Measuring E-Service Quality for Online Travel Agencies

Online travel agencies face intense competition, and thus have a great need to evaluate the e-service quality of their websites to succeed or even just to survive. The present study explores the underlying dimensions used by online customers to evaluate the e-service quality of online travel agencies, as well as the relationship of these dimensions to customer satisfaction and the repurchase intention, using both qualitative and quantitative data collection techniques. Six underlying dimensions of e-service quality are identified from the results of factor analysis; namely, Website Functionality, Information Quality and Content, Fulfillment and Responsiveness, Safety and Security, Appearance and Presentation, and Customer Relationship. Furthermore, four dimensions—Website Functionality, Information Quality and Content, Safety and Security, and Customer Relationship—are found to significantly influence online customers' evaluation of overall satisfaction and their repurchase intention. The results of multiple regression analysis show Website Functionality to be the most powerful factor in predicting customer satisfaction and the repurchase intention. Implications of the study findings are discussed, and important guidelines for the development of online travel agencies are provided.     

A Critical Investigation of the Bargaining Behavior of Tourists: The Case of Hong Kong Open-Air Markets

Shopping has long been recognized as an indispensable tourist activity. Hong Kong's open-air markets, where a multitude of bargaining activities can be observed, ranked as the second most popular of the island territory's diverse range of attractions in 2008 in terms of tourist arrivals. To develop cutting-edge marketing strategies that promote tourists' enjoyment of their bargaining adventure and ultimately enhance the overall shopping experience, the study reported in this article was aimed at identifying the dimensions underlying tourists' perceptions of the importance of 18 bargaining motivators and 12 bargaining attitudes and types of bargaining behavior, respectively, and subsequently evaluating the predictability of these underlying dimensions on tourists' shopping contentment indicators (overall bargaining satisfaction, the likelihood of a subsequent visit, and the likelihood of recommending open-air markets to others). A non-probability quota sampling technique was used to survey 203 Asian and non-Asian tourists in Hong Kong. A multivariate approach encompassing factor analysis and multiple regression was employed: Factor analysis delineated four underlying dimensions of factors affecting bargaining intentions. “Value for money” was shown to be the factor rated most important to tourists' bargaining intention; similarly, two underlying dimensions of bargaining attitudes and behavior—“bargain for psychological well-being” and “bargaining intensity”—were identified. Multiple regression results indicated the statistical significance of “bargaining for psychological well-being” and “bargaining intensity” to the existence of positive relations between shopping contentment indicators.     

Exploring the influence of media exposure and cultural values on Korean immigrants’ advertising evaluations

This study investigated how mass media exposure and cultural values influence Korean immigrants’ responses to models in print advertising. In a between-subject design, participants viewed advertisements featuring either Caucasian or Asian models. The results of structural equation modelling show that there are significant relationships between mass media exposure, cultural values, and attitudes towards advertising models. Media exposure and cultural values predict attitudes towards advertising models, such that Korean immigrants who are exposed to Korean mass media and demonstrate Korean values show positive evaluations of Asian models, whereas Korean immigrants who are exposed to American mass media tend to show positive evaluations of Caucasian models. Results are explained according to acculturation processes within the Social Cognitive Theory and Communication Accommodation Theory (CAT).     

Building entrepreneurial tie portfolios through strategic homophily: The role of narrative identity work in venture creation and early growth

In this article, we present the results of a case study of an entrepreneur who successfully founded and grew a venture underpinned by a portfolio of strongly homophilous, dyadic ties. Building on our case, we discuss how the entrepreneur strategically constructed these ties through a form of narrative identity work, explore the shared identity narratives that he used to do so, and highlight the heterogeneous nature of the resulting tie portfolio. We go on to explore the factors that motivated the entrepreneur to purposefully construct an entrepreneurial tie portfolio in this way. Building on our findings, we discuss the nature of narrative identity work and its role in creating homophilous ties, explore the connection between the resulting shared identity narratives and trust, and discuss the central role of values in strategic homophily.     

Facilitating the development of a global mindset through a cultural experience

The current article describes an assignment utilized in an undergraduate course “Leadership in a Global Society.” The assignment requires students to participate in a cultural experience and interview the leader of the event. Student feedback collected over several semesters indicates that the assignment was invaluable in helping students understand people from cultures different than the ones with which they normally identify. Furthermore, students reported gaining a better understanding of themselves and a willingness to seek out other cultural learning opportunities.     

The Changing Nature of Border,Scale and the Production of Hong Kong's Water Supply System since 1959

This article investigates the making of Hong Kong's water supply system since 1959. It starts by assessing the perspectives provided by the regime approach and the political ecology literatures. The case of Hong Kong brings in ideas from border studies and draws attention to the changing nature of the border to explain socio‐ecological and scaling interactions. The case study maps the border relationship between China and Hong Kong (and Britain), and the political tussle between them over the control of water supply to the city in the late colonial period 1959–78, which resulted in the creation of a localized self‐sufficient water supply system in Hong Kong, and the consolidation of Hong Kong's scale as a colonial city‐state under British rule. It further explicates the change in the nature of the political border since 1979, and the processes by which Hong Kong abandoned attempts to strengthen its local supply, becoming dependent on supply from the regional Dongjiang water networks, as well as the transformation of its scale to become a subordinate of the larger political unit in subsequent years.     

Object narratives and the enslaved at Sam Houston memorial museum

Objects offer an opportunity to narrate the past. Tourism scholarship has found that plantation museums in the American South give considerable attention to objects associated with the planter class to engage visitors with stories about them and their lifestyle. At the same time, museum stakeholders have cited a lack of objects associated with the enslaved as a barrier to greater representations of slavery. However, the concept of an interface object indicates objects can be used to make connections between things that are not intrinsic and to insert issues into stories that are told. These objects can even become charged with such issues. Using the case study of the Sam Houston Memorial Museum in Huntsville, Texas (USA), this paper considers the use of objects in narrating the past, particularly as it relates to slavery. It draws upon participant observation of guided tours and narrative analysis of the stories told about the enslaved on the Houston farm to consider how ordinary objects are used to incorporate slavery into the overarching museum narrative. Finally, the paper concludes that such objects are effective in initiating the conversation about slavery but are not sufficiently charged to facilitate a more meaningful engagement with the issue.     

Rethinking international subsidy rules

Geo-economic tensions, notably associated with the rise of China, and global collective action problems—climate change and the COVID-19pandemic—call for international cooperation to revise and develop rules to guide both the use of domestic subsidies and responses by governments to cross-border competition spillover effects. Current WTO rules dividing all subsidies into prohibited or actionable categories are no longer fit for purpose. Piecemeal efforts in preferential trade agreements and bi- or trilateral configurations offer a basis on which to build but are too narrow in scope. Addressing spillover effects of subsidies could start with G20 countries launching a work programme to mobilise an epistemic community concerned with subsidy policies, tasked with building a more solid evidence base on the magnitude, purpose and effects of subsidy policies. The need for such cooperation has become even more pressing by the COVID-19 pandemic and associated increase in the use of subsidy programmes in major economies.