Sarah Gardiner

Travel Decision Making An Empirical Examination of Generational Values, Attitudes, and Intentions

Underpinning generational cohort analysis is the notion that the formative experiences of each cohort influence its members’ lifelong beliefs, values, and behavior. However, previous studies have failed to verify this notion. This study is the first to do so, showing that memories of the formative years influence a generational cohort’s present-day travel decision making. Focus groups and an online survey of Australian Baby Boomer, Generation X, and Generation Y consumers provided data for the development and testing of the model presented here. Structural equation modeling shows the proposed model is robust, substantiating the importance of formative referents influencing salient referents, value perceptions, and attitude and intention to travel. This study provides a theoretical foundation for future research on this topic, highlighting the importance of considering a travel segment’s generational perspective when designing a marketing strategy.

The Generation Effect The Future of Domestic Tourism in Australia

An understanding of generational shifts in tourist behavior facilitates the effective prediction and accommodation of future tourism trends. Such predictions are important if the Asia-Pacific region is to reach its tourism potential. This study investigates the domestic travel motivations of 632 Australian Baby Boomer, Generation X, and Generation Y travelers to uncover each generational cohort’s travel mindset. Specifically, it considers how the sociohistorical environment when its members “came of age” during adolescence (i.e., thus creating a generation), create a unique lifelong perspective that influences both current and future tourist behavior. Although the survey results show that the travel decision-making process is similar across cohorts, model comparisons reveal generational differences. This study advances the theoretical understanding of the implications of generational perspectives on future travel behavior and provides foresight into demand factors that will drive future travel growth in the Asia-Pacific region and particularly growth in domestic leisure travel by Australians.

The travel behaviours of international students: nationality-based constraints and opportunities.

International students represent a large and potentially lucrative market for various sectors of the tourism industry. Although previous empirical studies have examined this topic, most treated the market as homogeneous and small sample sizes have been the norm. The present Australia-based study represents the first large-scale investigation of the travel activities of international students. The large sample size (N = 4633) has allowed the researchers to identify nationality-based differences between international student travel behaviours and the factors that constrain their travel. The approach that has been adopted extends theoretical and applied understanding of this important tourism market and informs how tourism industry leaders may capitalise on the opportunities by undertaking initiatives, such as innovative tourism marketing, product development and packaging initiatives.

Chinese Participation in Adventure Tourism A Study of Generation Y International Students’ Perceptions

This study explores Chinese Generation Y’s perceptions of adventure tourism experiences and their reasoning in deciding to participate. Focus group interviews reveal that Chinese youths have a unique generational sociocultural perception of participation in adventure activities. Much like their Western counterparts, members of China’s Generation Y want to experience the freedom of international travel that enables self-development and maturity, but they also have a strong sense of familial obligation and distinctive cultural beliefs that underpin their consumer decision making. Safety concerns of both the young people and their parents, along with self-efficacy beliefs regarding their physical ability to participate in the experience, can also reduce their likelihood of participation in adventure activities that they consider to be too risky or physically challenging. The study emphasizes that the design and marketing of adventure experiences must consider the unique Chinese generational psychology of this cohort and has implications for practice and future research.

Is the Australian domestic holiday a thing of the past? Understanding baby boomer, Generation X and Generation Y perceptions and attitude to domestic and international holidays

This study adopts a generational perspective to understand the shift in domestic and international travel motivations of Australians. In consideration of the largest and most dominant travel consumers at present, the Baby Boomer, Generation X and Generation Y cohorts, the study reveals significant differences between the cohorts’ value perceptions, attitude and intention associated with domestic holidays. However, the findings revealed no significant differences between the cohorts in Australians’ value perceptions and attitude towards international holidays. The study offers important insights for destination marketers seeking ways to address changes in tourism demand from a generational perspective, particularly those seeking to target the Australian tourism market.

