The impact of customers’ prior online experience on future hotel usage behavior

Service experience model stipulates the importance of service experience in increasing satisfaction, price acceptance, revisit intentions, etc. It has been extensively tested and validated in hotel management studies. However, the online service experience which, in these days, precedes the physical service experience has not be considered together in most hotel service experience studies. In hotel management literature, studies on online experiences are largely segregated from physical service experience model. In this study, prior online experience model is proposed which includes online experience preceding the physical service encounter, and a survey is administered. Result indicates the strong influence of online experience as a leading construct of the service experience model in hotels. Online experience strongly conditions the customers’ perception of physical service experience and, also, provides good ground for price acceptance. Interestingly, the influence of physical service experience on price acceptance seems to be rather alleviated with online experience, indicating the important role the online experience plays in managing customer perception on hotel service experience. Hotel management needs to pay close attention to their customers’ online experience beyond simple esthetics as the online experience seems to influence all the subsequent components of hotel service model.     

The impact of the ‘Girls on the Move’ Leadership Programme on young female leaders’ self-esteem

Using findings obtained from an evaluation of the ‘Girls on the Move’ Leadership Programme in Scotland, this paper assesses the impact physical activity leadership courses and leading physical activities had on young women’s global self-esteem. While research has shown that engagement in youth development activities can contribute to an individual’s self-esteem, less is known about the impact of youth leadership on young people’s self-esteem. Based on pre-course and six-month follow-up surveys and using the Rosenberg self-esteem scale, it was found that increases in global self-esteem scores were highest in those that maintained an involvement in leading activities. The self-esteem of those attending training but not taking on leadership responsibilities remained largely unchanged. The findings indicate that youth leadership development has the power to make important contributions to the development of young people and youth development professionals should seek to provide meaningful leadership experiences for young people.     

The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on customer experience design: The hotel managers’ perspective

This research responds to calls for research on the devastating impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on the hospitality industry by investigating how hotel managers are designing safe customer experiences. Specifically, this study examines the measures adopted in high-end and luxury hotels and identifies the effects of such measures on the intended (or planned) experience. Based on thematic analysis of interviews with hotel managers, this study identifies seven safety measures: hygiene and protection, internal work reorganization, servicescape reorganization, investments in technology and digital innovations, customer wait time reorganization, staff training, and updated communication. These measures are expected to affect the intended experience in terms of reassurance, quickness, intimacy, and proximity, as emerged from correspondence factor analysis. Based on these results, this research proposes a model for safe customer experience design and suggests practical implications to help hotel managers formulate strategies aimed at customer experience creation under safe conditions.     

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 effect of compliments on customers’ compliance with a food server's suggestion

Research has shown that compliments addressed to customers by an employee have a positive influence on the customers’ tipping behavior. In this study, we examined whether compliments also enhanced patrons’ compliance with a food server's suggestion. First, a restaurant waitress took the customers’ order for the main course. Then, in the ingratiation condition, the waitress complimented the customer for his/her choice while in the no-compliment condition, she did not give any compliment. Finally, the waitress suggested a dessert to the patron. Results showed that the dessert suggestion was more readily followed in the compliment condition.     

Invisible pioneers? The impact of women on the recreation movement

Abstract

This article explores and describes the impact of women on the American recreation movement from 1900 to 1960. The theses that emerged in this article are that women were actively involved in the early and middle years of the movement, that their activities were different from men's activities and thus largely invisible as recorded in the history of the recreation movement, and that the social “ethic of caring” embodied the professional and volunteer activities that women undertook. These theses provided a transitional history about the women who were involved with the recreation movement in various capacities. Although notable women were identified through the data collection, it was the “collective biography” of the women in the field that provided the archetypical model that described the impact of women on the recreation movement.     

Travelers’ food experience sharing on social network sites

The proliferation of social media offers new avenues for understanding traveler information sharing behavior. The purpose of this study was to explore the patterns of traveler food sharing experiences on soial network sites, their triggers, and consequences as well as the inter-relationships among these factors. Thirty-three semi-structured interviews and subsequent thematic analysis revealed five major sharing motivation domains including Social and relational, Self-image projection, Emotion articulation, Self-archiving, and Information sharing, all of which were situated along the two continuums (self–others and psychology–functionality) of a two-dimensional plane. This research uncovers fresh insights that are unique to travelers’ food experience sharing and offers theoretical contributions as well as practical implications for destination marketers.     

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.     

Social servicescape’s impact on customer perceptions of the hospitality brand – The role of branded social cues

This research examines how the social servicescape (i.e., employee-customer, employee-employee and customer-customer) impacts brand-related outcomes via branded social cues. Informed by theories related to cue consistency and conceptual fluency, results from three experimental studies conducted across sectors and scales of hospitality businesses (i.e., luxury hotel, high-end restaurant and limited-service hotel), indicate that branded social servicescape cues have direct, indirect and interactive effects on brand-related outcomes. In luxury contexts, when the brand’s personality is absent in employee-customer social cues, the negative effects were buffered if brand personality is reflected in employee-employee social cues. Conceptual fluency mediated the relationship between branded employee-customer social cues and brand-related outcomes, which was moderated by branded employee-employee social cues. Conceptual fluency also mediated the relationship between branded customer-customer social cues and brand-related outcomes. This research sheds light on how hospitality firms can leverage branded social cues to enhance customer evaluation of the hospitality brand.     

