Advances in Hospitality and Leisure: Volume 11

This research aims to explore the differences in destination image owing to culture and travel distance among international tourists to northern Norway. A self-administrated survey with a structured questionnaire is deployed at North Cape – the most popular Arctic destination in Northern Norway. Concerning cultural influences on destination images, this study examines the similarities and differences in perceived images among seven cultural groups. For evaluating geographic influences, this study uses six travel regions distinguished by the distance of travel to the study site as the base for the data analysis. Similarities and differences in destination imaged owing to above two factors are revealed by correspondent analyses. For example, Reindeers and Northern Light are the two greatest reflections of Northern Norway in the mind of all respondents. Misconceptions on tourism offerings in the study region transpire among the Japanese. Lastly, this study suggests that the distance of travel may evoke a moderating effect on the destination images. That is the farther the distance traveled the further image distortion exhibited.

This study attempts to investigate how electronic Word-of-Mouth (eWOM), consisting of (1) opinion seeking, (2) opinion giving, and (3) opinion passing, influences consumers’ purchasing intentions for tourism services on Social Networking Sites (SNSs). Two hundred and seventy three American college students participate in a self-administered survey concerning their use of SNSs and ways of making online recommendations. Based on four hierarchical regression analyses, this study finds that both opinion seeking and opinion passing significantly influence respondents’ purchasing intentions. Additionally, time spent on SNS use reveals a positive relationship with opinion seeking and opinion passing. The conclusion of the present study highlights the eWOM as a cost-effective communication tool for tourism marketing and renders practical and theoretical implications along with suggestions for future research.

Swimming is a popular holiday activity in tropical tourism destinations but is not risk free. Aside from the obvious risks of drowning, tropical waters harbour a number of marine animals that have the potential to injure or even kill unwary swimmers. Sharks, marine jellyfish and crocodiles may pose threats. From a destination perspective, strategies need to be implemented that firstly reduce the risk of injury and secondly care for swimmers who are injured. This paper first reports on the results of a survey of swimmers that examines a range of swimming-related behaviours then proposes an action pathway model that may be implemented by destinations to reduce risk for swimmers.

The theory of planned behavior (TPB) and place image have both been the foci of studies in understanding one’s intentional visit behavior in leisure research. Few studies, however, have ever attempted to differentiate the roles of attitude and image in predicting visitors’ intentional behaviors. This study is designed to fulfill this gap by examining the two concepts together in the context of responsible casino gaming. Based on the TPB and the concept of place image, a predicting model of visitor’s intentional behavior was posited and tested, based on a survey dataset collected in an American Midwest city. This study concluded that visitor’s attitude and perception of place image both play significant and distinctive roles in predicting visitor’s intentional behavior, and such perceptual discrepancies between attitude and image should be reflected and highlighted in leisure and marketing. Implications of this study in terms of leisure marketing are discussed.

SNS, namely social networking sites, has become one of the most effective and fast channels of information diffusion and dissemination. As an influential way of online marketing, SNS has been increasingly used by tourism organizations and enterprises to shape their destination image. On the basis of previews literature of destination image and SNS, this paper used the text analysis software ROST Content Mining (ROST CM) System to do a case study of the SNS destination marketing of Singapore on Chinese market. The authors analyze the text related to Singapore tourism on the major SNS in mainland China: Renren, Sina Weibo, and Douban, through word frequency analysis and the social semantic network, to summarize the destination image of Singapore on SNS. The paper also focuses on the difference of image building by official and individual SNS. Results found by this paper can be used by the relevant tourism organizations and enterprises to improve their destination marketing and image building on SNS channels.

This study re-evaluates the criteria in the choice of exchange partners from the buyer’s and seller’s perspective within the context of inclusive tour production and reveals priorities to such criteria among the business actors, providing theoretical frameworks for a wider understanding of the criteria within a tourism context. The study is based on a study of cooperative relationships between European tour operators and Norwegian sub-suppliers. It deploys a qualitative research approach (personal interviews) inspired by grounded theory. The resultant data present critical three consideration embracing (1) market capacity (its ability to acquire customers), (2) purchase price and the attaching conditions and (3) confidence/reliability as criteria of selecting the exchange partners. Lastly nine future agendas are suggested in a bid to theory development.

This study investigates the impact of tourists’ perception of consumer-generated content (CGC) on their travel behaviors. Online questionnaire survey was conducted on the clients of travel agency along with onsite interviews of visitors at several busy tourist destinations/spots in Taiwan including Alishan, Sun-Moon Lake, and airports. In total 316 responses were generated. The findings indicate that usability of social media is the strongest factor that contributes to respondents’ perceived functional and hedonic quality. Functional quality of social media then draw respondents’ awareness that eventually increases their intention to visit a destination of interest. The results also indicate that functional quality is more important than hedonic in terms of increasing the propensity of using social media.

Tourism is one of South Africa’s fastest growing sectors. Pro-Poor Tourism (PPT) is an approach to tourism development that results in increased net benefits for poor people. It enhances the linkages between tourism businesses and poor people, so that tourism’s contribution to poverty reduction is increased. The South African Township Tourism Organisation tries to implement PPT by providing tourists with the chance to learn about the country and its history in an authentic way. The authors took a sample of Tour Operators registered with Tourism South Africa in Cape Town, Johannesburg and Pretoria that include the two biggest townships Khayelitsha and Soweto. They used in-depth interviews to identify the kind of tours offered and the extent to which local communities are involved in and benefit from these tours. Results show that in terms of direct poverty alleviation township tourism is considered to be only moderately successful. The tour operators emphasised the need for more social investment and for local government to play an active role in encouraging the employment of more local people.

The present work studies hiking as tourist activity and its physical and mental benefits for the tourist. In particular, the study explores the relative importance of these benefits among the hikers and compare the importance with the tourists’ perceived experience, that is evaluation of the benefits. Building on the perception, performance and perceived quality and benefit literature a survey is carried out at different hiking sites in the southern part of Norway. The study results show that hiking tours in Norway perform rather well on factors such as physical benefits, mental benefits, facilitation of trail and slightly lower on information. Physical benefits are of higher importance than information and are also perceived to provide benefits in line with the importance given. Facilitation of trail is perceived to be of relatively high importance and the actual experience is rated higher than importance. Mental benefits is rated to be of most importance among the attributes. The tourists evaluate mental benefits to be somewhat lower than importance given. Subsequently, practice should focus on how to ensure mental benefits among hikers and research should seek to understand what this actually means in terms of new logics in tourism, that is experience value and the tourist own role in creating such value.

Mergers and acquisitions are frequent occurrences in the world of business. While a merged firm may convert an acquired asset to other brands, the restaurant industry tends to acquire the same brand name and does not change the name of the acquired assets. Acquisitions can prove to be a risky proposition in any industry. This study attempts to determine if a product-diversified acquisition in the restaurant industry is a value-creating decision. By comparing focused and diversified acquisitions, we try to find if focused acquisitions create value and that diversified acquisitions do not. Our initial expectation was that focused acquisitions create more shareholder value. We find that both focused and diversified acquisitions make significant positive abnormal returns for acquirers.