Place-Related Concepts and Pro-Environmental Behavior in Tourism Research: A Conceptual Framework

Abstract

The negative impacts of tourism development are increasing environmental problems related to the destruction of the global environment, calling on scholars and practitioners to look more at the relationship between people and place. In this concern, place attachment has attracted wide interest, especially from environmental psychologists, to investigate this relationship. This paper presents different approaches to analyze place attachment and related concepts to determine pro-environmental behavior in tourism consumption. It identifies critical gaps in the literature and extends existing theoretical frameworks by considering additional factors, and the entire process from input (participation), through mediations (attachment, meanings, satisfaction) to output (behavior). It reviews the definition of place attachment and essential place-related concepts and outlines why the suggested framework is necessary to extend the current body of research in people–place relationships. It also broadly evaluates current scales and measurement models of constructs included and the structural model of this framework, thereby making recommendations relevant for subsequent empirical research. Finally, contributions to theory, limitations, and suggestions are discussed.

1. Introduction

The tourism industry has flourished over decades and become one of the most important global economic activities. This has been bringing new opportunities for many countries, regions, cities, and local communities while at the same time posing numerous challenges. Undeniably, tourism development has been significantly contributing to socio-economic growth in terms of income, employment, improvement of living standards, the guarantee of social security, preservation of cultures, and protection of the environment. However, tourism’s growth has been imposing threats to the environment and societies, such as escalating traffic congestion leading to air pollution, increasing pressure on infrastructure while disrupting natural landscape structures, and unbalancing creatures’ habitats. Tourism activities have also raised the burden on waste in tourist attractions, causing soil and water pollution risks.

As one of the prominent actors that have been directly affecting the environment, humans and their behaviors are the keys to practice sustainable development [1]. Indeed, not all tourists behave eco-friendly, which, in many cases, might cause accumulated negative impacts. With a large and constantly increasing number, tourists have been imposing significant influences on the destination’s environment by their waste disposal behaviors, attitudes toward the environment, and choices of tourism services. Under these circumstances, besides seizing tourism development opportunities, with all its future dynamics, environmental protection is also essential to be taken into account. Hence, it becomes imperative to research pro-environmental behaviors and how to trigger them in tourism consumption.

People–place relationship has emerged as one of the top concerns when both, natural and cultural settings, are threatened by tourism development. In this regard, place attachment and place meaning are considered fundamental concepts when studying the linkage between people–place relationship and environmental behaviors. The operationalization of these concepts has been very diverse across several disciplines. Attachment and meanings assigned to a place could greatly determine tourists’ and locals’ perspectives on pro-environmental behaviors, such as policy advocacy, green consumption, willingness to pay for the environment, or the protection of natural resources [2,3,4]. In other words, individuals who hold attachment and meanings to a place can trigger their pro-environmental behaviors towards that place [4,5]. Accordingly, the present study follows this research line and analyzes how place attachment and place meaning affect pro-environmental behavior and elaborates an extended framework by including additional external factors to measure it more accurately. As a result, an entire process from input (participation), through mediations (attachment, meanings, satisfaction), to output (behavior) is presented with the aim to contribute to the theory of place and to provide for a better understanding of people–place relationship.

Lewicka [6] emphasized that even though many authors focus on the current level of place attachment and related concepts, researchers still know very little about the process of how these are formulated. On this point, some studies suggested activity participation as a potential antecedent variable of place attachment [7,8] and place meaning [4,9]. However, it is worthy to note that these studies are relatively fragmented, and to date, the place research has little focus on exploring aspects of participation thoroughly. In addition, place meaning scales used usually employs a qualitative approach to a specific place rather than verifying it quantitatively [10]. This results in a lack of a reference construct when researching different settings. Such concerns are the initial motivation for this research. It has the following two specific objectives:

• To close gaps in the literature on the theory of place research by reviewing the definition of place attachment and related concepts and proposing an extended theoretical framework for the accurate investigation of people–place relationships.
• To review and evaluate current scales and measurement models of constructs included and the structural model of the proposed framework, thereby making recommendations relevant for subsequent empirical research.

In the following, this paper is divided into several sections. Section 2 reviews the definition of place attachment, other essential place-related concepts, and pro-environmental behavior. Section 3 elaborates and develops a conceptual framework. Subsequently, current scales, construct measurements, and the structural model of empirical research are evaluated and discussed in Section 4. Section 5 concludes and provides recommendations for future research.

2. Theoretical Background

To date, people–place relationship research appears to be a fragmented puzzle, mainly due to questions related to definitions of place-related concepts, resulting in various applied terminologies [6]. Nonetheless, over the past fifty years, research of people–place relationship has primarily focused on two notions: place attachment and sense of place [6]. These concepts are widely adopted across many different disciplines. While geographers focus in their studies on sense of place [11], environmental psychologists often employ place attachment [6]. Besides these, there are several other place-related concepts that were used when referring to the connection between people and place, such as topophilia [12], place lifestyle [13], place dependence [14], place identity [15], place identification [16], community attachment [17], place affect [18], connectedness to nature [19], place meaning [20], place social-bonding [21], place memory [22], etc. The list is not exhaustive but positively manifests the considerable variation reflected in the diversity of methodologies and epistemologies used. These concepts are mostly similar or mutually inclusive [23]. They are not leading to a standardized framework of place, which has been widely validated [24]. Instead, researchers established separate frameworks based on previous relevant literature and in accordance with the purpose and context of their studies. As a result, a varied set of different frameworks integrated with countless indices has been introduced [3,7,8,11,17,25,26,27,28,29,30,31].

