Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080250

Authors: Antun Marinac

This study investigates how quality tourism supply contributes to destination competitiveness through the sequential mediating roles of local resource integration and perceived authenticity within a sustainability-oriented tourism framework. Building upon the Resource-Based View and destination competitiveness theory, the study proposes and empirically tests a sequential mediation model in which local resource integration and perceived authenticity explain the mechanisms through which quality tourism supply contributes to destination competitiveness. Data were collected through a survey of 430 tourism stakeholders, including representatives of hotels, restaurants, tourism boards, travel agencies, rural tourism enterprises, and local producers. The data were analyzed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) implemented in SmartPLS 4. The findings indicate that quality tourism supply positively influences local resource integration and destination competitiveness, while local resource integration significantly enhances perceived authenticity. Perceived authenticity, in turn, positively affects destination competitiveness. The results also confirm significant individual and sequential mediation effects, demonstrating that tourism quality generates stronger competitive advantages when destinations effectively integrate local resources and foster authentic tourism experiences. The proposed model demonstrated substantial explanatory power, explaining 45.9% of the variance in local resource integration (R2 = 0.459), 50.7% of the variance in perceived authenticity (R2 = 0.507), and 63.1% of the variance in destination competitiveness (R2 = 0.631). The study contributes to the destination competitiveness literature by introducing local resource integration as a strategic mediating construct and by integrating quality, authenticity, and competitiveness within a unified analytical framework. The findings provide theoretical contributions to destination competitiveness research and practical implications for destination managers and policymakers seeking to promote sustainable and competitive tourism development through place-based and community-oriented approaches.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080249

Authors: Xhuljeta Kasmollari Ilda Kanani

Cultural Routes have become important instruments for promoting shared heritage and sustainable tourism across Europe, yet the potential of travel literature to inform their development remains underexplored, particularly in the case of Via Egnatia. This study addresses this gap by developing a theoretical distinction between travel narratives as ideologically situated representations, shaped by colonial and Orientalist discourse, and as potentially corroborable sources of historical–geographical evidence. It applies this framework to nineteenth- and early-twentieth-century accounts by Byron, Leake, Lear, and Durham, published between 1812 and 1909. Using a qualitative, theory-informed case-study design, the study combines critical discourse analysis with the thematic coding of 127 narrative references, supported by a documented codebook, an intra-coder consistency check (84% agreement), and triangulation across authors and independent historical and archaeological sources. The analysis identifies documentary support for a mobility corridor along the Shkumbin Valley, derived primarily from the convergence between Leake and Lear and consistent with independent archaeological scholarship. A site-level cross-check of six heritage assets and a small purposive sample of recent visitor reviews provides preliminary indications that formal heritage protection already exists along the corridor, while visitor-facing interpretation does not consistently connect individual sites to a coherent Via Egnatia narrative. A similar pattern emerges from the analysis of Albania’s national tourism-planning documents. The study’s principal contribution is theoretical: it shows how critically read travel narratives can extend destination-storytelling and heritage-interpretation theory beyond descriptive associations, while offering a potentially transferable methodological framework for translating narrative and empirical evidence into interpretive practice for the Council of Europe Cultural Routes Programme.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080248

Authors: Lynnette van der Merwe I. Carina Kleynhans Antionette Roeloffze

Transformation in the hospitality industry increasingly requires graduates who possess not only technical knowledge and operational skills, but also behavioural and interpersonal competencies for sustainability in the industry. This demand from higher education students focuses on employability skills, knowledge, and abilities relevant to the hospitality industry post-COVID-19. This study explored industry practitioners’ perceptions of the transversal competencies required for graduate employability in the South African hospitality industry. An interpretivist research philosophy was adopted to support a subjective viewpoint through a qualitative research study, implemented through interviews with 17 purposively selected industry practitioners in Gauteng, South Africa. This includes managers and supervisors responsible for overseeing student internships during their work-integrated learning programmes. Data were analysed using interpretive thematic analysis supported by Atlas.ti v25 software program. The findings reveal that, in addition to technical knowledge and practical skills, employers highly value behavioural competencies such as adaptability, positive attitude, passion, work ethics, and the ability to think critically under pressure. The study further highlights the need for stronger collaboration between industry and higher education institutions to improve curriculum relevance, internship structures, and competency development. The findings contribute to hospitality employability literature by identifying industry-informed transversal competencies necessary to enhance graduate preparedness and employability within the post-pandemic hospitality sector.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080247

