Revisiting Attributes: How Important Is Green in the Consumer Selection of Hotel Rooms?

Consumers’ buying behavior is not always consistent with their positive attitude, particularly toward environmentally friendly products. In a survey of 197 travelers, the relative importance consumers ascribe to the attribute of green was assessed. Through a multi-methods study involving interviews, focus groups discussions, and forced-choice experiments that simulate market buying situation, it was found that consumers’ selection of hotel rooms is still much dictated by traditional choice factors. Through a conjoint analysis, it was found that consumers highly prioritized the price attribute. The green attribute was assigned a low relative importance of 4% among the respondents. Managerial and theoretical implications are discussed.     

Managers’ psychological diversity climate and fairness: The utility and importance of diversity management in the hospitality industry

ABSTRACT

Despite corporate investments in diversity management programs, there is a dearth in the literature that examines managers' attitudes toward diversity management practices. This is a glaring gap in the literature because the success of diversity management programs is highly depend on managers. A survey was distributed to hotel managers from properties in the southern United States. The results showed that psychological diversity climate predicted the perceived utility and importance of diversity management, and these relationships were mediated by the fairness of diversity management. These results suggest that psychological diversity climate has an impact on attitudes toward diversity management practices.     

What determines multinational hotel groups’ locational investment choice in China?

China's hotel industry has been developed quickly from a small number of 137 only in 1978 to 14,237 in 2009. One of the main drivers of the rapid development of the hotel industry has been the expansion of multinational hotel groups (MHGs) into China. The purposes of this study are to analyze the factors that determine the location strategies of MHGs and to assess what factors determine MHG's investment strategies in regard to choice of location. The study finds that the market demand and market size measured by number of inbound tourists, tourist spending, and actual foreign direct investment, the business environment measured by GDP per capital, and dummy variables measured by policy and mega events are all significant factors in affecting MHG's locational choices for investment. These findings may provide some insights for MHG's future investment strategies in regard to location choice.     

互联网对旅游目的地分销渠道影响——黄山案例研究

互联网的发展与应用对旅游目的地分销渠道产生了显著影响,传统旅行社的分销渠道功能发生变化,一些新的分销渠道如黄山的自助游服务酒店开始出现。关于互联网是否导致旅游分销渠道的"去中介化"和"再中介化"的争论成为学术界讨论的热点。文章以黄山为案例,以历时态的视角动态分析了互联网对黄山旅游目的地分销渠道的影响。研究发现,互联网使旅游目的地分销渠道更加多元化、网络化,目的地旅游分销关系、功能与结构等方面也发生了相应的变化,旅游者的主导地位增强,旅游中介的垄断地位相对减弱,但目的地的分销渠道"去中介化"与"再中介化"并未清晰地形成。     

组织学习对饭店持续创新能力的影响研究

在全球经济转型背景下,饭店为推动服务创新,满足顾客消费需求的多变性,越来越重视组织学习.文章以长沙、三亚高星级饭店为例,运用结构方程模型(SEM)进行了饭店组织学习对持续创新能力的影响研究,发现知识共享、知识运用、知识记忆对技术创新、制度创新和支持创新的影响较强,知识获取对制度创新和支持创新的影响较弱;饭店必须综合考虑知识获取、知识共享、知识运用、知识记忆等要素对服务创新的影响,才能有效提升饭店持续创新能力,保持领先的竞争优势.     

Application of the Theory of Planned Behavior to green hotel choice: Testing the effect of environmental friendly activities

The present study proposed and tested Ajzen's Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) model to explain the formation of hotel customers' intentions to visit a green hotel. The findings showed the TPB model has a good fit to the data and better predictive power for intention than the Theory of a Reasoned Action model. Based on theoretical support and suggested modification indices, a refined TPB model was developed. Consistent with the theory, the results of a structural equation analysis revealed that attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control positively affected intention to stay at a green hotel. Further investigation indicated the paths between these predictors and intention did not statistically differ between customers who actively practice ecofriendly activities and those who are not often engaged in environmentally conscious behaviors in their everyday lives. Implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.     

A stochastic cost efficiency analysis of international tourist hotels in Taiwan

The one-stage stochastic frontier approach (SFA) is used in this study to simultaneously estimate cost efficiency scores and factors of cost inefficiency for 66 international tourist hotels in Taiwan during 1997–2006. An SFA model with three outputs and three inputs is defined. The three outputs are room revenue, food and beverage revenue, and other operation revenue while the three inputs are price of labor, price of other operation, and price of food and beverage. This model also takes into account five environmental variables, including dummy variable of the hotels located in non-metropolitan area, dummy variable of chain hotels, the number of tourist guides, the minimum distance from each hotel to Taoyuan international airport and the minimum distance from each hotel to Kaohsiung international airport. Empirical results show that international tourist hotels in Taiwan are on average operating at 91.15% cost efficiency. All nominal variables are transformed into real variables in 1997 prices by GDP deflators. Chain systems, tourist guides, and international transportation can significantly improve the cost efficiency of international tourist hotels in Taiwan.     

Understanding the leadership perceptions of staff in China's hotel industry: Integrating the macro- and micro-aspects of leadership contexts

The objective of this paper is to understand the leadership perceptions of staff in China's hotel industry. This study integrates the macro- and micro-aspects of leadership contexts by identifying the contextual variables that affect leadership perceptions. In leadership research, industry setting, the hierarchical levels of an organization, and national culture are recognized as the contextual constraints that affect leadership perceptions, and these constraints were used in this empirical study. Four factors emerged from the factor analysis of a survey study: professionalism; integrity; masculinity or yang; and femininity or yin. A key finding indicates that both the industry setting and the hierarchical levels of an organization affect professionalism. Implications for the training and development of future international hospitality leaders and local staff are considered.     

北京旅游目的地形象的感知——中西方旅游者博客的多维话语分析

目前,很少有学者采用旅游者博客这一新兴的方式研究游客对旅游目的地形象的感知。文章选择中西方旅游者博客话语为切入点,从“文化繁荣”、“宜居和生态”、“现代化大都市”、“社会和谐”和“经济发展”5个维度探讨中西方游客对北京旅游目的地形象感知的异同,并讨论了两个不同旅游群体在文化背景、意识形态和消费水平方面的差异。最后,文章对如何提升来京中西方游客的体验评价提出了切实的建议。此研究意在强调旅游者博客在旅游目的地形象研究中的重要意义,同时亦希望能够对话语分析的跨学科发展作出贡献。     

国家形象与目的地形象：概念的异同和整合的可能

国家形象是国际商务和国际营销领域的重要概念,目的地形象是旅游领域的重要概念。在竞争日益激烈的全球化市场上,国家形象和目的地形象对于产品和旅游目的地获得竞争优势具有重要的战略价值。目前,国家形象和目的地形象研究基本上是独立的,文章在全面回顾两个领域最新研究进展的基础上,分析两概念定义、理论基础、形象主体和客体、形象内容等方面的异同;根据对国家形象、目的地形象与旅游研究中的其他社会心理变量之间关系的分析,提出整合这些变量的旅游意向模型以及相应的三个命题,以引导下一步的实证研究。