Cultural comparison of tourists' safety perception in relation to trip satisfaction

Although safety and security are seen as a priori for a prosperous tourism industry in any destination, safety and security perception and its influence on tourist behaviour have received limited empirical attention from researchers. This study investigated tourists' perception of the safety and security of a destination in relation to the level of satisfaction with their trip, using Turkey and its visitors as a case in point. The stepwise regression analysis was employed to investigate the relationship between trip satisfaction, safety and security‐related variables, existence of product or service failure, and selected demographic variables. Results showed that positive perception of Turkey's hygiene and health, and safety and security helped visitors to have greater trip satisfaction, especially if they stayed longer and enjoyed their trip without any product or service failure; however, German tourists and tourists with a secondary school degree are more likely to have less trip satisfaction. Practical implications and future research suggestions are discussed. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Choice behavior of tourism destination and travel mode: A case study of local residents in Hangzhou,China

The social and economic growth as result of promoting the rapid development of tourism in China has brought tremendous pressure on the urban transportation systems. Research of travel behavior concerning the characteristics of tourists has provided effective information for transportation planning. Due to different city plans, public transportation system design, car parking design and management, etc., the local situation in developed countries differs from the counterpart in China. However, little research has studied the factors influencing the choice of travel destinations in tourism. The research aims to study the tourism destination and mode choice behavior of tourists and provides suggestions to improve tourism transportation service system. An online questionnaire survey is used to collect data including the travel characteristics and personal attributes of local tourists in different holidays in Hangzhou, China. A multinomial logit model is constructed with the trip destination set as the dependent variable. Results show that age, residential type, car ownership, companion type and holiday length have a significant impact on destination choice. To determine what influences modal choice for such trips, a second logit model is established with travel mode set as the dependent variable with the explanatory variables of age, gender, companion type, car ownership, holiday length and travel destination found to be significant. The results demonstrated that people aged 26 to 44 prefer suburban areas, and they are the main group driving to their travel destination. Public transport use frequency decreases when the destination is located outside of the main tourist area. Finally, suggestions have been proposed to mitigate the congestion and parking problem based on model analysis from the perspective of the bus line setting, transfer improvements, and the policy to limit cars, respectively.     

Travel and tourism competitiveness index: The impact of air transportation,railways transportation,travel and transport services on international inbound and outbound tourism

The objective of the study is to examine the impact of air transportation, railways transportation, travel and transport services on international inbound and outbound tourism in a panel of 19 tourists - oriented countries, over a period of 1990–2014. By applying principal component analysis, the study constructs travel and tourism competitiveness index for inbound and outbound tourism. The main constructs of inbound tourism index include international tourists' arrival, tourism receipts, receipts of passengers' transports items and travel items while the constructs of the outbound index include international tourists' departure, tourism expenditures, and expenditures for passengers transport and travel items. The result of panel Fully Modified OLS (FMOLS) regression shows that the presence of air transportation, railways transportation, and trade openness positively affect inbound tourism index, while travel and transport services negatively affect tourism competitiveness index. The causality results confirm the bidirectional relationship between inbound tourism, air transportation, railways passengers carried, trade openness and travel and transport services, while there is a unidirectional causality running from inbound index to railway goods transported, from air transport freight to trade factor, and from travel services to air transport freight. Outbound tourism index confirmed the bidirectional causality relationship with air transportation, railways transportation, and travel and transport services, while the causality running from outbound index to trade factor, from air transport passenger carried to travel services, and from railway goods transported to trade and transport services, which support the unidirectional causality relationship between them. The variance decomposition results show that air transportation freight is the contributor that largely influences inbound-outbound tourism, while railways passengers carried and trade openness has the least share to influence inbound and outbound tourism index for the next 10-year period. The impulse response function indicates that air transportation, railways transportation, trade openness and travel services will positively impact on inbound truism while travel and transport services will positively affect outbound tourism for the next 10-year period. The study concludes with the importance of transportation sector that deem desirable to promote tourism worldwide. The concentration of different modes of transportation including air transportation, railways transportation, and travel and transport system would helpful to advance international tourism.     

