Impacts of festivals and events on residents’ well-being

This study investigated how residents’ participation in local festivals may influence their subjective-well-being and their quality of life. Using data collected from local attendees of a film festival, this study examined the relationship between socio-cultural impacts of a festival and subjective well-being of local residents. Findings revealed that while community benefits and cultural/educational benefits are positive predictors of subjective well-being of residents, quality life concerns were found to have negative impact on the well-being of residents. Findings also revealed no significant relationship between community resource concerns and subjective well-being of residents.     

Justice and trust’s role in employees’ resilience and business’ continuity: Evidence from Egypt

Resilience is increasingly recognized as a means of reducing the effects of disasters on tourist destinations. However, there is limited understanding of the contextual factors that promote resilient attitudes and behaviors among employees of tourism and hospitality organizations, which in turn lead to business recovery and success. Using a capital-based approach, this study explores the impact of employees' resilience – as manifested by hardiness, resourcefulness and optimism– on two indicators of business continuity: perception of job insecurity and creative performance. The mediating effects of distributive justice and trust in the organization are also tested to establish how they affect this relationship. Data were gathered from 960 employees in tourism and hospitality organizations affected by terrorist attacks in Egypt. Using results obtained through structural equation modeling, we demonstrate a direct relationship between employees' resilience and business continuity, with distributive justice and trust partially functioning as mediators. The implications and limitations are discussed.     

Self-efficacy and sustainable rural tourism development: local communities’ perspectives from Kuching,Sarawak

The future of the tourism industry is dependent on local communities’ ability to develop and sustain tourism developments, especially in sensitive rural areas. But there is limited research on this topic to guide tourism authorities and governments. In particular, few studies have studied sustainable rural tourism development from the perspective of the local communities. Therefore, this study examines local communities’ views on their capability to achieve sustainable rural tourism development in selected rural areas in Kuching, Sarawak. Questionnaires were distributed to the local communities residing at three rural tourism destinations in Kuching, Sarawak. Interestingly, the results indicated that local communities’ self-efficacy has a positive relationship with social, cultural, economic, and environmental sustainability. Hence, this study offers theoretical and practical contributions to sustainable rural tourism development literature and the tourism industry.     

A longitudinal study of Olympic Games’ impact on the image of a host country

This study tracked the change in Brazil’s image due to hosting a mega event. The authors measured perceptions of Brazil before and at three points in time after the 2016 Summer Olympics. The findings revealed some differences in the country image but no significant changes in destination image or Olympics image over time. This may indicate how difficult it is to change people’s perceptions positively in a world filled with negative media coverage, such as what Brazil received leading up to and during the Olympics. For DMOs, controlling the media narrative is more important than ever when forming the destination image.     

Examining tourism SME owners’ place attachment,support for community and business performance: the role of the enlightened self-interest model

This research examines how support for the local community by small tourism businesses influences their enterprise performance, and the extent to which the owners’ place attachment influences the level of support that they provide to the community. Confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modelling were used to analyse the responses from the owners of 298 small and medium tourism enterprises (SMTEs) operating in regional South Australia. Results of the analysis provide support for the validity of a structural model. The place attachment of tourism business owners has a significant positive effect on their support for the community which in turn has a significant positive effect on enterprise performance. The robustness of the structural model was tested through a series of invariance (equality) tests. Results demonstrate that the causal relationships among place attachment, support for community and enterprise performance hold true (are invariant) irrespective of the gender of the business owner, the size of the business, and/or the length of time the business has been operating. These findings have implications for research scholars in developing more robust tests of model relationships between and across groups, and for tourism policymakers aiming to support the sustainable development of regional tourism destinations.     

Characteristics of small business leadership from employees’ perspective: A qualitative study

Leadership is a much-studied topic, and yet, the topic still attracts researchers. As an essential factor in every organization, however, leadership contributes significantly to a business failure, especially in small independent restaurant businesses and this could be due to the unique operations of the industry and the lack of leadership studies on small hospitality businesses. This study aims to fill the gap by exploring the ideal characteristics for small independent restaurant leaders to become an effective leader using a qualitative approach from their employees’ perspectives. Qualitative data were collected through four focus groups and one dyadic interview. The findings of the qualitative data analysis revealed nine themes: respectful, compassionate, effective communicator, experienced, effective delegator, gives recognition, sociable, emotionally controlled, organized. The paper discussed implications of the findings for small independent restaurant businesses and the hospitality industry in general as well as implications for theory.     

Estimating the impact of showroom entertainment on the gaming volumes of Las Vegas hotel–casinos

Increases in showroom headcounts are found to increase casino gaming volumes in two Las Vegas Strip casinos. This study examines long-standing assumptions regarding the indirect contribution of investment-intensive showroom entertainment. Such contributions are difficult to measure and the literature contains no rigorously derived estimates of gaming contributions from in-house entertainment venues. Despite the paucity of research, gaming companies are willing to invest staggering sums in showroom entertainment, based in large part on the belief that traffic from these venues will increase gaming volumes. Using estimates produced by time series regression models, the two showrooms produced average gaming win contributions of $11.28 and $19.32, per paid showroom attendee. Based on these estimates alone, extravagant investment in showrooms would have to be justified by other means. Future studies aimed at understanding the showroom contributions to non-gaming profit centers and the role of showrooms in the high-roller's patronage decision are both recommended.     