A literature review concerning different frameworks was undertaken to select the place-related concept in line with this research’s contexts and objectives. In particular, it observed the diversity of ideas inducing confusion in the research on the people–place relationship, posing the necessity to go further in this field. The research initially noticed the work of Stedman [4]. He used attachment, meanings, and satisfaction to predict behavioral intentions. Following this research line, Ramkissoon et al. [3] elaborated and developed another place framework that has also received much attention. Unlike Stedman’s model, it tested place attachment in a multidimensional construct, treated place satisfaction as a cumulatively summed satisfaction instead of one with specific objects, and focused on an up-to-date list of pro-environmental behaviors rather than using some specific behavioral intentions only. Nevertheless, place meaning was not included in this framework. Meanwhile, the place literature seems to reveal that activity participation has never been integrated into both models and similar frameworks. Based upon these findings, this paper attempts to extend and develop a more overarching model, using activity participation to determine pro-environmental behaviors through attachment, meanings, and satisfaction, for more accurate measurement in the people–place relationship research. In the following theoretical bases, each place-related concept (i.e., place attachment, place meaning, place satisfaction, activity participation) and pro-environmental behavior will be introduced and integrated into the proposed framework in the context of both nature-based and urban settings.

2.1. Place Attachment

Place is defined in various approaches by diverse factors (geographical attributes, social dimensions, physical characteristics, measurements, scales, etc.). Leonard [32] described a place as a combination of social and cultural interactions, a space or set of spaces that are assigned meanings through personal use and interaction [33], based on accumulated experiences in everyday life from where they play, work, and live [34]. In other words, a place can be defined as a space that holds meanings [35], known as a “meaningful location” [6]. These meanings typically represent a group of physical contexts [36], ranging from urban settings (e.g., houses, streets, shops, buildings, non-residential indoor environments) to nature-based settings (e.g., parks, lakes, rivers, streams, forests, mountains, trails). Moreover, these meanings also reflect the social aspects of the context, where people engage with social relationships and group identities [37]. Hence, a meaningful place can be critical to individuals and their existence [38].

Attached to the concept of place is attachment, which originates from attachment theory and is introduced by Bowlby [39] as a result of research into the mother–infant relationship. The notion of place attachment refers to the satisfaction of human needs for their safety in a stressful situation by being attached to a person. The place attachment construct is extended in environmental psychology, referring to a positive emotional bond between a person and a place [27]. By employing studies from geographers and environmental psychologists, recreation researchers adopted and developed the concept of place attachment in recreation contexts [26].

In tourism science, place attachment is broadly accepted in different types of places. Recently, many place attachment publications have dealt with the attachment to nature-based settings such as national parks, protected areas, or mountain trails [3,10,26,40]. Other studies have focused on urban settings, including cities and tourist attractions [31,41,42], and second homes [43]. Besides, commercial settings—another variant of urban space—have also been studied to investigate the attachment to restaurants [44], hotels [45], and coffee shops [46], even though such publications do not pay much attention to the place research [6]. Additionally, research on place attachment can be extended to regions [47]. Meanwhile, the current literature reveals that country and continent attachment appears in only a few studies and is mostly absent in publications on tourism. Tuan [12] provided a possible explanation, as the too large scale of the settings can often limit individuals to experience directly, thereby reducing the process of transforming space into a meaningful place.

Environmental psychologists suggest that place attachment should be measured as a multidimensional construct [3,8,11,46]. Previous research highlighted the two most prominent components of place attachment: place dependence and place identity [15,27,42,48,49]. Place dependence [14] illustrates the attachment to the function of a place, emphasizing the importance of satisfying human needs. The greater the degree of dependence on a place individuals acquire, the less they are willing to substitute any other place [27,50]. Meanwhile, place identity [15] represents a personal identification with a specific place. It provides individuals with the chance to express and assert their identity in this place [51].

Besides the two-dimensional model, researchers further incorporate various additional dimensions such as place affect, place social bonding, place lifestyle, place memory, and place expectation into their upgraded models. Place affect [18] is a crucial but generally overlooked sub-construct in the place literature [52]. Kals and Maes [18] conceptualized this dimension as a strong-affective link an individual holds towards a place. Place social bonding [21] complements the place attachment concept, explaining why people tend to be more attached to places where interpersonal relationships are strengthened [37,50]. To explain the attachment to daily life and routines, some scholars uses place lifestyle. Seamon [13] illustrated this concept as the merging of place into a person’s daily routine. It means a person’s movement in a place becomes routine and is to some extent choreographed in their daily lives. Some people may even become exasperated when their favored place is closed, such as a diner, to the extent that the restaurant owners have to invite regular guests to their homes during holidays [53]. Place memory, proposed by Lewicka [22], describes memories of a place remembered through interactions with the attributes of this place, while place expectation, introduced by Chen et al. [54], is a component reflecting the attachment to a place through future experiences expected by individuals. Both dimensions have recently emerged as sub-constructs, integrated into the multidimensional model of place attachment when researching tourist cities [22,54].

On the one hand, the diversity of components has strongly promoted the multidimensional model of place attachment in empirical research. The two most commonly found measurement models are the first-order model [27,45,54,55,56,57] and the second-order model [3,42,56,58]. The first-order model, known as the multi-factor correlated model, allows place attachment’s components to vary considerably within individuals. In cases where the first-order factors are detected to be well correlated, they will be represented by place attachment, a single second-order factor in a second-order model [56,58]. Place attachment then plays a critical role in explaining the variation between first-order factors. On the other hand, when the correlation between first-order factors is so high that they are perfectly indistinguishable, the elaborated model will omit these factors while adopting place attachment as a unidimensional structure [21,56,58].

