Tourist behavior research related to the COVID-19 pandemic published in English-language journals: A critical review and reflections
Received date: 2022-01-18
Request revised date: 2022-02-17
Online published: 2022-04-12
Copyright
Tourist behavior has long been one of the most researched themes in tourism literature. The COVID-19 pandemic has brought enormous strikes and challenges to the global tourism industry. Within this context, an increasing number of studies related to both tourist behaviors and the COVID-19 pandemic have been published in English-language journals. Despite critical discussions on COVID-19 related tourism studies on a whole, preceding review studies have largely failed to specifically and systematically assess the up-to-date progress of and substantive contributions made by COVID-19 related tourist behavior studies. Based on an analysis of 83 articles published in the top 8 SSCI listed academic journals in the field of tourism as of 31 August, 2021, the following conclusions are drawn. First, the extant studies could be categorized, according to their research themes, into four clusters, namely risk perception and travel intention, tourism decision-making, actual behaviors and experience, and attitude towards technology. Second, quantitative studies are dominant in article number, most of which are in favor of either questionnaire surveys or experiments. Third, with respect to substantive contributions, significant theoretical contributions are rarely made in the extant studies, most of which are found approaching solving real-world problems and/or depicting consumer phenomena, instead of building theories. Specifically, those sampled studies were using a theory (or theories) either to help develop hypotheses regarding the relationships between well-known concepts or to help describe and/or interpret an alleged novel consumer phenomenon. As such, it is suggested at the end of this article that future studies could benefit greatly from more rigorous conceptualization and theorization by using qualitative methods, big data techniques, and experiments in their excavation, identification, and confirmation of the uniqueness of the COVID-19 pandemic as a public health crisis as well as the associated distinctive tourism consumer phenomena. Further, indigenized tourist behavior research related to COVID-19, which is deeply rooted in the pandemic prevention and control practices and tourism development in China, should be highly encouraged.
CHEN Ganghua , LI Mohan . Tourist behavior research related to the COVID-19 pandemic published in English-language journals: A critical review and reflections[J]. ECOTOURISM, 2022 , 12(1) : 114 -124 . DOI: 10.12342/zgstly.20220012
表1 83篇论文在8种期刊的分布Tab. 1 The distribution of the 83 articles in 8 journals |
| 期刊 | 论文篇数 | 百分比(%) |
|---|---|---|
| 《Current Issues in Tourism》 | 28 | 33.7 |