Up in Smoke? The Impact of Smog on Risk Perception and Satisfaction of International Tourists in Beijing

This research explored the perceptions of on‐site international tourists towards the smog in Beijing. A scale measuring the degree of tourists' concern about smog conditions was developed. The links among smog concern, risk perception, trip satisfaction and destination loyalty were tested with a structural equation model. Direct relationships were found for the hypothesized effects of smog concern on risk perception and satisfaction. Further, the influence of risk perception on reducing satisfaction as well as the role of satisfaction in forming revisit intention (loyalty) was identified. The broad concerns of this study are applicable across all key Chinese tourism cities visited by international tourists. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Travel information online: navigating correspondents,consensus, and conversation

Travel information exists in paper guides, word of mouth, and countless websites. Organizing a trip has never been more accessible and simultaneously riddled with doubt. Professional journalists produce travel journalism while often anonymous reviewers on TripAdvisor provide their commentaries, and in between, there are blogs, wikis, tourism boards, vendors, and a host of other information sources available. How does the twenty-first-century tourist make sense of all of this information? Through a study of tourists in Paris, this study seeks to understand the methods and strategies that they employ in order to identify trustworthy and useful information. Interviews with a sample of travellers reveal that each person has his/her own unique process guided by their personal motivations, but they also share several practices along the way. This research reveals that tourists ultimately exhibit a multistep process of verification using both professional and non-professional sources. No one type of author or website appears to be a unique or singular influencer when it comes to primary or trustworthy sources. These findings will lead to larger discussions about destination management and transparent practices among information providers.     

Creative tourism and visitor motivation

Creative tourism has been explained as a new genre of tourism that offers the visitor an opportunity to develop their creative potential through an engaged experience in the destination visited. Despite a growing literature on the topic, little attention has been given to examining what motivates creative tourists to visit particular places and events. This paper aims to address this research gap by applying the push-pull framework to investigate the travel motivations of creative tourists. To do so, the responsive interviewing model was employed to survey 20 of such tourists who had visited creative spaces and spectacles in three of China's UNESCO-designated creative cities. Through a qualitative thematic analysis of the transcribed interviews, a new push-pull framework is introduced to conceptualise the travel motivations of creative tourists. Our paper concludes with practical considerations for destination managers seeking to design and market creative tourism experiences.     

Investigating the effects of a shared bike for tourism use on the tourist experience and its consequences

ABSTRACT

As public bike-sharing systems have been widely set up in cities around the world, a shared bike for tourism use can enhance tourists’ experience at destinations and lead to tourists’ post-visit evaluations. Thus, this research explores the attributional effects of the value of using shared bikes (namely, instrumental value and affective value) on tourists’ emotional experience (namely, hedonics and perceived uniqueness) as well as on satisfaction and destination loyalty. We obtain a sample of 302 tourists using shared bikes as transport modes during their visits to examine the proposed relationship model. Results show that both instrumental and affective values of shared bike use positively relate to hedonics and perceived uniqueness experiences. While both hedonics and perceived uniqueness have positive effects on satisfaction, only perceived uniqueness shows a positive effect on destination loyalty. The findings of multi-group analyses indicate that the direct effects of the tourism experience on destination loyalty are significantly positive for the low-motivation group but not for the high-motivation group. Empirical implications and recommendations for future research are also discussed herein.     

Gastronomy as a tourism resource: profile of the culinary tourist

The aim of this paper is to explore the characteristics and motivations of culinary tourists whose destination is the city of Córdoba (Spain) while attempting to determine whether gastronomy is an important aspect of the trip or if it is perceived simply as a secondary activity. Fieldwork was carried out among a series of restaurant establishments in the city of Córdoba. A demand survey was conducted in 10 particular establishments that were selected among those offering local dishes and which are regularly visited by tourists and the questionnaire was distributed among clients obtaining 206 valid answers. Our results reveal the strengths and weaknesses of Córdoba's restaurant sector. While 10% state that the cuisine is one of the main reasons for visiting the city, 68% believe that the local cuisine is an important but not an essential aspect of their trip and the rest view it as being secondary. These three types of tourists exhibit different kinds of motivation. This suggests that strategies should be designed and developed to promote gastronomy as one of the city's chief tourist attractions. Good tourism management based on initiatives such as the creation of culinary routes could be an alternative for implementing strategies aimed at the social and economic development and promotion of particular areas, for example turning typical food from rural areas in certain regions into a marketable attraction.     