2.2. Place Meaning

To describe place meaning, this paper adopts the approach from Stedman [4]. Accordingly, place meaning refers to what is attached (the importance-meanings) rather than to how much of it is attached (the bond-attachment) [2,10].

People often assign meanings to attributes of a setting and interact with the setting through those meanings [20]. Consequently, meanings ascribed to a place would reflect the physical characteristics of the place individuals perceive and their social interactions [59], leading to different meanings in different locations. Meanings individuals hold to natural-based settings are often related to their private inner facet through self-reflection and self-discovery [36]. Other than that, meanings can be assigned according to the classified functions of natural areas such as “national parks”, “national forests”, or “wildlands” for the purpose of conservation and recreation [49]. Furthermore, ascribed meanings can also derive from the functional value of a place, as reported by Bricker and Kerstetter [55], on the meanings that rafts associated with the South Fork in the American River, California, hold. In urban spaces, social and cultural activities are a source of inspiration, bringing cultural landscapes along with brilliant meanings [60]. Berleant [61] described urban spaces as an excellent repository of social and cultural meanings and the embodiment of collective memories. Such socio-cultural objects might represent values and symbolic meanings tourists assign and associate with a place [62]. With respect to the historical square, Zakariya et al. [63] discovered that “historic site” and “tourist” are the most crucial meanings for tourists in general, and “patriotic” and “bonding” for local visitors in particular, especially the adolescent, youth and young adult groups.

Place meaning is a complex construct but has received little attention with regard to developing its measurement model. Place meaning is often explored through qualitative approaches rather than quantitative ones and is usually bounded by small sample sizes. Thus, it might reflect meanings held by few selected individuals only [10]. Furthermore, meanings assigned to a place are not the same between individuals, while meanings assigned to distinct places are even more different because of their physical and social characteristics [10,64]. There are only a few specific constructs of place meaning available that are mainly applied to nature-based settings such as lake areas [4], rivers [55], national forests [65], and marine settings [10]. Therefore, most place meaning scales are rarely verified quantitatively, often resulting in the non-existence of a reference construct that can be widely embraced at different sites.

2.3. Activity Participation

Activity refers to the presence of humans in a particular space. In urban settings, Montgomery [66] used the term “vitality” to describe the activity, referring to the number of people being present on streets at different times. Vitality can only exist when interaction and exchange occur in the space itself; otherwise, such space will become lifeless. Within these spaces, in addition to architecture, streets, and urban landscapes, tourists further have chances to interact with mundane customs, habits, and local lives [67], as well as with service activities and staffs in hotels, restaurants, and coffee shops [44,45,46]. Maitland [68] emphasized that tourists tend to be attracted to such heterogeneous tourism spaces because these places hold various activities and existing human life simultaneously.

On the other hand, activity in nature-based settings is often associated with nature-based tourism and outdoor recreation. Early research attempts defined nature-based tourism as activities involving three main elements: education, recreation, and adventure [69], and nature-based tourists as individuals who travel to natural areas [70]. Accordingly, activities under these definitions could be hiking, trekking, swimming in natural environments (lakes, rivers, seas, etc.), cycling, boating, surfing, or climbing.

Activity types of tourists are commonly used and reported in tourism studies as an essential dimension for measuring participation. Nevertheless, it is not the only dimension, and how to develop a comprehensive measurement model of activity participation is a major issue. In particular, the measurement of activity participation in nature-based settings is often challenging, due to the dispersed nature of outdoor recreation [71]. In parallel with measuring participation by type, several studies have attempted to identify significant time-spent factors, such as the frequency of visits [72,73,74,75], the time devoted to different activities [13,76,77], and the length of association [7,8,13,75]. These dimensions, including activity types and time-spent indices, are sometimes aggregated and used to measure experience in activity [78,79]. Such research has been motivated by the notion that experience can be a critical variable that differentiates visitors through the lens of knowledge about recreational activities and the context in which they occur. Such differences in knowledge can lead to differences in attitudes, preferences, and behaviors [71].

2.4. Place Satisfaction

In the consumer behavior literature, satisfaction often refers to the cognitive difference between a consumer’s expectations and actual performance after purchasing [80]. Additionally, Westbrook [81] suggested that satisfaction is also a conscious experience or subjective feeling of an individual. When embedding Westbrook’s findings into the place theory, Stedman [4] describes place satisfaction as the perceived quality of a place under a multidimensional summary judgment, the perception of proper values meeting specific basic needs ascribed from the attributes of a place, its function, and social interaction. It is a critical concept to understand tourist behavioral psychology [52], and it has been integrated into many frameworks of place-related concepts in tourism research [3,45,82,83]. Today’s destinations consider visitors’ satisfaction as the key to their success in tourist attractions [84].

To date, it seems that there is no universal construct to measure visitors’ satisfaction. According to Lee et al. [44], the literature converges around two different approaches: transaction-specific satisfaction and overall satisfaction. The former refers to satisfaction with specific objects or encounters and can be measured with one or multiple items. The levels of structural complexity and insights obtained are proportional to the number of items in the scale. A multi-item scale can also deliver greater reliability than a single-item measure [85]. In contrast, the latter is summed cumulatively from satisfaction on various aspects of a place. It aggregates all specific assessments of previous transactions [86,87], providing a more up-to-date and stable construct [88].

