MOOCs in tourism and hospitality: a review

ABSTRACT

Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) have grown significantly and globally in less than ten years. However, practices and research in tourism and hospitality MOOCs remain nascent. This study proposes the MOOC Components Framework with six groups of course components: scaffolding, lectures, networking, collaboration, assessment, and affirmation. Drawing on this framework and a case study method, the study analyses 18 tourism and hospitality MOOCs from higher education institutions. The results highlight that: tourism and hospitality MOOC offerings lack diversity; the forum is the preferred communication tool; social media are comparatively underused; the discontinuity of MOOC instructors needs attention; and finally, littless multilingual support is available.     

The willingness of heritage tourists to pay for perceived authenticity in Pingxi,Taiwan

Authenticity plays an important role in heritage tourism. Previous studies have employed secondary data to assess the value of authenticity. This study goes further and empirically measures the intrinsic value of authenticity directly by integrating both qualitative and quantitative methods. The study was conducted in Pingxi, Taiwan and used open-ended questions to guide respondents to construct their own perceived authenticity. The respondents were asked whether they were willing to pay for what they had described. Four hundred and three valid responses were obtained. By using the dichotomous choice method and logistic distribution function, the willingness to pay (WTP) was estimated as NT$233. The study compiled 15 items to measure perceived authenticity based on previous literature and on-site visitor surveys. Three factors were derived by employing exploratory factor and confirmatory factor analyses. Discriminant analysis showed that intra-personal authenticity has a greater impact on WTP than object-related and inter-personal authenticity. This study might be the first empirical study to propose three independent concepts of authenticity, and to estimate the intrinsic value of perceived authenticity. The paper concludes suggestions that contribute both to theories of authenticity and applications by heritage management agencies.     

价值观与旅游消费行为关系研究进展与启示

价值观是影响旅游者消费心理和行为的重要因素.内隐性价值观与外显性旅游消费行为关系的研究路径可以归纳为"由内而外"(价值观→行为)和"由外而内"(行为→价值观)两种路径,不同研究路径的视角、目的和方法等存在一定差异.现有的价值观与旅游消费行为关系的研究成果,主要集中在旅游者价值观的界定和度量、旅游市场细分、旅游活动偏好、价值观对旅游消费行为影响等方面,并回顾了中国旅游者价值观研究.中国消费者价值观与旅游行为关系研究应具有中国情境化特征,理论建构要嵌入中国社会文化现实和具体消费情境,从主位研究视角发展旅游者价值观概念,将定量和质性研究方法相结合,增强价值观对旅游消费行为影响的解释力,加强对不同群体和区域消费者个人价值观与旅游行为关系的研究.价值观与旅游消费行为关系的中国情境化取向研究,有助于从价值观视角揭示中国旅游者行为的规律,为企业开展价值观驱动的旅游营销活动提供理论指导.     

基于《旅游学刊》关键词计量分析的旅游学科创新力及知识体系构建

既有研究有少量以关键词为研究对象来探讨旅游学科相关信息,然鲜见对学科创新力及知识体系演变与构建的研究。文章以《旅游学刊》2000—2014年载文的书写关键词为研究对象,运用文献计量可视化软件CiteSpace进行数据统计分析,结合内容分析,创新性地将学科创新力测评及知识体系演变结合研究。结果显示：（1）学科创新潜力、创新活力和创新保持力分呈变异V形和倒V形,除2000—2004年的创新潜力和创新活力变化稍大外,2000—2004年的创新保持力、2005—2009年及2010—2014年的各项创新力较为稳定;（2）学科知识体系演变由学科内容及方法的演变来展现,内容为数量-质量-精神层次的演变,方法为质性方法-量化方法-质与量结合的演变;（3）构建由研究内容、方法及目的3大部分组成的旅游学科知识体系框架。文章探讨以《旅游学刊》单一期刊为研究对象,理论建构依据的是“分析性归纳”,强调的是“典型性”,反映的是“高水准旅游学术刊物”这一同质化范围内。     

旅游产业融合、新业态与非正规就业增长:一个基于经验与概念模型的实证分析

旅游新业态是产品形态、组织形态和经营形态的融合.旅游产业融合催生了旅游新业态.旅游新业态是旅游非正规就业增长的源泉.文章实地调研了以新业态形式运作的酒店、旅行社和景点景区,发现旅游非正规就业在不同行业中普遍存在.为了验证这个假说,向前述三类不同的旅游企业发放了300份问卷,利用问卷形成的构念构建了一个经验模型,通过这个模型发现,旅游产业融合通过产品形态、组织形态和经营形态影响非正规就业.文章的核心观点有三个:第一,旅游产业融合催生了新业态,旅游新业态可以通过非正规就业带动就业总量增长.第二,旅游产品形态、组织形态各自单独并不影响非正规就业,它通过与经济景气度和企业成本交互作用对非正规就业产生影响.旅游经营形态既独立影响非正规就业,同时也和经济环境和企业成本交互作用影响非正规就业.第三,经营形态是旅游非正规就业的核心,在任何情况下,它都在5%水平上显著影响非正规就业.因此,在经济结构调整时期,政府部门应该重视旅游领域出现的各种新业态,新业态可能会改变就业模式.     

