Personal values and travel motivations: the moderating effects of visit experience, gender and age

Abstract

Purpose

To understand differences in visitors' travel motivations, this study investigates the relations between personal values and travel motivations as well as the moderating effects of visit experience, age and gender on values–motivations relations among Australian visitors visiting Indonesia.

Design/methodology/approach

The multigroup confirmatory factor analysis (MGCFA) was performed using Analysis of Moment Structures (AMOS) to assess the constructs' validity across groups (potential vs repeat visitors; younger vs older visitors; male vs female visitors). A group model comparison thus was run in the multigroup analysis to test whether any differences in values–motivations relationships were significant across the groups.

Findings

This study shows that travel motivations are associated with values in a systematic way, and values–motivations relations can vary by age, gender and visit experience. Specifically, self-enhancement values are associated with escape-seeking motivation and conservation values are associated with assurance-seeking motivations. Whilst, there is no associations found between openness to change values and novelty-seeking motivations and between self-transcendence values and interaction-seeking motivations. Further, values influence travel motivations for potential but not repeat visitors and for younger but not older visitors.

Research limitations/implications

Tailoring marketing strategies to align with visitors' personal values and travel motivations is crucial. Further, acknowledging the moderating influences of visit experience, gender and age in values–motivations relations enables destination marketers to create more effective and targeted approaches for diverse demographic groups in marketing, promotions and destination development.

Originality/value

This study for the first time provides a better explanation on how the travel motivations are formed in relation to values, age, gender and visit experience.

Citation

Maghrifani, D., Sneddon, J. and Liu, F. (2024), "Personal values and travel motivations: the moderating effects of visit experience, gender and age", Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Insights, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/JHTI-07-2023-0458