2.5. Pro-Environmental Behavior

While people have increasingly traveled worldwide, it remains unclear if every visitor intends to participate in pro-environmental behaviors. Albeit many efforts in raising awareness, individuals often do not choose friendly pro-environmental behaviors among multiple available options during their trips [89].

Pro-environmental behavior has a complex and diverse operating construct [90]. In environmental psychology, pro-environmental behavior refers to environmentally concerned behavior [91], environmentally responsible behavior [92], environmentally significant behavior [90], or conservation behavior [93]. Pro-environmental behaviors can be understood as conscious behaviors with the aim to minimize negative impacts on the environment [89]. Kaiser and Wilson [94] labeled them as goal-directed pro-environmental behaviors, which people execute and apply towards specific environmental goals. On the other hand, Gatersleben [95] emphasized the difference between such types of pro-environmental behaviors and those that do not necessarily have environmental goals, i.e., environmentally beneficial behaviors stemming from habits (e.g., turn off faucets after use), or being motivated by other purposes (e.g., use bicycles instead of cars to save money and improve health). Steg and Vlek [1] underlined those appropriate behaviors of humans in pro-environmental ways could positively affect environmental issues (e.g., environmental pollution, global warming, or ecosystem degradation) that have been emerging for decades.

Early research efforts employed a unidimensional construct to evaluate and measure the complex construct of pro-environmental behavior [96,97]. Its advantage is to assess the environmental support by the number of reported behaviors in a straightforward way. However, self-reported behaviors may conflict with actual behaviors. Campbell [98] found an apparent contradiction between verbal commitments and behavioral performances stemming from a disregard for the difficulty of executing those behaviors. Based on Campbell’s research, Kaiser et al. [99] elaborated a more accurate unidimensional measurement of pro-environmental behavior. Specifically, all behaviors in this construct can be ranked from degrees of easy to difficult, based on a self-reported perception of individuals’ ability to perform those behaviors in achieving environmental goals. The model explains that people with a solid commitment to environmental goals will favor all behaviors, whether these behaviors are difficult or easy. In contrast, people with less commitment will focus only on the easier ones. A probabilistic Rasch model has been adopted to validate this measurement model, which recently has shown higher reliability and validity than the conventional composite measurement [100].

3. The Development of a Conceptual Framework

Initially, activity participation is added to the proposed framework, following the idea that attachment and meanings assigned to a place arise from an interaction between people and that place. In turn, place attachment and place meaning affect pro-environmental behavior positively. Within this nexus, place satisfaction plays a significant and mediating role (Figure 1). Definitions of constructs included in the framework are provided in

Table 1. Terminologies used in the proposed framework.

Activity participation	is comprised of activity types and the time-spent indices in participation [8,35,66,69,75].
Place attachment	is a positive emotional bond between a person and a place [27].
Place meaning	refers to what is attached (the importance-meanings), rather than to how much of it is attached (the bond-attachment) [2,10].
Place satisfaction	is the perceived quality of a place under a multidimensional summary judgment [4].
Pro-environmental behavior	is conscious behavior with the aim of minimizing negative impacts on the environment [89].

.

3.1. Activity Participation in Formulating Attachment and Meanings of Place

Some studies have shown that activity participation plays a significant role in formulating attachment and meanings people hold to a place. Tuan [35] noted this importance, arguing that getting to know a place is a key for delineating and transferring an undifferentiated space into the place. People need to interact with a place to know that place. Indeed, an emotional bond to a particular setting is likely to emerge only after one or more visits [8].

The place literature reveals that place attachment can differ between individuals depending on the type of activity they partake in [7,101,102]. Nonetheless, not much attention has been paid to the association between activity types and place meaning. Ramos et al. [9] were interested in this association, debating that individuals are attracted to pleasurable traveling experiences and satisfy their needs of seeking favorite meanings in a place through a set of activities they enter into. The experience obtained evaluates individuals’ attachment and meanings they imbued to the place in varying degrees based on the encounter modes [4]. Thus, it is logical to hypothesize that individuals performing different activities in a setting would formulate the different meanings they attribute to that setting.

Together with activity types, time spent in a place also influences positively place attachment. As defined above, time-related factors can include the length of association, time devoted to different activities, and frequency. Hummon [17] found that long-term residency enhances emotional attachment by familiarity and experience of events over time, specifically through local social participation. In the entertainment sector, Moore and Graefe [8] identified that years of interaction, frequency of use, and geographic proximity were directly proportional to the degree of attachment when measuring tourists’ place dependence and place identity. Frequency refers to the number of visits to a specific place. In particular, the more often individuals visit a place, the higher the degree of attachment they hold to that place, leading to the greater their environmental responsibility [73].

In short, the place literature suggests that it is necessary to consider time-spent variables when researching the connection between people and place. More notably, most of the literature on place-related research is weighed between two prominent constructs: the importance-meanings and the bond-attachment [2,10]. This drives the logic that the time individuals spend in a place is also strongly related to place meaning, as Smaldone et al. [75] demonstrated in their research.

Proposition 1.

Activity participation is a good predictor of place attachment.

Proposition 2.

Activity participation is a good predictor of place meaning.