Cognitive psychology and tourism research: state of the art

Purpose This review aims to discuss concepts and theories from cognitive psychology, identifies tourism studies applying them and discusses key areas for future research. The paper aims to demonstrate the usefulness of cognitive psychology for understanding why tourists and particularly pleasure travellers demonstrate the behaviour they exhibit. Design/methodology/approach The paper reviews 165 papers from the cognitive psychology and literature regarding pleasure travel related to consciousness, mindfulness, flow, retrospection, prospection, attention, schema and memory, feelings and emotions. The papers are chosen to demonstrate the state of the art of the literature and provide guidance on how these concepts are vital for further research. Findings The paper demonstrates that research has favoured a behaviourist rather than cognitive approach to the study of hedonic travel. Cognitive psychology can help to understand the mental processes connecting perception of stimuli with behaviour. Numerous examples are provided: top-down and bottom-up attention processes help to understand advertising effectiveness, theories of consciousness and memory processes help to distinguish between lived and recalled experience, cognitive appraisal theory predicts the emotion elicited based on a small number of appraisal dimensions such as surprise and goals, knowledge of the mental organisation of autobiographical memory and schema support understanding of destination image formation and change and the effect of storytelling on decision-making, reconstructive bias in prospection or retrospection about a holiday inform the study of pleasurable experience. These findings indicate need for further cognitive psychology research in tourism generally and studies of holiday travel experiences. Research limitations/implications This review is limited to cognitive psychology and excludes psychoanalytic studies. Practical implications Cognitive psychology provides insight into key areas of practical importance. In general, the use of a cognitive approach allows further understanding of leisure tourists’ behaviour. The concept of attention is vital to understand destination advertising effectiveness, biases in memory process help to understand visitor satisfaction and experience design and so on. Use of cognitive psychology theory will lead to better practical outcomes for tourists seeking pleasurable experiences and destination managers. Originality value This is the first review that examines the application of concepts from cognitive psychology to the study of leisure tourism in particular. The concepts studied are also applicable to study of travellers generally.

The spirit lives on : the legacy of volunteering at the sydney 2000 Olympic Games

This study examines the volunteer legacy of a mega-sport event. An online, qualitative, open-ended questionnaire (n = 15) and in-depth interviews (n = 10) were administered to and conducted with Sydney 2000 Olympic volunteers to ascertain the legacies that exist at least 10 years after the completion of the event. The results show that the legacy of the Olympic volunteer experience includes the starting and/or rekindling of a volunteer career, the development of a unique set of skills and abilities, and nostalgia for the atmosphere of the Games with a special emphasis on the ideals of Olympism. The legacy has been perpetuated via formation of a group of volunteers soon after the Games as well as through the use of memorabilia along with sharing stories and expertise on the volunteer experience. The findings provide valuable insights for those seeking to recruit and retain volunteers as well as those who are concerned with developing event legacy strategies to leverage volunteer efforts.

Challenging the use of generational segmentation through understanding self-identity

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore congruency between the self-identity of Baby Boomer, Generation X and Generation Y consumers with the generational label and popularised identity of each generational cohort. Design/methodology/approach – Data were collected using a mixed methods approach of focus groups (n=49) followed by an online survey (n=627) of Baby Boomer, Generation X and Generation Y consumers. Focus group data were thematically analysed. Descriptive, ANOVA and factor analysis was conducted on the survey data. Findings – The results show that most consumers only have a vague association with their generational label and profile and find it easier to characterise generations that are different to their own. Generation self-identity congruency is greater among members of the Baby Boomer cohort compared to the younger generations. Yet, even in the Baby Boomer cohort, generational identity is not homogenous among its members. Practical implications – The results challenge the explicit...

Attention, emotion and hedonic service experiences: Managing and delivering services in the Asian Century

Purpose – This paper aims to address the central guiding questions: What principles of services management need urgent re-thinking in the Asian Century? What opportunities and challenges lie ahead? Design/methodology/approach – This paper provides a review of relevant literature on hedonic consumption and related issues of emotion, attention, mental time travel and, importantly, how these phenomena may be measured. Findings – The paper addresses this question from a psychological and customer perspective. Services managers are well-positioned and have a great future for two reasons. First, services in general are the growing part of the global economy. Second, services managers provide the experiences required by increasingly affluent consumers. On the other hand, there is in general within the services sector, a lack of knowledge and expertise in understanding the consumer psychology of hedonic consumption. Additionally, and especially in Western countries, there is lack of knowledge about the cultural d...