Abstract
Understanding activity preferences and their antecedents is essential for creating personalized tourism offers and effective destination marketing, vital components of a sustainable tourism destination. Previous studies have provided insights into tourist behavior and activity choices, but without research on activity preferences and their relationship with perceptions of destinations. The literature still lacks an integrative model exploring the antecedents of activity preferences, including tourist characteristics, destination personality, and destination image, and explaining the nature of the relationships between them. This research proposes and tests a structural model of individual characteristics, destination image, destination personality, and activity preferences. A survey was conducted on a sample of 502 visitors to The Trail of Roman Emperors in Serbia. The results confirmed the influence of personality (extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, and openness) and destination personality (sincerity and ruggedness) on activity preferences. Additionally, the model revealed the significant influence of individual characteristics on perceptions of destination personality and image. Managerial implications were given in light of the importance of this research for destination branding that will support long-term destination sustainability.
Highlights
The choices of, and preferences for, activities during vacations, are an important aspect of tourist behavior
Understanding activity preferences and their antecedents is vital for creating personalized tourism offers [2,7] and as a basis for effective marketing campaigns [8]. which can help to support the sustainability of destinations
The fit of the model was estimated using the following indices: Sattora–Bentler χ2 (SB χ2 )—if insignificant the model has a good fit but as it is sensitive to the number of respondents, it is generally significant in a number of cases; Standardized Root Mean-Square Residual (SRMR), Root Mean-Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA)—SRMR and RMSEA should be less than 0.08 [106]; Comparative
Summary
The choices of, and preferences for, activities during vacations, are an important aspect of tourist behavior. They influence tourists’ experiences, their levels of satisfaction and their happiness with particular destinations [1]. For this reason, activities are a critical focus for planning and decision-making, and for managing tourism products, services and experiences [2] in ways that help to ensure the long-term sustainability of destinations [3]. Balancing the competing priorities of sustainability and increasing the economic value of tourism is a key challenge facing Destination Management Organizations (DMO) [5,6]. Understanding activity preferences and their antecedents is vital for creating personalized tourism offers [2,7] and as a basis for effective marketing campaigns [8]. which can help to support the sustainability of destinations
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