3.2. Place Meaning-Attachment Association

Several place research results support the linkage between place meaning and place attachment. As mentioned, place is a concept based on meanings through experience and interaction with a setting. People need to recognize symbols of a place before having an emotional attachment to the place at a higher level [103]. Accordingly, people become attached to the place through symbolic meanings they assign to that place, and thus place meaning is a necessary foundation to form the attachment [20]. In a quantitative approach, Stedman [20] confirmed a strong meaning-attachment association, revealing the mediated role of place meaning in the relation between the physical attributes of a place and the degree of place attachment of people. Manzo and Perkins [104] found that changes in physical characteristics related to the values of a place individuals perceive could negatively affect and reduce their attachment level. Likewise, Wynveen et al. [10] showed that the degree of attachment visitors hold is affected by the type and the degree of meanings they ascribed. Information obtained from such empirical studies suggests a strong relationship between meanings and attachment, hence providing for a solid argument to incorporate this association into the proposed framework:

Proposition 3.

Place meaning positively influences place attachment.

3.3. Attachment and Meanings in Promoting Pro-Environmental Behavior

Early attempts to study place attachment predicted behaviors towards the environment [14]. Attachment to a place might reflect the psychological change of an individual in relation to that place [54]. Thus, this emotional bond facilitates learning about the attitudes and behaviors of tourists after their trips to a specific place or the reactions of residents to changes in their environment. Individuals who have in-depth knowledge of a place are able to create experiences, benefits, and new opportunities through social participation [5]. According to Park et al. [105], tourist groups often establish a strong emotional bond with tourist attractions to satisfy their inner needs, leading to positive attitudes and behaviors towards the attractions. Based on this, environmental psychologists have been motivated to widely adopt place attachment to predict and evaluate pro-environmental behaviors [3,40,50,106].

Individuals are also willing to protect places that are meaningful to them. For example, local rural nature-based communities reported strong environmental concerns when negative impacts were imposed on meanings they ascribed to these places [2]. In summary, when the attachment and meanings held by people to a place is high, the willingness to protect the place is optimized [4].

Proposition 4.

Place attachment positively influences pro-environmental behavior.

Proposition 5.

Place meaning positively influences pro-environmental behavior.

3.4. Satisfaction Plays a Mediating Role between Attachment, Meanings and Behaviors

Some authors [107] argue that humans could be satisfied with a place, possibly their living area, but not necessarily be bound to that place. Nonetheless, most studies on the satisfaction–attachment association have recorded positive results [4,14], with evidence suggesting that place attachment and its sub-constructs can significantly predict visitors’ satisfaction [3,4,45]. Meanwhile, the satisfaction–meaning association is not much supported by the place literature. In this rarity, Stedman [4] showed that satisfaction could be influenced by the characteristics of the physical environment when they are treated as the basis of meanings. Even with little empirical support, this satisfaction-meaning association is still used as an assumption in the proposed framework.

Proposition 6.1.

Place attachment positively influences place satisfaction.

Proposition 6.2.

Place meaning positively influences place satisfaction.

There is disagreement among scholars concerning the linkage between satisfaction and pro-environmental behavior. Stedman [4] mentioned that high satisfaction can prevent environmental behaviors. Specifically, individuals are only strongly concerned about the environment when they feel unsatisfied with the threats being imposed on their favorite meaningful place by potential negative impacts. Meanwhile, Halpenny [40] reported that there was no significant influence of satisfaction on pro-environmental behavioral intentions of park visitors. In contrast, Ramkissoon et al. [3] supported the positive influence of satisfaction on respondents’ willingness to engage in pro-environmental behaviors in national parks. Subsequent empirical studies also showed the significant influence of place satisfaction on predicting pro-environmental behavior [108,109]. Accordingly, despite the controversy about this association changes in varying contexts, it is proposed:

Proposition 6.3.

Place satisfaction positively influences pro-environmental behavior.

4. Evaluation Model

4.1. Place Attachment as a Multidimensional Construct

Scannell and Gifford [50] highlighted the importance of evaluating the multidimensionality of place attachment, as each component contributing to place attachment has a distinct impact on an individual’s pro-environmental behaviors [40,50,56,110]. Understanding different impacts varying on sub-constructs is necessary when elaborating place attachment policy intervention.

Some works have incorporated this multidimensional nature when examining place attachment’s relationship to environmental attitudes and behaviors. Nevertheless, their results are inconsistent because the effect of the different place attachment components is heterogeneous. When examining the effect of two sub-constructs of place attachment, corresponding to nature attachment (attachment to physical attributes of a place) and civic attachment (social association with a place), on pro-environmental behavior, Scannell and Gifford [50] discovered a more substantial influence of nature attachment. Kyle et al. [28] also detected inconsistent effects of place attachment components on individuals’ attitudes. Specifically, negative environmental issues provoked a strong reaction from those whose place identities are high, but a lesser response from those with a high degree of place dependence. In another wok, Halpenny [40] suggested different complex effects of the three-dimension model of place attachment (place affect, place identity, and place dependence) on the pro-environmental behaviors of guests in a national park. The work showed that place identity, followed by place affect, is considerably stronger correlated with specific behaviors towards the environment than place dependence. Meanwhile, place affect failed to show predictive power with regard to pro-environmental behavior when measuring it independently. Instead, its effect was amorphous and pervasive. Vorkinn and Riese [110] found that place meaning can promote conflicting behavioral intentions. They revealed that Norwegian residents attached to a municipality seemed to support the development of a hydropower plant contributing to the municipality’s growth. In contrast, those who were only attached to this municipality’s natural areas considered this project as a threat. Hence, a simple measure of place attachment may lead to inaccurate predictions about behaviors towards the environment, requiring the utilization of multidimensional types of attachment.