Changing perceptions and reasoning process: Comparison of residents’ pre- and post-event attitudes

Upon a systematic assessment of how residents’ trust in government(s) and attachment to a marquee event influence their evaluations of the event’s impacts and subsequent attitudes towards the hosting of the event, this study further explores the dynamic nature of residents’ subjective evaluations and corresponding attitudes to the event. In line with the confirmation bias theory, findings clearly demonstrate that residents’ trust in government(s), attachment to the event, perceptions of the event’s impacts and ultimate support to the event have changed in a predictable manner over time. Moreover, findings indicate that individuals’ direct experience with the event alters the associations between their cognitive/affective evaluations and attitudes towards the event, with a shifted focus to the cognitive evaluations after the event.     

Exploring the discrepancies in perceived destination images from residents’ and tourists’ perspectives: a revised importance–performance analysis approach

A comprehensive and balanced understanding of both local residents’ and tourists’ perceived destination image (DI) is a pivotal step for successful tourism development. Using the revised importance–performance analysis approach, this study assesses the differences between residents’ and tourists’ perceived implicit importance and performance of DI attributes in the Liyu Lake Scenic Area in Hualien, Taiwan. A mixed methods approach was adopted. First, 30 pertinent image attributes were identified by interviewing local residents and tourists. These image attributes were subsequently used in a questionnaire survey. Results indicate that residents’ and tourists’ opinions were divided on environmental issues and purposes of visit. The most significant finding is that both the residents and tourists regarded the majority of the attributes as “possible overkill,” suggesting that destination management organization should reconsider the direction for future development and try to realize the “real needs” of the residents and tourists based on their motivations.     

Exploring tourists’ soundscape emotion and its impact on sustainable tourism development

Despite the long-standing appeal for tourism researchers to pay more attention to the effects of soundscape, there remains a serious lack of in-depth studies on the topic. Drawing on moderating effects of tourists’ soundscape emotion, this study examines certain determinants of tourists’ pro-environmental behaviour. Kulangsu was used as a source of empirical data for its abundant soundscape resources. The results revealed the explicit connections of human-environmental relationships to pro-environmental behaviour. All the paths are more significant when grouped with positive soundscape emotions than with their negative counterparts. This demonstrates the importance of soundscape to promote sustainable development in tourist destinations.     

The impact of perceived benefits and risks on current and desired levels of outsourcing: Hotel managers’ perspective

The purpose of this paper was to investigate the interactions between perceived benefits and risks of outsourcing and outsourcing adoption from the hoteliers’ perspective. Data were collected from 123 hotels in Egypt using a list of 32 hotel activities. Results revealed that managers’ perceived benefits of outsourcing had a direct positive effect on the current level of outsourcing, while indirect effects on the desired level of outsourcing. Interestingly, results confirmed the mediating role of current outsourcing between managers’ perceived benefits and the desired outsourcing. However, the perceived risks of outsourcing had a nonsignificant moderating effect. The findings provide implications for both theory and practice.     

Conflict and agreement in stakeholder attitudes: residents’ and hotel managers’ views of tourism impacts and forest-related tourism development

This paper probes differences in attitudes toward tourism impacts between two leading stakeholder groups in tourism, local residents and the managers of tourism facilities. It uses case study surveys of residents and managers in Belek, Antalya, Turkey. Differences in attitudes across seven main areas are investigated, including the positive and negative economic outcomes of tourism; positive and negative sociocultural impacts; negative environmental impacts; views on further tourism development, and benefits and problems related to forested land close to destinations. The results reveal that some attitudes are held in common – especially positive attitudes including tourism's benefits in creating jobs and income. Differences were mostly observed not in the direction but in the strength of opinion. The most significant differences were found in managers' beliefs that tourism's environmental and social impacts were few, while residents were extremely negative about those impacts. Differences of attitudes on the future use of forestland headed the list of all differences between managers and residents. Divergent loyalties were revealed. Managers supported their business and employers; local people supported their local area. The need for further research, including the role of perhaps distant “moral stakeholders”, and for more comprehensive understanding, and more sustainable outcomes, are highlighted.     

Organizational support versus supervisor support: The impact on hospitality managers’ psychological contract and work engagement

Considering perceived organizational support (POS) and perceived supervisor support (PSS) at the same time and understanding which one is more critical receives little attention. A scenario-based experimental design was conducted to examine the influences of high PSS & low POS and low PSS & high POS on hospitality employees’ psychological contract (PC) and work engagement. The results show that managers experience both psychological contract breach (PCB) and lower work engagement under these two imperfect situations. Furthermore, managers have relatively higher PCB and lower work engagement under the situation of receiving lower PSS than receiving lower POS. Finally, it was found that PCB has a more negative influence on managers’ work engagement when receiving lower PSS. Theoretical and practical implications based on the results are discussed.     

