Broadening the Study of Tourism

Abstract

Following this introduction, this special issue includes five articles on the consumer psychology of travel and tourism behavior. Each of five papers contributes theoretically and empirically toward developing the field of tourism psychology and behavior. Each paper combines seemingly intuitively obvious propositions with unique insights resulting in deeper and more useful mental models of (1) the prior events and thoughts that drive tourism behavior, (2) thick descriptions of tourism consumption systems, and (3) the consequences of tourists' visits (e.g., perceived quality of the visit experience, satisfaction with activities experienced; intentions to return, post-experience, word-of-mouth, communications). This introduction champions the view that weak psychological ties stimulate or inhibit tourism behavior. Many of these ties are held unconsciously by consumers, and some ties may be retrievable automatically when thinking about a tourism-related activity. In most cases the presence of any one weak tie is necessary but not sufficient to result in a specific tourism behavior; the conjunctive presence of three or more antecedent events are observable. This introduction includes examples for German and British tourism behavior. Adopting such a view of tourism psychology and behavior may result in advancing a useful theory of travel and tourism marketing.