The impact of exploitative leadership on frontline hospitality employees’ service performance: A social exchange perspective

Based on social exchange theory, we investigate the impact of perceived exploitative leadership on frontline hospitality employees’ service performance. A three-phase analysis of 207 supervisor–subordinate dyads from three hotels in China demonstrates that exploitative leadership has a negative effect on frontline hospitality employees’ service performance. Furthermore, leader−member exchange (LMX) plays a mediating role in the relationship between exploitative leadership and employee service performance. Moderated path analyses indicate that traditionality weakens the direct influence of exploitative leadership on LMX and an indirect influence of exploitative leadership on employee service performance through reduced LMX. We also discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.     

The impact of language style on consumers′ reactions to online reviews

The current research examines the novel impact of an online review's language style (figurative vs. literal) on consumers' attitudes towards a hotel and their reservation intention. Previous marketing research advocated for the use of figurative language to advertise hedonic consumptions. Yet, we found that, in the context of online hotel reviews, figurative language doesn't offer significant advantages in terms of persuasive power. Specifically, our findings indicate that, when a review is posted by a reviewer with low expertise level, consumers actually exhibit lower levels of attitude and reservation intention if the review is written in figurative (vs. literal) language. When the reviewer possesses high expertise level, the language style effect was attenuated. Finally, serial mediation tests show that the causal link between language typicality → perceived reviewer expertise explains the language style effect on consumers' pre-purchase evaluations.     

The effect of employees’ verbal mimicry on tipping

van Baaren et al. (2003) found that a waitress who mimicked their patrons by repeating their order received significantly larger tips. In this study, we tried to replicate these results by testing the effect of repetition after a delay between the customer's initial order and the repetition. A waitress was instructed to mimic or not half of their customers by repeating their order verbatim when she brought the order to the table. Mimicry increased the frequency in tipping and the amount of money left by the customers.     

The impact of uncertainty on tourists’ controllability,mood state and the persuasiveness of message framing in the pandemic era

Drawing on uncertainty theory, this study examines how to boost travel intention by analyzing the impacts of uncertainty on the effectiveness of destination marketing messages. Three studies (including four scenario-based experiments and five pretests) were employed to examine these impacts. Study 1 demonstrated that travel outcome uncertainty impacts travel intentions and revealed controllability and mood state as parallel and serial mediators. Study 2 showed that a combination of low (vs. high) uncertainty and gain (vs. loss) framing leads to higher travel intentions. The results further show that in the temporal distance condition, the effect of message framing is attenuated. Study 3 revealed that a combination of low (vs. high) uncertainty and hedonic (vs. utilitarian) attributes increased travel intentions. The research also provides practical implications for global tourism marketers to lower the uncertainty barrier.     

The application of Aristotle’s rhetorical theory to the sharing economy: an empirical study of Airbnb

ABSTRACT

Sharing economy businesses require extensive trust-based communication between users and service providers to facilitate users’ positive persuasion processes. Based on Aristotle’s rhetorical theory, this study identifies three key persuasive cues (credibility, emotional bonding, and accommodation characteristics) and validates their roles in establishing users’ trust in an Airbnb setting. The moderating role of interactivity is further analyzed. Research findings from a survey sample of 171 Airbnb users indicate that persuasive cues are positively associated with trust in Airbnb hosts, which significantly leads to Airbnb brand trust. Interestingly, the moderating role of interactivity is only found in the relationship between emotional bonding and trust in Airbnb hosts. This study contributes to a better understanding of the factors that affect users’ trust building in the sharing economy context, and it offers guidance for platform providers to better operate their businesses by highlighting the important roles of persuasive cues and interactivity in users’ trust-building processes.     

The impact of relational identity on the relationship between LMX,interpersonal justice,and employees’ group commitment

Lord and Brown (2004) have suggested that relational identity plays a boundary role in the relationship between leader–subordinate congruence (leader affective behaviors and interactive justice) and subordinates’ attitudes and behaviors. The purpose of this study is to test this hypothesis in the context of China's hotel industry. A sample of 585 questionnaires from 43 two-five star hotels in Mainland China was analyzed. The results show that the moderating role of relational identity was not significant, though it did have a direct effect on group commitment.     

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.     

The influence of travel photo editing on tourists’ experiences

Photo editing has become a prevalent practice when people share their travel photos on social media. This study examines this understudied phenomenon by exploring travelers' photo-editing behavior and its impact on tourists' destination experiences. Three pilot interviews and 23 in-depth interviews were conducted using photo-elicitation. The results show that photo editing does not necessarily alter the objective part of the trip memories, but rather reminds tourists of more positive than negative memories. Compliments from the social media audience on the edited photos improve tourists' overall recall of their destination experiences and further enhance their reflection on these experiences. The findings also enrich the understanding of the hermeneutic circle of representation in tourists’ photo editing behavior.