Volunteer tourists’ perceptions of their impacts on marginalized communities

Abstract

Using a phenomenological approach, this study examines the experiences of volunteer tourists in host communities using social representations theory. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with volunteer tourists on perceived impacts on favela (slum) communities of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. This study was developed to address a need for further research that critically looks at the social impacts of volunteer tourism in marginalized communities. It addresses the following question: How does volunteer tourism influence a marginalized community from the perspective of the volunteers? Notably, the majority of the volunteers in this study had difficulty describing how volunteer tourism has benefited the community beyond their own individual contributions, and it was difficult for them to see broader implications of volunteer tourism in general. Recommendations of management actions that will help to maintain and enhance the benefits and alleviate the negative consequences and obstacles that were perceived by volunteer tourists are given.     

The effects of festival impacts on support intentions based on residents’ ratings of festival performance and satisfaction: a new integrative approach

Festivals can provide an effective vehicle for sustainable tourism. It is therefore necessary to examine the impacts of festival tourism as well as their consequences in order to manage their relevance to the local community. The lack of a multiple mediation approach, however, has hampered research on the psycho-social process through which festival impacts (perceived benefits, costs, and affective impact) influence resident support. We propose a new integrative approach in which resident-rated festival performance and satisfaction are putative mediators that transmit the effects of the three festival impacts to support for future festivals. The theoretical foundations of this integrative approach or model are jointly built on social exchange theory, the affective theory of social exchange, and the theory of reasoned action. The integrative model was successfully validated using eight sample festivals within China, which included 353 observations with 10,000 bootstraps. The empirical findings reveal that 14 out of the 17 hypotheses received empirical support in this study, and it thereby contributes significantly to new understanding in the literature.     

Place attachment,host–tourist interactions,and residents’ attitudes towards tourism development: the case of Boa Vista Island in Cape Verde

A clear understanding of residents’ attitudes towards tourism development and its determinants is a crucial pillar for designing tourism development strategies to promote sustainable development. The literature on the influence of host–tourist interactions and place attachment on residents’ attitudes towards tourism development in developing countries is still scarce. To extend knowledge in this field, this study aims at developing and testing a structural model to examine direct and indirect causal effects of place attachment, host–tourist interaction, and perceived positive and negative tourism impacts on the residents’ attitudes towards tourism development in an island tourism destination – Boa Vista Island in Cape Verde. Results suggest that the residents’ attitudes are positively affected by place attachment, host–tourist interaction, and perceived positive impacts; and negatively affected by perceived negative impacts. Host–tourist interaction emerges as the strongest (direct and indirect) determinant of the residents’ attitudes towards tourism development. Moreover, although both positive and negative perceptions of tourism impacts have significant impacts on the residents’ attitudes, the influence of the former is stronger than that of the latter. The paper ends with relevant theoretical and practical implications to promote positive residents’ attitudes towards tourism development in Boa Vista.     

The impact of four CSR dimensions on a gaming company’s image and customers’ revisit intentions

The purpose of this study is to investigate whether perceptions of corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives affect casino customers’ corporate image as well as the customers’ behavioral intentions (i.e., revisit intentions), through the lens of Carroll’s corporate social performance model, stakeholder theory, and legitimacy theory. This study also examines the mediating effect of corporate image on the relationship between perceived CSR and behavioral intentions. An onsite survey was conducted with 596 casino customers in South Korea. The results revealed that ethical CSR had the strongest impact on corporate image, followed by economic and philanthropic CSR. Only philanthropic CSR had a significant and direct effect on behavioral intentions. Corporate image mediated the relationship between three types of CSR (ethical, economic, and philanthropic) and behavioral intentions. Companies can benefit from these findings by understanding how specific CSR initiatives can enhance corporate image and increase customer retention. This study advances the emerging field of CSR in the gaming industry.     

The effects of community factors on residents’ perceptions toward World Heritage Site inscription and sustainable tourism development

Using partial least squares-structural equation modeling, we analyzed data from 410 questionnaires completed by a sample of residents from the vicinity of the George Town World Heritage Site (WHS), Malaysia, to investigate the effects of community factors on residents’ perceptions and support for WHS conservation and tourism development. To conceptualize these relationships, we developed a framework based on social exchange theory (SET) and previous empirical evidence. While community attachment, cultural attitudes, community involvement, and community gain had positive effects on residents’ perceptions, the effects of community members’ gain and status consistency were particularly strong. Our results suggest that perceptions strongly influence support for WHS conservation and tourism development. Having examined a number of new resident perception factors, this study makes a significant theoretical and methodological contribution to the tourism and resident perception literature. Furthermore, this study has practical implications for future sustainable community development in the George Town WHS.