Authors: Xinda Yang Sirichai Preudhikulpradab

Island destinations combine natural settings, local culture, and participatory activities that may support recovery, social connection, and personal meaning. Evidence remains limited on the relative contribution of different island experience dimensions to tourist satisfaction and well-being, especially in inhabited island destinations. This study examined four experience dimensions in West Island, Sanya, China, and used the findings to develop a destination improvement model. Tourist satisfaction was conceptualised as a visit-specific evaluation, while tourist well-being referred to the broader psychological benefits associated with travel. An explanatory sequential mixed-methods design was adopted. The quantitative phase used 411 valid questionnaires from Chinese domestic tourists. A full six-construct confirmatory factor analysis assessed the measurement model, after which multiple and simple linear regressions tested the prespecified direct relationships. The six-factor model showed good fit (χ2(390) = 389.98, p = 0.491, CFI = 1.000, TLI = 1.000, RMSEA = 0.000, SRMR = 0.035). The four experience dimensions explained 58.0% of the variance in tourist satisfaction. Co-creation experience made the largest unique contribution (β = 0.345), followed by emotional experience (β = 0.329) and environmental experience (β = 0.312; all p < 0.001). Educational experience was not significant (β = 0.029, p = 0.422). Tourist satisfaction had a significant positive influence on tourist well-being (β = 0.764, p < 0.001; R2 = 0.583). Semi-structured interviews with 12 experienced tourists explained the coefficient pattern through ten themes, and seven academic and industry experts refined five strategic components through two Delphi rounds. The resulting model prioritises cultural co-creation, emotional resonance, environmental quality, and service support, while treating transformative learning as an area for targeted development and evaluation. The integration of survey results, tourist accounts, and expert assessment provides an evidence base for selecting and monitoring destination improvements in inhabited island settings.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080246

Authors: Angélica María Arboleda-Ramos Jossie Esteban Garzon-Baquero Daniela Bellon Monsalve Pablo Andrés Gutiérrez-Pérez Iván Mauricio Osorio

Hotel capacity in emerging destinations is often described through room counts or conventional classifications, even when these say little about how accommodation systems operate. This study investigates the accommodation sector in Villavicencio, Colombia, through the Hotel Capacity Index (ICH), a classification tool based on three variables: rooms, beds, and services. Using field data from 84 hotels, the analysis considers capacity structure, room and bed configuration, occupancy patterns, service provision, and selected operational practices. The results show a hotel system concentrated mainly in medium-capacity establishments, with 71% of the sample in the ICH-2 category. Although the sector shows some internal flexibility in the way sleeping capacity is organized, it remains only weakly differentiated in service provision and operational sophistication. Occupancy patterns also show marked seasonality, with stronger performance in the second half of the year and clear peaks in the final quarter. Limited digital integration, low levels of certification, weakly formalized feedback systems, and incomplete accessibility conditions show broader constraints in upgrading the accommodation base. The study shows that the main issue in Villavicencio is not simply the amount of hotel supply, but the composition and functionality of that supply. In emerging destinations, expanding accommodation supply is not enough when the structure of that supply remains concentrated and only weakly differentiated.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080245

Authors: Anastasia Christou

The proliferation of solo female travel as a cultural and social practice has been accompanied by a narrow representational default: the solo female traveller of tourism marketing, and of much scholarship, remains implicitly white, Western, middle-class, able-bodied, and heterosexual. This paper addresses that narrowing by developing ‘compound mobility friction’, a conceptual tool for understanding how overlapping social positions (race, class, age, sexuality, and nationality) interact multiplicatively, rather than merely additively, to shape women’s access to, experience of, and safety within independent travel. The paper is conceptual in orientation: it develops and illustrates the concept through an interpretive synthesis of publicly available survey data, industry intelligence reports, and published scholarship on digital travel cultures, rather than through original coding of a bounded corpus of digital texts. Organised around four intersecting axes (race and ethnicity, class, age, sexuality and gender identity) the discussion illustrates how constraints on solo female travel are likely to be unevenly distributed, and how marginalised travellers may perform additional, uncompensated labour of research, risk assessment, and community-based knowledge production that mainstream travel safety discourse does not reliably provide. The paper’s contribution is twofold: it offers compound mobility friction as an analytical vocabulary that is distinct from, and more precise than, adjacent concepts such as intersectionality and mobility justice, and it identifies concrete implications for tourism research methodology, destination marketing, and travel safety infrastructure.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080244