4.2. Place Meaning: A Typology of Perceived Place Values

Another gap in the literature addressed in this paper concerns the lack of reference conceptual construct of place meaning when doing related research in different settings. In this respect, a qualitative approach is needed to expand this construct to be able to include it and validate the framework quantitatively.

Settings and their attributes are the core in determining attitudes, perceptions, and evaluations of individuals about a place, thereby forming place meaning [64]. That motivated researchers to elaborate this concept with qualitative methods. These research designs are diverse, including interpretive designs [35], interviews and focus groups [10,36,55,65], narrative approaches [111], storytelling [112], visitor-employed photography [64], and mapping with informal conversations [113]. However, these qualitative approaches may also have some constraints when ascribed meanings may not be representative for the entire population due to small sample sizes [10]. These meanings do not convey the same thing to everyone, even though the findings are all derived from attributes of the same place [64]. Indeed, in tourism experiences, people are usually looking for differences, and therefore meanings they ascribe to a place are not necessarily objective [114]. Even the socio-cultural background of tourists might influence the way they define and perceive the meanings of buildings and spaces [115]. It is worthy to note that meanings created by tourists are shaped by their memories, preferences, and interests, as well as encounters with attractions [116]. For those reasons, meanings are diverse, complicated, and challenging to grasp.

Many authors adopted place meaning as cognitions and evaluative beliefs. Specifically, meanings assigned to a place are reflected in the values of that place to an individual [4,10,65]. Therefore, those findings on meanings are a definite resemblance of the value of place in natural contexts (see details in Appendix A,

Table A1. Place meaning and value of place in nature-based settings.

Place Meaning (Wynveen et al. [10], Copyrighted by Elsevier)	Value of Place (Brown et al. [130], Copyrighted by Elsevier)
Aesthetic beauty The seascapes and landscapes are beautiful. I enjoy the sounds of the waves and wildlife. The tropical beaches are special.	Aesthetic/scenic value I value these places for the attractive scenery, sights, smells, or sounds.
Lack of built infrastructure/pristine environment The reef appears healthy. It is a pristine environment. The vastness of the GBR around my place puts things into perspective. The place provides a wilderness experience. There is little evidence of human built structures.	Wilderness value I value these places because they are wild. Therapeutic value I value these places because they make people feel better, physically and/or mentally.
Abundance and diversity of coral and other wildlife The amount, diversity, and structure of the coral is unique. The numbers and diversity in types of wildlife.	Biological diversity value I value these places because they provide for a variety of plants, wildlife, marine life, or other living organisms.
Unique natural resource It is important because it is part of a World Heritage Area. The GBR is a natural wonder. The place has a unique set of corals, other wildlife, and water quality. It has inherent value because it is part of the natural environment.	Heritage value I value these places because they have natural and human history. Biological diversity value I value these places because they provide for a variety of plants, wildlife, marine life, or other living organisms.
Facilitation of desired recreation activity There are a lot of different things to do. It is a good place for the kind(s) of recreation I enjoy.	Recreation value I value these places because they provide outdoor recreation opportunities.
Safety and accessibility It is easily accessible. It is a safe place to be.	Therapeutic value I value these places because they make people feel better, physically and/or mentally.
Curiosity and exploration The area provides a sense of exploration and curiosity. It challenges me to be self-reliant.	Learning value (knowledge) I value these places because we can use them to learn about the environment.
Connection to the natural world I feel like I am a part of the place. I feel connected to the natural world.	Spiritual value I value these places because they are spiritually special to me.
Escape from the everyday The place makes me feel calm, tranquil, and/or peaceful. Being there provides escape from everyday life. I feel happy or good or a sense of pleasure. I can be alone or I feel a sense of solitude.	Therapeutic value I value these places because they make people feel better, physically, and/or mentally.
Family and friends I enjoy being there with family and friends. I feel a sense of connection to my ancestors. I want to pass my family’s knowledge about the place to younger generations. Being there makes me feel like I am part of a lifestyle that is unique to the area.	Spiritual value I value these places because they are spiritually special to me. Future value I value these places because they allow future generations to know and experience them as they are now.
Not match	Life Sustaining value I value these places because they help produce, preserve, clean, and renew air, soil, and water.
Not match	Intrinsic value These places are valuable for their own sake, no matter what I or others think about them or whether they actually used.
Not match	Economic value I value these places for economic benefits such as tourism, forestry, agriculture, and other commercial activity.

for a comparative example). In particular, the construct of place value was developed and has demonstrated its versatility through numerous quantitative studies, in various nature-based settings, and across many countries [117]. Recently, Yao et al. [118] demonstrated the applicability of place value in relation to place attachment and revisiting behavior when analyzing those concepts in the context of Meizhou island in China. Accordingly, these studies suggest measuring place meaning by a generalized value typology. However, using such a scale might not allow an in-depth exploration of certain significant values in a specific area due to the differences in place attributes and the way individuals perceive these values. Instead, it provides an overview of the total value of the place.

Notwithstanding, the current literature does not support a similar approach for urban settings. It would be beneficial for future research to focus on a value typology that can be applied in urban contexts, such as cities and their tourist attractions, restaurants, hotels, bars, coffee shops, or other commercial and service providers.

