation

The present study extends research on the role of celebrity endorsements in destination marketing by exploring various facets of the effect of celebrity endorsements in destination marketing on the consumer. More specifically, theories of source credibility, congruence, social identity and consumer cosmopolitanism, are used to build research questions that investigate the relative effectiveness of a celebrity endorsed tourism advertisement vis a vis a generic advertisement and the boundary conditions governing the same such as destination type (local/global), celebrity country of origin and consumer level factors. The research questions are addressed using four experimental studies in sequence. The same four experiments are run in three countries with different socio-cultural backgrounds to enhance generalization, with a combined sample size of 1073 respondents. Major findings suggest that a celebrity endorser is effective for a destination advertisement. Significant cross-country differences were observed in consumer affect depending on the choice of celebrity (local or global) and the destination type (i.e., domestic or international). The effects are also moderated by consumer cosmopolitanism. The study has multiple theoretical and managerial implications.     

Factors contributing to perceptions of recreational crowding

Abstract

This paper examines perceptions of crowding in a river recreation setting, using an alternative to the conventional crowding measure and a diverse set of potential predictor variables that have not been examined concurrently in previous studies. Analysis focuses on differences between three groups of respondents: crowded floaters, whose enjoyment was reduced by encounters with other people; neutral floaters; and those floaters whose enjoyment was increased by the visitor density they encountered. Findings support some previous arguments that crowding is related more to visitors’ expectations, preferences, and previous experience than to actual or perceived encounter levels. Further, perceptions of crowding were found to be related to encounter expectations and preferences at specific river locations (e.g., at put‐in and rapids) and to perceptions of other aspects of trip quality.     

Crowding standards at Petra Archaeological Park: a comparative study of McKercher's five types of heritage tourists

To achieve sustainability in heritage tourism, tourists should be placed at the heart of the management and planning processes. Indicators and standards-based frameworks were developed in the field of outdoor recreation management to manage and measure crowding and other problematic issues in parks and related areas. Using normative theory and visual research methods, this article aims to examine crowding standards of tourists at Petra Archaeological Park, and compare these standards between the types of heritage tourists suggested by a model developed by Bob McKercher. Results showed that tourists’ acceptability levels go down with an increasing number of tourists, and tourists who are highly motivated to visit heritage sites (i.e. purposeful and sightseeing heritage tourists) had the most restrictive acceptable number of tourists at the park. The normative standards formulated in this article provided a guidance to manage crowding at Petra.     

How Visitor and Environmental Characteristics Influence Perceived Crowding

This paper aims to investigate tourists’ perceptions of crowding and factors influencing those perceptions. The effects of visitor socio-demographic characteristics, economic factors, and destination situational characteristics are investigated. Questionnaire data were collected from a sample of 362 tourists at Pantai Cenang Beach, Langkawi Island. The results confirmed the significant effect of visitor socio-demographic characteristics on perceived crowding. Among the economic factors, although the findings did not confirm an effect for level of income, the results showed a positive effect for spending money per day on perceived crowding. Furthermore, the hypothesized effect of situational characteristics on perceived crowding could not be verified. In light of the absence of studies investigating the factors influencing perceived crowding using partial least squares–structural equation modeling, this study contributes theoretically and methodologically to the perceived crowding literature. Moreover, the results can assist the local authorities to understand the perceptions of tourists for future development.     

Tourists’ perceptions of crowding,attractiveness, and satisfaction: a second-order structural model

Drawing on theories of stimulus overload and social interference, this study proposes a multidimensional way to measure tourists’ perceptions of crowding. Three dimensions of crowding are discussed: neutral, personal, and social. A second-order structural equation model is used to analyze the relationships among crowding perceptions, destination attractiveness, and satisfaction by surveying tourists at Mount Sanqingshan National Park (n?=?424). The results of a covariance-based SEM show that tourists’ perception of crowding (TPC) has negative effects on reported attractiveness of the destination. However, TPC dose not directly affects their satisfaction. Results of this study refine the multidimensional connotation of TPC and provide another dimension to evaluate the quality of tourists’ experiences apart from the universal construct of satisfaction. The paper then goes on to discuss the importance of managing TPC.     

Consumer Insights and the Importance of Competitiveness Factors for Mature and Developing Destinations

This article aims to understand the importance of various destination attributes to the competitiveness of tourism destinations from a consumer perspective, while at the same time contrasting these in a mature versus developing destination. A sample of Australian-based domestic tourists were surveyed to assess the relative importance of tourism destination competitiveness (TDC) attributes in the context of developing and mature destinations. This research firstly appears to verify that the importance of many TDC elements, highlighted by consumers, is not dissimilar from other stakeholder-based TDC studies. Furthermore, this research effort established that in terms of attribute performance, relative destination immaturity may well constrain a developing destination’s ability to satisfy the needs of consumers.     

Are neighbour tourists more sensitive to crowding? The impact of distance on the crowding-out effect in tourism

The concept of the crowding-out effect has been employed in the tourism literature to analyse complex phenomena. However, there is limited insight into the crowding-out effect on tourists by tourists, and even less into the impact of distance on the crowding-out of tourists. This paper examines the relationship between crowding perceptions, tourists' attitudes toward crowding and the consequences of being crowded out. Results from a sample of 729 international tourists in Hong Kong suggest that there is a crowding-out effect on tourists by tourists, but this has only a marginal influence on the majority. The limited crowding-out effect is induced by tourists in general rather than by a single segment. The study also investigates the effect of distance on tourist crowding. The findings reveal a decaying effect of distance on tourists’ crowding perceptions, as neighbour tourists are more susceptible to tourist crowding than tourists from long-haul markets.     