Authors: Sanja Kovačić Ioannis Katsounis Ivana Šagovnović Aleksandra Tešin Senka Šekularac-Ivošević Dimitris Gavalas

Cruise tourism is one of the fastest-growing segments of the global tourism industry, generating significant economic benefits while also creating challenges related to overtourism, congestion, environmental pressure, and residents’ quality of life. Understanding residents’ attitudes towards tourism is therefore essential for sustainable destination management. Although previous studies have examined the roles of place attachment and quality of life in shaping tourism attitudes, evidence from cruise destinations remains limited. This study investigates the influence of place attachment and quality of life on residents’ attitudes towards tourism in two contrasting European cruise destinations: Kotor (Montenegro) and Athens/Piraeus (Greece). Additionally, it aims to explore the link between place attachment and quality of life, which remains understudied in this context. The study also investigates whether destination moderates the effect between explored variables. To address this objective, Kotor and Athens/Piraeus were purposively selected as a maximum-variation pair. A quantitative survey was conducted among 319 local residents (157 from Kotor and 162 from Athens/Piraeus). The findings indicate that both place attachment and quality of life significantly influence residents’ attitudes towards tourism. Stronger place attachment was associated with more positive perceptions of social interaction with tourists and beneficial cultural impacts, but it also influenced residents’ attitudes indirectly through perceived quality of life. Moreover, place attachment was identified as a significant determinant across all five dimensions of residents’ quality of life. Furthermore, quality-of-life dimensions, particularly heritage and commercial development, socialisation and economic opportunities, and environmental conditions, emerged as significant predictors of tourism attitudes. Destination comparisons revealed overall consistency between both cruise tourism destinations, except for the link between place attachment and health and safety benefits, which was stronger among residents of Athens. The findings provide practical implications for sustainable tourism planning by highlighting the importance of incorporating residents’ perceptions into destination management.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080243

Authors: Mohamed Soliman Arunneewan Buaniew Ahmad Albattat Fatima Zahra Fakir

This study examines how smart hotel technologies shape guests’ pro-environmental behavioral intention (PEBI) and sustainable tourism advocacy (STA) in Thailand’s Deep South. Drawing on stimulus–organism–response (SOR), value–belief–norm (VBN), and technology acceptance (TAM) theories, it models four technology stimuli that operate through two mediators, guest satisfaction and environmental personal norm, and one boundary condition, environmental self-identity. Data from 412 guests of smart hotels in Pattani, Yala, and Narathiwat, collected by purposive sampling, were analyzed with partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) and fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA). The model explained substantial variance (R2 = 0.67 for satisfaction, 0.59 for environmental personal norm, 0.65 for PEBI, and 0.58 for STA). Green smart features, experiential senses, and intelligent operations raised both satisfaction and personal norms, with experiential senses the strongest driver (beta = 0.31 on satisfaction and 0.33 on norm); perceived usefulness raised satisfaction (beta = 0.14) but not personal norms (beta = 0.05, non-significant). Environmental self-identity strengthened the norm-to-behavior link, and fsQCA revealed five equifinal configurations that reliably produce high PEBI. By moving the outcome beyond satisfaction to environmental action and advocacy, the study helps hoteliers and policymakers design technology-enabled interventions that advance SDG 11, SDG 12, and SDG 13.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080242