To go or not to go: travel constraints and attractiveness of travel affecting outbound Chinese tourists to Japan

The fast growth of the Chinese economy has transformed Chinese outbound tourism into one of the major players in the tourism industry worldwide. However, Chinese outbound tourists may still encounter travel constraints in some countries, such as Japan, which has had a close and complicated relationship in history with China. This study adopted the qualitative approach by applying focus group and in-depth interviews to investigate and triangulate the travel barriers affecting Chinese outbound travel to Japan. The findings indicated that domestic nationalist sentiment played a key constraining role in influencing Chinese outbound travel decision-making, followed by current political factors, while quality products and service, as well as social environment encouraged tourists to travel. This research also found that visitors and non-visitors have perception differences in terms of travel barriers and attractiveness of travel.     

基于旅游经历的目的地吸引力感知差异研究

关于旅游经历对旅游者目的地感知的影响,现有的研究文献从感知形象和感知价值等方面进行了探讨,但尚未出现从目的地感知吸引力角度进行的相关研究。目的地的初游者和重游者代表着两类具有不同旅游经历的目的地游客,本文的研究目的在于探讨二者对旅游目的地吸引力的感知及其差异。实证研究结果表明,目的地感知吸引力包含了整体环境吸引和观光体验吸引两个维度,重游者在整体环境吸引上的感知显著高于初游者,二者在观光体验吸引的感知上没有显著差异。     

Impact of financial/economic crisis on demand for hotel rooms in Hong Kong

The main objectives of this study are (1) to identify the factors that influence the demand for hotel rooms in Hong Kong and (2) to generate quarterly forecasts of that demand to assess the impact of the ongoing financial/economic crisis. The demand for four types of hotel room from the residents of nine major origin countries is considered, and forecasts are generated from the first quarter of 2009 to the fourth quarter of 2015. Econometric approaches are employed to calculate the demand elasticities and their corresponding confidence intervals, which are then used to generate interval demand predictions. The empirical results reveal that the most important factors in determining the demand for hotel rooms in Hong Kong are the economic conditions (measured by income level) in the origin markets, the price of the hotel rooms and the ‘word of mouth’ effect. Demand for High Tariff A and Medium Tariff hotel rooms is estimated to have experienced negative annual growth in 2009 due to the influence of the financial/economic crisis, whereas that for High Tariff B hotel rooms is thought to have grown in 2009 after having decreased in 2008. The demand for tourist guesthouse rooms is expected to be the least affected by the crisis. Overall demand is predicted to recover gradually from 2010 onwards.     

Assessment of the Partnership Quality between Travel Agencies and Health Care Organizations on the International Medical Tourism Market in Taiwan

The medical tourism literature lacks insight into related issues of these types of partnerships. Those that integrate multiple perspectives into one research framework are especially rare. This study evaluated and compared the influence of external environment uncertainty, trust, and resource dependence perspectives on the quality of interorganizational partnerships in the international medical tourism market and quantified these elements using external environment uncertainty assessment on the international medical tourism development. The research sample was based on a survey from 161 travel agency managers in Taiwan. This study found that external environment uncertainty has direct negative impact on trust and resource dependence has a positive influence on interorganizational partnership. Moreover, trust has a significant impact on partnership quality while resource dependence does not. Therefore, medical travel agents should extend their network of trustworthy health care organization partners in order to improve performance, decrease their self-risk, collect information, and avoid missed opportunities.     

倒边盖挖逆作法基坑支护结构可靠性分析

为了解决采用标准Monte Carlo法计算复杂基坑工程上常见小概率失效,导致计算效率低的问题,以南京市湖南路地下商业街工程为工程背景,首先,将随机响应面法与基坑工程三维模型相结合,求解极限功能函数的响应面方程,并用标准Monte Carlo法计算失效概率和可靠指标,探讨采用倒边盖挖逆作法作为基坑支护结构施工方法的可行性;其次,基于该响应面方程,以土体的弹性模量为随机变量参数,采用马尔可夫链蒙特卡罗子集模拟法(MCMC子集模拟法)计算基坑支护结构的失效概率,并与标准Monte Carlo法结果进行对比分析。结果表明：当支护结构最大侧移控制指标为25 mm时,计算得到的可靠指标均大于4.6,即采用倒边盖挖逆作法施工过程中基坑是安全的;10万次和50万次标准Monte Carlo法计算得到的失效概率均为零,说明对于标准Monte Carlo法,在计算小概率失效问题时10万与50万的样本量是不足的;而MCMC子集模拟法用2.98万个样本计算出的结果与标准Monte Carlo法采用100万个样本计算的结果相对误差仅为1.7%,表明MCMC子集模拟法对于小概率失效问题求解的优势。所提算法在一定...