Communicating Destination Social Responsibility Through Social Media: The Roles of Tourists’ Social Engagement, Citizenship Behaviors, and Emotions

Abstract

Social media is a particularly useful tool to promote sustainable tourism destinations. However, little is known about consumer engagement with social media communication in a destination social responsibility (DSR) context within the tourism industry. Grounded in the Stimulus-Organism-Response model, this study examines the factors that influence the intention to generate electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) on DSR issues through a specific social networking site. This research includes tourists’ social engagement, citizenship behaviors, perceived DSR, emotional responses to perceived DSR, and emotions toward a post as explanatory variables to investigate a specific behavioral intention as the outcome. The authors designed a study based on an online survey of Spanish Facebook users. Empirical testing confirmed most of the hypothesized effects except the influence of tourists’ helping behaviors on the intention to share the post.