Authors: Babu George Joseph Lema Cathrine Linnes Jerome Agrusa

Tourism scholarship has long treated technological innovation as an accelerant bolted onto a stable practice: people move through physical space to consume experiences, then return home. This conceptual paper asks what happens to the field’s theory once that assumption is relaxed. Rather than forecasting a single future, the paper develops a structured conceptual foresight framework to examine how emerging technological trajectories may challenge the constitutive assumptions of tourism theory. Drawing on tourism scholarship alongside developments in computation, the biosciences, and cognitive science, the framework integrates established concepts from futures studies including Voros’s futures cone, Inayatullah’s causal layered analysis, and Dator’s four generic futures to explore alternative trajectories for tourism. This analysis identifies four constitutive assumptions on which tourism theory quietly rests, namely geographic displacement, embodied co-presence, the destination as passive stage, and the tourist–host dyad, together with a typology of de-anchoring that traces what becomes of the field as each assumption loosens. Four conceptual scenarios follow: the dematerialization of place, biologically mediated travel, autonomous destination ecosystems, and the erosion of the tourist–host distinction. Some sit in the cone’s plausible band; others are placed at its preposterous edge on purpose to stress-test the field’s categories rather than to predict events. Throughout, the analysis stays tethered to tourism and hospitality concerns: destination economics, the work of destination management organizations, labor displacement, experiential inequality, the measurement infrastructure behind tourism statistics, and the shift from sustainability toward regeneration. We close with a research agenda for an anticipatory, theory-building stream within the field.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080241

Authors: Yeşim Helhel Selçuk Helhel

In the last twenty years, as global uncertainties increased, tourism demand has become more fragile and harder to predict. This study aims to examine the impact of global uncertainty on tourism demand in G20 countries from 2001 to 2023 and to compare the forecasting performance of machine learning algorithms with traditional econometric approaches. The analysis uses international tourist arrivals as the dependent variable; per capita income, the real effective exchange rate (REER), the Global Uncertainty Index (WUI), and lagged demand are included in the model. The dynamic panel (System GMM) estimation confirms strong habit persistence in tourism demand, with the coefficient on lagged arrivals being highly significant at 0.8672 (p<0.01) for the full G20 sample, 0.8812 (p<0.01) for advanced economies, and 0.8524 (p<0.01) for emerging markets. The negative and statistically significant WUI coefficient across the full sample (−0.4568, p<0.01), advanced economies (−0.4683, p<0.01), and emerging economies (−0.4452, p<0.01) demonstrates that global uncertainty systematically suppresses tourism demand. Furthermore, income elasticities (lnGDP) exert a positive and statistically significant impact across both advanced (0.2145, p<0.01) and emerging nations (0.3412, p<0.01), whereas real exchange rate appreciation (lnREER) significantly deters demand in emerging markets (−0.1145, p<0.05). The negative and significant WUI coefficient (−0.45 to −0.47) in both developed and developing countries indicates that uncertainty systematically suppresses tourism demand. Machine learning models, especially during periods of high volatility, produced more successful results; the hybrid model achieved an average MAPE of 3.98% for the 2016–2023 period, demonstrating high accuracy. The findings highlight the importance of flexible and data-driven approaches during periods of uncertainty; they suggest that policymakers should focus on reducing uncertainty shocks and increasing demand resilience.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080240

Authors: Li-Shiue Gau Jui-Liang Hung Wei-Siang Lai Hung-Yi Chu Jui-Chuan Huang

Stand-up paddleboarding (SUP) at Sun Moon Lake, Taiwan, requires selective attribute prioritisation under operational and environmental constraints. This study develops a five-stage theoretical–procedural framework that organises participant needs through Schmitt’s experiential modules, classifies asymmetric quality functions using Kano analysis, links attributes to acceptable price and behavioural intention, and compares Kano-derived priorities with an evaluation–outcome priority matrix (EOPM). A quantitatively dominant sequential mixed-method design combined interviews with four operators and one certified coach, field observations, online reviews, and an electronic survey administered from 8 to 24 May 2023 to a purposive convenience sample of participants with prior SUP experience at Sun Moon Lake; 450 of 499 responses were usable (90.1%). Analyses included descriptive statistics, Kano classification, Satisfaction Improvement and Dissatisfaction Reduction Coefficients (SIC/DRC), 5000-resample bootstrap subgroup comparisons, correlation analysis, exploratory factor analysis, multiple regression, and the EOPM. Relaxation (SIC = 0.749) and happiness (SIC = 0.744) produced the largest satisfaction gains, whereas safety (DRC = −0.636) and shower facilities (DRC = −0.607) showed the strongest dissatisfaction sensitivity. Professional coaching (r = 0.349), skill instruction (r = 0.339), and safety (r = 0.331) were the strongest correlates of composite behavioural intention (Cronbach’s α = 0.941). Exploratory factor analysis identified experiential–relational enhancement and operational–competence support; both predicted behavioural intention (β = 0.174 and 0.296, respectively; adjusted R2 = 0.182). The EOPM identified safety and skill instruction as strategic strengths, while professional coaching remained an improvement priority, illustrating partial convergence between asymmetric quality and outcome-based prioritisation. The framework supports selective investment in non-negotiable operational foundations and high-leverage experiential enhancements in eco-sensitive sport tourism.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080239