A service position model of package tour services based on the hybrid MCDM approach

ABSTRACT

Traditionally, package tour (PT) agencies assumed that tourists only pay attention to the PT’s price, so PT service providers often offer limited package tours based on options and prices. Nowadays, PT service providers face the difficult challenge of how to offer diverse PTs to satisfy tourists’ needs based on a reasonable price. This study proposes an evaluation model of package tours based on diverse resources and transportation means. This study proposes a two-dimensional evaluation framework to analyse tourists’ needs regarding package tour services and the proposed model could be applied to plan mass customized package tours based on the portfolio of value satisfaction index (VSI) and the price satisfaction index (PSI). The study also proposes that mass customized package tours can improve the traditional tour planning method through a portfolio of diverse tourism resources. Moreover, the study integrates the different choices of traffic and transportation tools, as well as tourism resources and providers in six portfolios of package tours in the Nantou county of Taiwan. These six package tours can be planned through three traffic and transportation tools (tourist coach, railroad, and minibus) and four tourism resources (natural experiences, cultural exploration, shopping and cuisine, and event participation).     

Film-induced tourist motivations. The case of Seville (Spain)

Tourists' attraction to filmed sites has increased destination marketing organisations (DMOs) interest in film-induced tourism. Seville, Spain, has been the setting of many national and international film productions. Film tourism research has focused on impacts, travel preferences and destination choice, but there is a lack of research on motivations of film tourism. As a consequence, DMO actions in film tourism are often developed ad hoc, in an unplanned and opportunistic way without understanding the phenomenon. This research tries to fill this gap by focusing on film tourism in Seville in order to identify film tourists' motivations. Results identify film tourism activity and find five motivations of the film-induced tourist in Seville: film site experiences, fantasy, novelty, touring the film and personal film-location connection. Results show films add something valuable to destination experience (as a secondary or tertiary attraction). Destination managers should consider novelty factor as an element to enhance tourist experience, especially for non-European ones as well as for female tourists and tourist above 25 years, to motivate a slightly positive site experience.     

Independent tourist's automobilities in Norway

This paper critically examines the methods of transportation used by independent tourists and how importantly they value mobility throughout their journeys. While independent tourists are frequently identified as being adventurous and highly mobile, relatively few researchers have critically examined the modes of transport they use or the importance they play in enhancing and fulfilling their desired experiences. Indeed, most literature portrays independent tourists as habitual users of public transport as opposed to modes of personal transport. In this paper, the notion of automobility – a combination of autonomous and self-directed movement – is explored from the perspective of independent tourists in Norway. A multi-method qualitative study was undertaken which analysed the views of 38 independent tourists at eight different locations. The findings revealed that personal modes of transport were intrinsic features of the journeys undertaken and that they offered alternative sensory experiences in contrast to public transport. Moreover, for many independent tourists, autonomous journeys were considerably more important than the destinations they visited. Thus, for many independent tourists in Norway, demands for control, flexibility and adventure could only be satisfied by using particular modes of transport.     

Towards tourism: a Laotian perspective

This paper reports the findings of a study of the attitudes of residents towards tourism in the District of Viengxay, Lao People's Democratic Republic, where tourism is in its infancy. Based on focus group interviews, the paper analyses the societal and individual attitudes of the residents towards tourists, tourism development and employment in the tourism field. It was found that locals have little understanding of the motivations of tourists for visiting their villages. Villagers look forward to tourism development to bring more communication and fame to their village, as well as to tourism's contribution to the local economy. Community‐mindedness, control and organisation, cultural exchange, understanding and cultural awareness are prime motivators in forming local attitudes towards tourism. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Energy tourism: An emerging field of study

