Examining Japanese tourists' US-bound travel constraints

Abstract

Most studies on travel/leisure constraints to date were conducted in Western countries under a Western-centric research paradigm. It is not clear whether people from non-Western countries, such as Japan, face different outbound travel constraints. It is also not clear whether constraints research in a non-Western context will generate results that are consistent with what has been documented in the literature. This study focused on Japanese travellers' US-related travel constraints. The data were drawn from an online panel survey on 1200 recent and potential Japanese outbound travellers. Four categories of constraints emerged in this study: personal preferences, psychological concerns, cost concerns, and accessibility issues. In addition, this study revealed that Japanese tourists with different socio-demographic characteristics faced diverse US-bound travel constraints.