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Contemporary Tourist Behaviour
Yourself and Others as Tourists
David Bowen
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eBook - ePub
Contemporary Tourist Behaviour
Yourself and Others as Tourists
David Bowen
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About This Book
This fully updated edition responds to themes emerging over the decade since publication of the first edition and transmits the content into the 2020s. The themes include technological change, ethical consumption, and the tourist response to health risk, political instability and other uncertainty. Examples are introduced from all parts of the world, capturing the explosion of research on tourist behaviour, to produce a text that is strong both on theory and practical application.The second edition: - Compares classic and contemporary studies.- Evaluates recently emergent themes.- Discusses worldwide examples.- Contains extensive use of figures/tables and full colour photographic images.This is the go-to text for students and academics interested in tourist behaviour both from within the tourism field and from other fields and disciplines.
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1 Backdrop
As a follow-on from the Prologue, this chapter will provide a backdrop to the remaining chapters. After an initial overview of contemporary challenges, particularly natural disasters including pandemics, growth in tourism and tourists, and destination competitiveness, the chapter introduces some tourist fundamentals and also gives prominence to tourists and time.
Contemporary Global Challenges
Tourists operate within a political, social, economic and environmental system with a number of identifiable, ongoing challenges. These are frequently ignored in studies of micro-level tourist behaviour (Wong et al., 2018). A list of contemporary global challenges for tourism is presented in Fig. 1.1. The list is drawn from a variety of sources such as academic articles, practitioner reports and other publications, mainstream media commentary (newspapers, radio, TV) and tourist social media. It is positioned here, even before a customary starter section on definitions, because the big picture is vital. It is important to place due emphasis on specific elements of tourist behaviour (e.g. motivation, satisfaction). However, it is good to remember the wider challenges within which tourism operates.
The top three challenges within Fig. 1.1 are expanded below in this chapter. The choice of global challenges is arguable. Tourism forums debate such lists, sometimes with rather too much vigour. The first challenge, natural disasters including pandemics, was moved after January 2020 to first position, as the extent of lockdown from Covid-19 became apparent, first in China and then beyond. That is despite a view that in the medium term (1–5 years), as a vaccinated post-pandemic world moves forward from Covid-19, the consequences will shape rather than shift change. In due course the lead challenge will slip back down the list, just as challenges in previous lists have done so over time.
The second challenge, growth in tourism and tourists, and the third challenge, destination competitiveness, have taken on some extra shades of meaning with the ramifications of Covid-19. All of the other challenges are introduced elsewhere in this volume, sometimes in detail (see, for example, Chapter 5, ‘Technological Change’, this volume) and sometimes as a shorter interlude (see, for example, political instability, Chapter 8, ‘Fear’, this volume). Each challenge will, of course, have a more local twist. The effect of climate change on tourists in the mountains of Chile is different from the effect on the coasts of Sri Lanka.
For balance it is worth scrutinizing other listings of global challenges. Consideration is drawn here to Von Bergner and Lohmann (2014). Through use of a Delphi survey with 16 tourism experts they ranked 21 of the most prominent challenges through to 2020 as perceived in the period November 2010 to April 2011. Additionally, they created an overview in the form of five meta-challenges. Even taking into account the changes wrought by the subsequent decade, and particularly Covid-19, the list of five meta-challenges deserves reflection (Fig. 1.2). They infuse this volume at many points.
Von Bergner and Lohmann (2014, p. 429) suggest that their challenges provide a strategic road map for businesses and organizations by asking ‘What does this mean for me/my organisation?’ In the context of this volume the challenges in Fig. 1.1 and Fig. 1.2 can be reframed as ‘What does this mean for me as a tourist?’ or ‘What does this mean for contemporary tourist behaviour?’
Natural disasters including pandemics
Natural disasters have long had an influence on tourism and tourist behaviour. As the full scale of Covid-19 emerged there was much ongoing conversation about its influence as countries and regions slipped in and out of lockdown. Academics, providers and tourists all had their views. In the initial flurry of academic publication two possibilities were prominent, which can be summarized as shaping (modification) and shifting (radical transformation) (Hall et al., 2020; Gossling et al., 2021).
The evidence for modification was based on the relatively fast recovery and eventual maintenance of the political, social, economic and environmental status quo from other natural disasters, e.g. from the Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004. The tsunami affected many countries, with a heavy overall death toll, variously estimated at around 225,000 people, and destruction of tourism and other infrastructure in a wide range of countries including Indonesia, Maldives, Sri Lanka and Thailand. Destination image was also damaged.
Fig. 1.1. Contemporary global challenges for tourism.
Fig. 1.2. Meta-challenges for global tourism. (From: Von Bergner and Lohmann, 2014, p. 428.)
Evidence for radical transformation was based on the perceived opportunity provided by the pandemic to fast-track a wishlist for change, principally derived from the sustainability movement, including reference to negative perceptions in the way that tourism and tourists influence economic, social and environmental structures within destinations. In response to those impatient for disruption and change, experienced academics and also organizations such as the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), which traditionally takes an advocacy role, called for reflection. One such response from McKercher (2021) examines outbound tourism demand from 49 economies severely impacted by various crises, not just natural disasters, since 1995. He evidences much destination resilience and suggests that the rate of recovery may be rapid depending on government policy, rebounding consumer confidence and technological change. However, he also adds a note of caution. Pent-up demand may be far delayed and Covid-19 may be different in its impact from what has gone before.
The role of health as a contemporary global challenge and health fears in tourist decision-making are placed in a wider context than just Covid-19 in Chapter 8, ‘Fear’, this volume. Another potential natural disaster that some argue is greater than Covid-19 is the declared worldwide climate emergency with related changes in biodiversity. Climate change is considered within the framework of a sustainable approach to tourism in Chapter 6, ‘Ethical Consumption’, this volume.
Growth in tourism and tourists
Antonescu and Stock (2014) reflect on the change in tourism’s spatial patterns since the beginning of the 19th century and the emergence of a double-sided globalization, with both a global system of interconnected tourist places and the touristification of those places through exposure to a tourist gaze (see Chapter 11, ‘In-Visit Experience’, this volume). The fundamental big picture of growth in tourism and tourists following the end of World War II was almost a constant until Covid-19. The overall trend for the number of international arrivals since 1945 was one of year-on-year growth, except in 2001 following the 9/11 attack in New York, which led to a drop of 1%. One billion international arrivals were first reported in 2010. Prior to Covid-19 there were some potential caveats to a prediction that the future of tourism suggested more growth (see, for example, Chapter 6, ‘Ethical Consumption’, this volume, or Chapter 8, ‘Fear’, this volume). Song et al. (2018) in a review of tourism and globalization identify disruptors to continued growth. They include pressure group movements for greater environmental sustainability, which by 2020 included multiple new groups formed to influence perceptions of the worldwide climate emergency. Song et al. (2018) also warn of future economic shocks, such as those following the 2008 financial crash in the USA that created weak business and investor confidence, high levels of public debt and borrowing, and a decade of government austerity programmes. However, the summary data from World Tourism Barometer in November 2019 (UNWTO, 2019) was striking, less than 1 month before Covid-19 became global knowledge. Since the headline figure of 1 billion international arrivals in 2010, more or less unrelenting growth led to a global arrivals figure of 1.32 billion in 2017 and 1.40 billion in 2018. The figures for international arrivals in 2019 reached 1.46 billion (UNWTO, 2020a). Overall there was growth at 4% or above over 10 consecutive years. There was mixed growth performance reported by regions and it was stated that global economic slowd...