4.3. Measuring Pro-Environmental Behavior

The theoretical bases seem to indicate no scientific consensus on the measurement tools for the structure of pro-environmental behavior. The most common approach is self-reported behaviors, which proved to generate moderately valid estimates [119]. Behavioral measures generated through self-reports are often sensitive to response biases [120], such as social desirability [121]. People with low or anti-environmental beliefs might underrate their sustainability behaviors, while those with high environmental beliefs might overrate them when self-reporting their behaviors [122]. As a result, data obtained from self-reported behaviors are usually not unreliable. In addition, scholars rarely consider the environmental impact of pro-environmental behaviors and generally refer to the available literature to design the measurement model of pro-environmental behavior. This might cause the omittance of essential behaviors with substantial environmental impacts, or failure to distinguish the impact levels between behaviors leading to no weight in measuring relative effects of behaviors [95]. Therefore, the evaluation of environmental friendliness based on the number of behaviors appears to be inaccurate without considering the degree of their impact on the environment in practice.

To address these limitations, several approaches have been considered. Some scholars adopted the measurement tool based on the Rasch model [100] to evaluate estimates of behavioral difficulties. Others [121] integrated the degree of social desirability when measuring pro-environmental behavior. Social desirability could be the extent to which respondents expect to satisfy enumerators or follow social norms in terms of survey items. Additionally, many studies considered the environmental impact assessment of pro-environmental behaviors after self-reporting those behaviors [95,123] to develop a broader measurement model to evaluate the intentions and impacts of environmental behaviors more accurately. Nevertheless, in the field of environmental psychology, research focuses mainly on understanding behavior rather than analyzing its impacts [94]. Besides, measuring the environmental impact of behavior in practice is highly complicated because of its dependence on many factors beyond individual control [124]. Therefore, the selection of additional supporting methods is often confused and depends on the objectives of each study.

4.4. Model Testing between Different Groups

Stedman [4] considered the complexity of place-related concepts in their application to different groups regarding the interrelationship between attachment, meanings, satisfaction, and behavioral intentions. He questioned whether people with higher satisfaction are willing to defend their favorite places? Or if people are more willing to do so when the degree of satisfaction is lower? Initially, the answer relies on the impact of attachment and meanings and is likely reflected in the different activities participation, especially between residents and tourists. Residents will have frequent interactions thanks to their geographical proximity, so their degree of place attachment and place meaning is likely to be higher. Accordingly, they are more sensitive to environmental changes. In particular, threats, perceived from a low level of satisfaction (i.e., dissatisfaction), appearing on their favorite attachment and meanings, can strongly trigger their behavioral intentions [4]. Meanwhile, tourists tend to defend a place they are emotionally attached to, providing meaningful values to them, and have a high level of satisfaction through their experience in that place [3,82].

Concerning place meaning, there might be differences in perceived values between residents and tourists, as residents do have more opportunities to engage in other activities than recreational ones. Likewise, differences can appear in pro-environmental behaviors as residents also have more time and opportunities to engage in a wide and diverse variety of environmental actions. However, there is not too much change in the construct of place attachment when its measurement models are applied across multiple contexts and to different groups. The popularity of the 2-dimensional scale (i.e., place identity and place dependence) of place attachment is a typical instance [15,27,42,48,49]. Instead, differences in place attachment construct, the number of sub-components and their item lists, come principally from scholars’ interpretations of theory and their choice of reference models which are usually based on prior empirical studies. Evidently, these assumptions need to be tested further in future research when there is still little attention to comparing residents and tourists in previous empirics.

Taking those important notes into account, the proposed framework will consider whether to modify the construct of place meaning and pro-environmental behavior and the relation of place satisfaction to other factors in the proposed framework, depending on the purpose of research, study subjects, contexts, and cultural backgrounds.

4.5. Reinforcement Cycle

The proposed theoretical framework is based on a one-way effect and is to be validated by structural equation modeling. However, in practice, a psychological and behavioral cycle is repeated continuously, where the outcome variables become stimulus and affect against the previous antecedent variables. Specifically, engaging in pro-environmental behaviors can increase a sense of place satisfaction. Such satisfaction, in turn, can strengthen an individual’s attachment to a place, making that place more meaningful to the individual. As a result, a stimulus is generated to provoke the individual’s revisiting behavior towards the place. From there, a new psychological and behavioral circle starts as a loop. This effect can be defined as reinforcement [125]. In simple words, we act more when we receive more, and vice versa [126].

There are numerous findings in the place research supporting these reversal effects, although they are fragmented and present controversial conclusions. On the contrary to the current proposed theoretical framework, reversal effects use pro-environmental behavior and its influence on satisfaction as a starting point. Pro-environmental behaviors are similar to pro-social behaviors directed towards others [127], positively affecting individual well-being [128]. Indeed, people randomly assigned to perform acts of kindness or to spend money on others reported being happier than those set to do the same for themselves [127]. Such a feeling of well-being, in the place research, might be similar to the sense of place satisfaction when people are satisfied with their needs of bringing benefits to the environment.

Additionally, pro-environmental behavior also contributes to an increased level of place attachment [108]. The engagement in pro-environmental behaviors can be considered as an interaction with a place. Albeit not the same as outdoor recreation activities, these interactions also provide an opportunity for place exposure, contributing to formulating and strengthening place attachment. Following that logic, pro-environmental behavior engagement, at the same time, provides further opportunities to explore and perceive values of place, creating a more meaningful location for individuals.

