Abstract
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyse the impact of peacefulness in the tourists’ country of origin in their main decisions and behaviours when travelling internationally. Design/methodology/approach A sample of 600 international tourists from 49 countries was divided into five groups according to each respondent’s belonging to a country with a specific level of peacefulness, assessed by the Global Peace Index, to test differences in international travel decision and behaviour patterns. Findings Travel safety is a critical issue to most tourists, while the peacefulness level of travellers’ country of origin is an important key factor for understanding different travel behaviours and safety perceptions held when going on an international trip, namely, regarding involvement, risk and safety/insecurity perceptions. Research limitations/implications This is one of the few studies investigating the impact of peacefulness in the tourist’s country of origin on travel decisions and behaviours, based on the Global Peace Index. Additionally, this study responds to the call of the Prospect Theory regarding general consumption contexts, and adds to the Experiential Consumer Perspective, here applied to tourism consumption. Practical implications This study provides guidance to destination and tourism industry managers to attract and segment their market according to tourists’ country of origin, in accordance with its respective level of peacefulness as defined by the Global Peace Index, especially in destinations more affected by terrorism, war, political turmoil, crime and other safety risks. Originality/value No published study has tested the impact of peacefulness at home on tourists’ international travel behaviours and decisions yet.
Highlights
According to the International Institute for Peace through Tourism, founded in 1986, travel and tourism is the world’s first “Global Peace Industry”—“an industry that promotes and supports the belief that every traveller is potentially an “Ambassador for Peace” (D’Amore, 2009, p. 566). Apart from this belief and the research conducted on the existence of a causal relationship between peace and tourism (Litvin, 1998; Pratt and Liu, 2016), a question still remains: does peace lead to tourism or does tourism lead to peace instead? if there is a link between peace at tourists’ country of origin and tourism, how does it influence their behaviours and attitudes, attitudes towards risk in international travel?
The ten risk perception variables were all included in the analysis: financial, performance, physical, social, psychological risk, risk of time, risk ofsatisfaction, political instability/unrest, health and terrorism risk
Travel safety is a critical issue to tourists
Summary
If there is a link between peace at tourists’ country of origin and tourism, how does it influence their behaviours and attitudes, attitudes towards risk in international travel?. The research on tourism and peace started in the 1980s (D’Amore, 1988). There has been a new investment in the research attempting to assess the “possibilities for tourism to act as an agent for peace in post-conflict social reconciliation” The perspective that peace and “peacefulness at home” may lead to an increased predisposition for international travel, eventually associated with lower levels of travel risk perception, has been neglected in the literature. The question of how diverse levels of peacefulness at home may determine diverse travel risk perceptions and travel attitudes and behaviours has not been studied before.
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