2.1. Tourism Experience Memory
Memory is the accumulation of people’s impressions of activities and behaviors that have experienced in their minds [
6]. In the case of tourism experiences, both the expected and on-site experiences are stored in the mind of the tourist in the form of memories, referred to here as tourist experience memory, which may gradually disappear spontaneously or due to interference factors, or may be strengthened continuously by stimulus factors. When tourists are faced with a travel decision again, their stored experience memories from past travels will be extracted in an orderly manner, causing them to recall the unique feelings experienced previously. Here, they may rely on those experience memories to make their destination decision [
7,
8]. Therefore, only when the tourist experience is transformed into a tourism experience memory that is deeply remembered by the tourist, can the tourist’s behavioral intentions, such as revisiting the destination or recommending it to someone else, be affected [
9]. Tourism experience is the accumulation of individual tourists’ experiences—based on emotions and occurrences—during their tours. Not all tourism experiences will be vividly and permanently remembered by tourists [
10]. Kim pointed out that memorable tourism experiences are more likely to stimulate the formation of flashbulb memories of tourists, which are characterized by brightness, accuracy, and persistence [
11]. Based on the results of Kim et al.’s research [
12], this study defines the vivid long-term memories formed by the memorable tourism experiences of tourists as tourism experience memory. The two most important dimensions of tourism experience memory are reproducibility and vividness of memory [
13]. Reproducibility refers to the complete recall of the tourism experience, while vividness refers to the recall of specific things, plots, and emotions in the tourism experience.
2.3. Positive Emotions
Most studies show that emotions are positive or negative experiences associated with specific patterns of physical activity [
22,
23,
24,
25]. Positive emotions are defined as positive psychological states such as joy, surprise, happiness, and pride that tourists feel. Since the pathway of influence of positive and negative emotions is relatively independent, we can focus on the role of positive or negative emotions separately according to research needs [
26]. Hosany et al. stated that a single-level dimension is more effective than a two-level dimension in measuring tourists’ emotional experiences, while the positive emotion dimension can better reflect the value of tourism [
27]. First, tourism is a series of events in which tourists seek pleasant and unforgettable experiences for enjoyment. The “rosy view” effect may reduce negative phenomena in tourists’ reviewing of a tourism experience and magnify positive experiences [
23]. Second, negative memories are characterized by defense and avoidance, and tourists tend to seek advantages and avoid disadvantages by forgetting unpleasant negative events and reconstructing the overall experience to reduce cognitive dissonance [
15]. Therefore, this study focuses on the positive factors in tourist experiences and on the mechanism of positive emotions. Hosany et al. believed that emotion is the result of an individual’s processing or evaluation of relevant information, such as situations or events, and develops a concise destination emotion scale (DES) which mainly contains three dimensions of positive emotions: joy, love, and positive surprise [
27,
28]. In fact, positive emotions arising from tourists’ perceptions of destination supply can contribute to an individual’s overall tourism experiences by enhancing their sense of well-being [
29,
30].
2.4. Hypotheses Development
According to the emotional evaluation theory, emotions are generated through the individual’s internal perception evaluation mechanism, and tourists’ perception evaluation of the destination supply determines their emotional response [
31]. In addition, Hosany and Breitsohl, when exploring the influencing factors of tourists’ emotions, believed that the perception of destination supply was one of the important sources of stimulation affecting tourists’ emotional state [
32,
33]. In the face of a good tourism environment, resources, facilities, services, and other destination supply factors, tourists usually have positive emotional experiences such as surprise and joy. To reduce purchase risks, tourists tend to collect relevant product information and promotion schemes before making decisions to satisfy their imaginations and assumptions about various aspects of the destination, such as scenery and service facilities, and thus trigger the emotional reaction of tourists expecting to participate in local tourism activities. Lamore et al. believed that the integration of products and promotional activities produces a synergistic effect, which helps consumers generate positive emotions [
34]. Long verified that destination information supply, perceived promotion, and positive emotions, such as happiness, gratitude, and passion, had a significant impact on tourists by applying emotion evaluation theory and the hierarchical regression method [
35]. Tercia believed that the contact of stimuli such as information promotion at all stages of tourism causes tourists to react emotionally [
36]. Therefore, we propose the following hypotheses:
Hypothesis 1. The four dimensions of tourism supply perceptions, that is, tourist attraction perception, service/facility perception, promotion perception, and information perception, included in destination supply perception have a significant positive impact on the three dimensions of tourists’ positive emotion composition, namely, joy, love, and positive surprise (divided into 12 subdivided hypotheses).