| 《Annals of Tourism Research》 | 20 | 24.1 |
| 《Tourism Management》 | 13 | 15.7 |
| 《Journal of Travel Research》 | 9 | 10.8 |
| 《Journal of Destination Marketing & Management》 | 5 | 6.0 |
| 《Journal of Sustainable Tourism》 | 3 | 3.6 |
| 《Journal of Travel & Tourism Marketing》 | 3 | 3.6 |
| 《Tourism Management Perspectives》 | 2 | 2.4 |
表2 与新冠疫情相关的旅游者行为研究的主题Tab. 2 Topical themes of COVID-19 related tourist behavior studies |
| 主题 | 论文数量 | 具体话题 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 风险感知与出游意向 | 46 | 外部风险(19)* | 政府措施(5);社交媒体(2);大众媒体(2);安全与健康风险(8);假期(1);群体歧视(1) |
| 内部心理(10) | 度假意图(2);情感和认知风险(2);异我中心-自我中心(1);内部焦虑(1);个人控制感(1);感知不确定性(2);主观规范(1) | ||
| 人口统计学变量 (14) | 受教育程度(2);年龄(3);性别(2);职业(1);居住地址(1);;健康状况(1);婚姻状况(1) | ||
| 预测(3) | |||
| 对技术的态度 | 9 | 无接触服务(6) | 无人机(1);交互技术(1);服务机器人(1);自动驾驶技术(2);智能手机(1) |
| 虚拟旅游(3) | |||
| 旅游购买决策 | 28 | 目的地选择(15) | 目的地形象(4);目的地偏好(7)[类型化的目的地偏好(4);拥挤作为变量(2);疫情发生地(1)];与目的地有关的情感(4)[忠诚(2);依恋(2)] |
| 旅游产品购买决策 (13) | 退票与保险(3);疫情对住宿选择的影响(7)[P2P住宿(3);社交距离影响选择(4)];住宿(酒店)感知变化(2);机票购买(1) | ||
| 实际旅游中的行为与体验 | 13 | 社会交往(4);环保行为(1);自我保护行为(2);旅行有关的疫苗接种(2);旅行倦怠(1);路线选择(1);疗愈(2)[宗教旅游(1);户外休闲(1)] | |
注:* ()中的数字表示论文数量。 |
表3 样本论文(83篇)所采用的研究取向Tab. 3 Research approaches of sampled studies (n=83) |
| 研究取向 | 论文篇数 | 百分比(%) |
|---|---|---|
| 定量研究 | 65 | 78.3 |
| 定性研究 | 10 | 12.0 |
| 混合研究 | 4 | 4.8 |
| 概念研究 | 4 | 4.8 |
表4 单一数据来源的样本论文(70篇)的资料/数据来源Tab. 4 Data sources of sampled single-sourced studies (n=70) |
| 资料/数据来源 | 论文篇数 | 百分比(%) |
|---|---|---|
| 问卷调查 | 46 | 65.7 |
| 实验法 | 10 | 14.3 |
| 网络文本 | 5 | 7.1 |
| 二手统计数据 | 4 | 5.7 |
| 访谈 | 4 | 5.7 |
| 其他(餐厅历史数据) | 1 | 1.4 |
表5 有实质贡献的论文(72篇)的贡献类型Tab. 5 Types of contributions in sampled studies with substantive contributions (n=72) |
| 实质贡献类型 | 论文篇数 | 百分比(%) |
|---|---|---|
| S6(只是验证了变量之间的关系,并未对现有框架、概念做出重大改变) | 46 | 59.0 |
| S7(单纯应用现有理论,力图用现有理论解释新现象) | 13 | 16.7 |
| S5(只是引入/改变某个变量,并未对现有框架、概念做出重大改变) | 10 | 12.8 |
| S4(对原有理论框架中的已知变量/变量间关系做出重大调整) | 5 | 6.4 |
| S1(解决异常复杂的理论/实际问题) | 2 | 2.6 |
| S2(方法论创新) | 1 | 1.3 |
| S3(引入新的视角) | 1 | 1.3 |
中山大学旅游学院博士生史艳荣、新疆大学旅游学院硕士生张艳和温倩参与本文部分资料的收集和整理工作。
| [1] |
陈钢华, 孙九霞. 现代旅游消费者行为学[M]. 广州: 中山大学出版社, 2019.
[
|
| [2] |
|
| [3] |
|
| [4] |
|
| [5] |
|
| [6] |
|
| [7] |
|
| [8] |
|
| [9] |
|
| [10] |
|
| [11] |
|
| [12] |
|
| [13] |
|
| [14] |
|
| [15] |
|
| [16] |
程励, 赵晨月. 新冠肺炎疫情背景下游客户外景区心理承载力影响研究: 基于可视化行为实验的实证[J]. 旅游学刊, 2021, 36(8):27-40.
[
|
| [17] |
孙佼佼, 郭英之. 疫情防控中身体距离作用下旅游者幸福感影响路径: 基于模糊集的定性比较分析(fsQCA)[J]. 旅游学刊, 2021, 36(8):41-51.
[
|
| [18] |
程云, 殷杰. 新冠肺炎疫情是否激发了康养旅游意愿?一个条件过程模型的检验[J/OL]. 旅游学刊, https://doi.org/10.19765/j.cnki.1002-5006.2021.00.020
[
|
| [19] |
|
| [20] |
|
| [21] |
|
| [22] |
|
| [23] |
|
| [24] |
|
| [25] |
|
| [26] |
|
| [27] |
|
| [28] |
李想, 李咪咪. 全球疫情下旅游研究实践相关性的再思考[J]. 旅游学刊, 2020, 35(8):15-17.
[
|
| [29] |
陈钢华, 保继刚. 国外中国旅游研究进展: 学术贡献视角的述评[J]. 旅游学刊, 2011, 26(2):28-35.
[
|
| [30] |
李想, 陈钢华. 本土化研究的争议与边界: 兼论对中国本土化旅游研究的几点思考[J]. 旅游学刊, 2019, 34(10):12-20.
[
|
/
| 〈 |
|
〉 |