Alternatively, environmental psychologists provide some evidence of using place satisfaction to predict place attachment. For instance, satisfaction with neighborhood settings is closely related to an individual’s identification with that area [4]. Likewise, Halpenny [40] reported that an individual’s satisfaction with natural areas, such as national parks, could significantly anticipate the individual’s overall attachment to that place. In the festive context, research by Lee et al. [30] indicated that satisfaction positively affects festival participants’ dependence, identity, and social association towards the event venue. Meanwhile, it seems to be an unexplored unknown whether place satisfaction and place attachment can positively affect place meaning. Nonetheless, omitting these linkages, the place literature has focused more on the relationship between attachment, satisfaction, and activity participation. The conceptualization of place attachment is close to psychological commitment [28], so that it can, directly and indirectly, affect tourists’ loyalty to the place [45]. In particular, those satisfied with their traveling experience have a high degree of loyalty, i.e., revisit behavior and word-of-mouth recommendation [83]. Eventually, individuals end their psychological and behavioral cycle and start a new loop by revisiting the place that is meaningful and strongly attached to them.

5. Conclusions

The proposed framework addresses a critical gap in the literature on the process of how attachment is embraced and meanings are assigned to a place, as already pointed out by Lewicka [6]. It not only allows to measure current levels of attachment and meanings but also to focus on how people create them. Adding activity participation and place meaning strengthens the place framework developed by Ramkissoon et al. [3], whereas the proposed extension is also consistent with their suggestion. Specifically, they recommended a better measurement model to predict pro-environmental behavior by including recreation involvement, which is relatively equivalent to activity participation, and the physical characteristics of a setting, which, according to Eisenhauer et al. [59], are reflected by meanings ascribed to that setting. Over and above, place attachment intervention policy would be more clearly and existentially specified by flexibly changing activities individuals take part in, increasing their time of interaction in a place, as well as promoting the attributes of the place. Those are the starting points that will stimulate the whole system of the framework, affecting attachment and meanings people hold to the place and their satisfaction, and then triggering the positive behaviors towards the environment. The proposed framework, therefore, can provide more improved insights into people–place relationship.

When measuring all constructs integrated into the proposed framework, many issues need to be considered. Firstly, place attachment should be measured as a multidimensional construct. This is of high importance, as the sub-constructs of place attachment have heterogeneous relationships with their theoretically relevant antecedents (i.e., activity participation, place meaning) and outcome variables (i.e., place satisfaction, pro-environmental behavior). Secondly, the place literature indicates no appropriate reference construct to measure place meaning in different settings. Qualitative approaches are a commonly found solution. However, in nature-based settings, it is suggested to use a value typology instead of place meaning. Place values have been flexibly developed and proven their reliability in several studies, various natural areas, and different countries. Notably, consideration must be given that the use of a value typology might limit the in-depth exploration of certain meaningful values in a specific place. Meanwhile, its advantage is a flexible alternative to place meaning rather than employing a qualitative approach to elaborate this construct. Thirdly, the construct of place meaning and pro-environmental behavior and the relation of place satisfaction to other factors included in the framework might not be consistent between residents and tourists. It is because of their differences in participation when residents have more time and opportunities to engage in other activities beyond recreation as well as more active and diverse environmental actions. Therefore, subsequent empirical research will need to consider these differences and make appropriate modifications when applying the proposed framework to different groups.

With regard to the measurement of pro-environmental behavior, it is worthy of recognizing that self-reported behaviors can be subject to response biases, which are the primary cause of the scale’s reduced reliability. The Rasch model is proposed to modify the weights of these behaviors by evaluating estimates of behavioral difficulties in identifying easy and difficult behaviors. Additionally, more precise measures can be developed by integrating a social desirability construct into the framework when measuring pro-environmental behaviors or further performing an environmental impact assessment of self-reported behaviors. The choice of additional measurement depends on each particular study, where the validity and reliability of the measurement must always be evaluated. Finally, the proposed framework is not limited to a one-way structure. Instead, examining the reinforcement of a psychological and behavioral cycle in the framework is suggested. It is crucial to consider this reinforcement loop because any intervention can produce a corresponding stimulus, which then can disrupt or strengthen an individual’s psychology and behaviors towards a place.

These pointed notes on construct measurements and the structural model are essential in the next step: testing the proposed theoretical framework. To do so, empirical research is in progress in a multinational and multicultural context. It will test interrelationships between essential place-related concepts and pro-environment behaviors. It will also account for the different levels of participation, attachment, meanings, and behaviors across different groups: residents and tourists, highly and lowly engaged visitors, as well as the group of indifferent visitors. The spatial setting of this subsequent empirical research will initially focus on nature-based locations such as national parks and protected areas in both Asia and Europe. Accordingly, these empirics will be able to comprehensively validate and generalize the proposed model across multiple sites in different countries, cultures, and tourist markets.

Future studies may not necessarily limit activity participation to on-site interactions but also consider it via social media (e.g., virtual tourism) or word of mouth. Consequently, the framework can extend the construct of pro-environmental behavior, as nowadays, people can experience and affect a place they have never visited via online tools and services. Besides, it is worthy to note that the theoretical framework of place attachment is mainly focused on predicting behavioral intentions, rather than actual actions towards the environment [3]. They are often quite different [129] due to the contradiction between verbal commitments and the difficulty of executing behaviors [98]. Therefore, the question of how to transform behavioral intentions into actual performance is still pending. There is also great potential along this research line. It may not only focus on triggering tourist behaviors at the tourist attractions but also on positively influencing their general behaviors towards the environment everywhere else. Eventually, the common confusion of using various place-related concepts can be enlightened by adopting them as an extended family of constructs rather than seeking an accurate measurement, which was well tested for validity [6].