After conceptualizing the interrelationships between energy and tourism, the authors provide a definition of energy tourism as a new niche of industrial tourism, theorize on how it overlaps with other types of special interest tourism, and discuss specifics concerning its forms, locales, and possible societal impacts. Potential directions, along with research questions, for future research in the field of energy tourism are proposed. Then, the results of an explorative pilot study of energy tourism in the Czech Republic are presented to give a first insight into the proposed questions. Questionnaire surveys completed by tourists and operators of three energy tourism attractions – so-called Coal Safaris (guided tours through surface coal mines, observing minescapes and mining machinery in full operation), a nuclear power plant information centre, and Dragon Kite Festivals under wind turbines – have focused on exploring the motivations and perceived benefits of energy tourism for organizations; tourists' motivations for, and experience from, visiting; and any changes in attitudes towards current energy development dilemmas by visitors afterwards.     

Adventure tourist destination choice in Tanzania

It is said an adventure is an experience and experience is a part of expectations. Yet as adventure tourists expect unique experiences, certain ingredients of services (degree of satisfaction) affect their deeper needs to become attached to a place. Are such needs developed over time at a new destination? This paper suggests tourist behaviours and preferences towards destination choice change over time. The proposed model suggests that tourists’ expectations and motivation at early stages of planning affect satisfaction and level of perceived constraints, and these further predict place identity and dependence at the end of travel. As much as satisfaction arises from concrete services such as food and transportation services, constrained activities are expected to have a negativeconsequence on expectations and motivations. Since this paper is based on international adventure tourists, typically willing to take on calculated risks during their visits to Tanzania, we expect many of these hypothesised gaps to diminish as tourists become mature and aware of services offered at the destination. To test awareness and familiarity, we add different proxies for maturity (i.e. late stage of stay, repeat visitors and loyalty intentions) and awareness (i.e. tourists with escape motives) of services provided at the specific destination.     

Lessons from the field: reflecting on a tourism research journey around the ‘celtic’ periphery

The challenge within the tourism academy to acknowledge the situated nature of knowledge within the research process is intensifying. Drawing on a multidisciplinary body of reflexive narratives and recent work in tourism that acknowledges the personal influences that construct knowledges, this paper embraces this challenge by offering an autobiographic narration of field work in Ireland, Scotland and Cornwall. Food tourism is employed as a conceptual vehicle to pursue a more culturally focused, critical tourism investigation, thereby contributing to work that extends tourism research beyond the sphere of management and business. Drawing on research involving in-depth interviews with (food) tourists and participant observation, it is suggested that tourism knowledge is constructed at the micro-level, directly shaped by seemingly insignificant or overlooked moments. The paper illustrates how personal aspects of field work (gender, age, ethnicity, personal insecurity, loneliness and physical demands), combined with overcoming more practical issues (weather and transport logistics), should inform the contextual foundations of any empirical research; it from these moments where tourism knowledge is truly cultivated. Underpinned by qualitative methodological literature within a framework of critical realism, it urges others to embark upon a similar reflexive journey in order to develop tourism research into a robust sphere of academic enquiry.     

Visitor satisfaction with a key wildlife tourism destination within the context of a damaged landscape

Wildlife tourism is a growing industry globally and visitor satisfaction is vital to ensure its long-term sustainability. The Lower Kinabatangan River is a premier wildlife tourism destination that is affected by surrounding land uses and needs careful management to ensure it continues to provide positive wildlife tourism experiences. As little is known about the motivations and satisfaction of tourists with this experience, a visitor survey was conducted along the Lower Kinabatangan River with 346 surveys completed. The attribute ‘Interest in viewing wildlife’ had the highest mean level of importance and satisfaction (mean?=?4.54 and 4.1, respectively, on a 5-point scale). Respondents were very satisfied with their wildlife tour experience (85%) and would recommend the experience to their friends (87%). However, almost half of respondents (47%) felt more needed to be done to protect the Kinabatangan River and wildlife. Although respondents were satisfied overall with their experience, they also expressed concerns over the number of boats and the protection of the River. Comments focused on the presence of rubbish in the River, intrusion of oil palm and the loss of forest. Many issues are beyond the management realms of tour operators but will impact on the future of the industry.