Staging a comeback? The influencing mechanism of tourist crowding perception on adaptive behavior

An increasing number of studies have recently elucidated the serious negative effects of tourist crowding. However, how tourists cope with crowding and adopt adaptive responses remains unclear. Thus, this study qualitatively identified the mechanism of tourist crowding perception of adaptive behavior from interviewees and then quantitatively validated the mechanism through the mediation of tourist fatigue and negative emotions, as well as the moderation of peer emotion contagion. Tourists were more likely to return to a destination and engage in temporal replacement behavior through the mediating effect of tourist fatigue, but it was also found that peer emotional contagion interferes with two paths that explain how tourist crowding perception influences tourist emotion change or state variation, impacting adaptive behavior responses. Consequently, we recommend diverting tourists, focusing on alleviating fatigue and negative emotions and channeling the peers’ negative emotions to mitigate the negative impact of tourist crowding.     

ANALYZING PERFORMANCE AUDIT REPORTS OF DESTINATION MANAGEMENT ORGANIZATIONS' ACTIONS AND OUTCOMES

As past research has considered the major stages of the consumer behavior model separately, it is hardly possible to evaluate the most effective factor over final decision making. Thus, this study has a special significance, as it evaluates every stage, makes a comparison between stages, and puts forward the relationship between them. The discussion of findings is related to the assessment of data collected through a questionnaire survey among Turkish domestic tourists. Study findings have concluded a positive interrelationship among all stages of the consumer behavior model in tourism, and these findings can be regarded as sufficient evidence to support the 10 research hypotheses proposed in the study. In light of these findings, the paper also addresses both theoretical and practical implications.     

Continuing the Discussion on Coping as a Conceptualization for Constraint Negotiation and Accommodation: Responses to Little,Samdahl, and Walker

Abstract

The relationship between perceived crowding and the desire to further limit established carrying capacities is examined from a study of users of the Sylvania Recreation Area. The relationship is found to be weak, especially among those users with low education. Possible explanations in terms of expressed crowding as a status group convention are discussed. It is concluded that user limitation decisions cannot be directly derived from studies of perceived crowding.     

Which consumer feedback metrics are the most valuable in driving consumer expenditure in the tourism industries? A view from macroeconomic perspective

The link between consumer feedback metrics and consumer expenditure at the microeconomic level has been extensively examined. However, little is known at the macroeconomic level about the influence of consumer feedback metrics on consumer expenditure. Relying on actual data concerning consumer feedback metrics and consumer expenditure, the present study examines the influence of various consumer feedback metrics on consumer expenditure in the tourism industries. Our study collected data about consumer feedback metrics and consumer expenditure over the period 2008–2017. The findings indicate that consumer satisfaction and consumer effort score (CES) are the best performing consumer feedback metrics in hotels, restaurants, and travel agencies industries. Furthermore, the top-2-box performs best for predicting consumer expenditure in online booking industry. The findings reflect the significance of consumer feedback metrics on the economy as a whole; therefore, efforts to boost consumer feedback metrics should consider a national agenda.     

Perceived crowding and festival experience: The moderating effect of visitor-to-visitor interaction

The purpose of this study is to explore the influence of two types of perceived crowding (spatial crowding and human crowding) on festival experience as well as how the interactions among visitors moderate the relationship by introducing the variable ‘visitor-to-visitor interaction’. To this end, taking Chinese local cultural festivals as the research object, empirical tests with regression analysis are conducted on 555 questionnaires concerning people's festival experience and perception of spatial crowding and human crowding. The results reveal an inverted U-shaped relationship between perceived human crowding and festival experience, whereas perceived spatial crowding consistently negatively affects the festival experience. Furthermore, the moderating effect of interactions among visitors is confirmed: the quality of interaction has different moderating effects on the relationship between different types of crowding perception and festival experience, and the quantity of interaction positively moderates the relationship between perceived spatial crowding and festival experience.     

Discrimination is a Societal Issue Too: Moving Beyond Individual Behavior

Crowding in natural settings such as nature reserves may lead to both long-and short-term spatial and temporal behavioral adjustments. This study analyzes the short-term coping process as a function of the crowding disturbance in two popular nature reserves in Israel. Using binary and multinomial choice models, a direct robust connection between the crowding disturbance and a hierarchical set of behavioral responses was found. People less sensitive to crowding tried to avoid or reduce the length of the contact by changing pace. More sensitive visitors may change route. Finally, visitors most sensitive to crowding may terminate their visit altogether.     

The role of language in the online evaluation of hospitality service encounters: An empirical study

In an increasingly global travel market, hospitality services encounters involve growing interactions between providers and customers often belonging to different nationalities and cultures and speaking different languages. Extant hospitality management literature has explored the influence of language on service evaluations mostly in offline settings. This study innovatively captures the effect of the language used in online hotel reviews on online consumer ratings in two distinctively different destinations located in culturally different countries: Italy and Russia. Based on almost half a million Booking.com online reviews written by hotel guests in Moscow and Rome, we illuminate if and to what extent domestic vs. foreign language use affects online customer satisfaction. We find that the use of domestic language exerts a positive impact on online ratings in both countries. Implications for hospitality practitioners and managers, developers and managers of online review platforms, and customers of hotel services are discussed.