In Bohanek’s (2005) study, emotions had a significant impact on the depth of memories, and people were more likely to recall experiences that involved many emotions and recalled them more vividly [
6]. Events related to positive emotions more easily form deep experiential memories compared to those without emotional involvement [
11], and the memory recall process is faster and more accurate. Tung believes that positive emotions are one of the most important components in promoting the formation of tourists’ (positive) experience memories [
9]. Kim believes that positive emotions have a profound influence on the vividness and reproducibility of tourists’ experience memories [
5]. Pan conducted a study on the Chinese situation based on Kim’s study and found that tourists’ positive emotions had a significant positive influence on the reproducibility and vividness of their experience memory [
13]. Through interviews, she found that tourists are often better at remembering pleasant experience memories, are willing to record and analyze them, and hope to get positive affirmation of the travel experience in the process of sharing [
37]. Curiosity is an important internal motive driving individual behavior and seeking surprise is an important motive for tourists to travel [
7,
38]. Tourists tend to look for places with unique tourism resources. After the tour, the first memory of the trip is often the most surprising experience. Therefore, this study proposes the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 2. The three components of tourists’ positive emotions, including joy, love, and positive surprise, have a significant positive impact on the two components of vividness and reproducibility of tourism experience memory (six subdivided hypotheses).
The supply of tourist destinations is the basis of tourist experience, and the memories formed through tourist experience are the basis of the supply of the destination. Barbieri et al. studied surfing tourism and revealed that tourists’ perceptions of perfect waves, exotic natural environments, and other perceptions of destination supply influence tourism experience memory [
39]. Kim constructed a destination attribute measurement scale related to tourism experience memory, laying the foundation for conducting further research on the creation of tourism experience memory [
5]. Lee analyzed the role and influence of experiential memory in a restaurant reconstructed from an old railway station in Taiwan, indicating that there exists a strong correlation between tourists’ perceptions of the cultural heritage of food attractions and feelings of nostalgia and experiential memory [
23]. Pan et al. found that tourists’ perceptions of the unique supply features of certain tourist destinations significantly promoted the vividness of tourists’ experience memory [
13]. Wannoo believed that pricing policy, uncrowded slopes/lifts, beautiful scenery, and accessibility had a significantly positive impact on the vividness, coherence, accessibility, and other characteristics of experience memory [
40].
In addition to the influence of the above-mentioned tourism product perceptions on tourism experience memory, some scholars have proposed that information and promotion programs for tourist destinations may also have an important impact on tourism experience memory. For example, Simon took Canadian brand promotion activities as an example and proposed that tourists’ perceptions of destination information and promotion had a significant impact on tourism experience memory [
41]. Kruger et al. found that tourism experience memory was affected by the quality of information about food and entertainment, and of promotional material [
42]. Papyrina proposed that advertising information is used as an external stimulus to resonate with consumers’ imagination, arouse tourists’ emotions, and convey specific memories of the pre-visit experience [
43]. Therefore, this study proposes the following hypothesis:
Hypothesis 3. The four component dimensions of the perception of destination supply, including tourist attraction perception, service/facilities perception, promotion perception, and information perception, have a significant positive impact on the two dimensions of tourism experience memory: vividness and reproducibility (eight subdivided hypotheses).
As discussed above, tourists’ perceptions of destination supply have been found to positively influence tourism experience memory. Furthermore, the literature suggests that tourists’ perceptions of destination supply and positive emotions are positively correlated, which affects tourism experience memory. Accordingly, this study examines positive emotions as a mediator between tourists’ perceptions of destination supply (specifically, tourism attraction perception, service/facilities perception, promotion perception, and information perception) and tourism experience memory in rural tourism. That is, the study explores tourism experience as an external stimulus of tourists’ positive emotions which, in turn, may influence the formation of more profound and unforgettable experience memories. This is because the internal influence mechanism of destination supply perception on tourism experience memory may be realized through the mediating role of positive emotions (
Figure 1). Accordingly, this study proposes the following hypothesis.
Hypothesis 4. Positive emotionsmediate the relationship between tourists’ perceptions of destination supply and tourism experience memory.