Authors: Ceyda Kolkesen Meltem Altinay Ozdemir José António C. Santos

Despite the growing popularity of solo female travel, few studies have examined how empowerment-related factors combine to influence solo travel intention or the mediating role of perceived behavioural control in these relationships. Accordingly, this study investigates the effects of solo travel motivation, negotiation skills, and perceived behavioural control on solo travel intentions among Gen Y and Gen Z female travellers. It also examines whether perceived behavioural control mediates the relationships between solo travel motivation and solo travel intention and between negotiation skills and solo travel intentions. Data were collected from 200 solo female travellers in Türkiye using purposive sampling. The proposed relationships were tested using structural equation modelling and mediation analyses. The results revealed that solo travel motivation and negotiation skills both positively influenced perceived behavioural control and solo travel intention, with negotiation skills being the strongest predictor of both outcome variables. In addition, perceived behavioural control significantly mediated the effects of solo travel motivation and negotiation skills on solo travel intentions. These findings indicate that negotiation skills provide a critical empowerment mechanism that increases women’s perceived behavioural control and, consequently, their solo travel intention, offering a novel contribution to the literature on solo female travel. The findings have important practical implications for tourism practitioners and policymakers seeking to promote solo female travel by empowering women’s negotiation capabilities and perceived behavioural control.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080238

Authors: Milana Čugalj Stefan Šmugović Bojana Kalenjuk Pivarski Velibor Ivanović Dragana Novaković Saveta Bikić Mateja Stanojević Tamara Stošić

Traditional food products are essential for gastronomic tourism, yet their integration into hospitality is limited by supply chain challenges and a significant attitude-behavior gap. This study identifies perceptual factors, operational barriers, and socio-professional predictors influencing traditional food procurement. The research was conducted on a sample of 307 hospitality managers in Vojvodina, Serbia. Data was systematically analyzed through examination of manager perceptions and procurement decisions. Results reveal that although managers highly rate sociocultural and ecological impacts, these factors were not statistically significant predictors of actual procurement in the estimated model, suggesting the presence of a perceptual–operational gap. Instead, professional characteristics drive decisions. Formal education in hospitality and tourism, combined with 6 to 10 years of professional experience, significantly increases the decision to source traditional products. Among non-procuring managers, operational barriers such as inconsistent quality and delivery issues outweigh economic factors as perceived obstacles to procurement. To address these challenges, this study conceptualizes the Perceptual–Operational Gap (POG) as a diagnostic and integrative analytical framework that receives preliminary empirical support in this study. This three-level framework maps product characteristics, managerial perceptions, and procurement outcomes. The model provides a diagnostic tool enabling practitioners to identify attitude-behavior gaps, understand operational barriers, and recognize which manager groups require targeted attention. Based on these insights, decision-makers can design targeted interventions. The POG model moves focus from cultural promotion to practical professional approaches, offering a replicable solution for integrating gastronomic heritage in destinations worldwide.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080237

Authors: Öznur Çetinkaya Gizem Kandemir Altunel

Botanical tourism is a growing niche within nature-based travel, yet little is known about tourists who travel specifically to observe plants in their natural habitats. This study addresses this gap by examining the travel motivations of international botanical tourists visiting Turkey through the push–pull framework. A qualitative approach was adopted, and semi-structured interviews were conducted with 56 tourists recruited through a specialist botanical tour operator. Reflexive thematic analysis identified six push factors: biophilia and nature centrality, psychological escape, plant passion and identity, knowledge seeking, transformative experience, and ethical reflection. Five pull factors were also identified: professional guides, endemism, natural landscapes, seasonality, and remoteness and authenticity. The findings show that botanical tourism is an identity-based and knowledge-oriented form of travel in which personal motivations are closely linked to ecological destination attributes. The study extends push–pull theory and offers practical implications for guide training, endemic-route design, phenology-based itineraries, and conservation-sensitive tourism management.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080236

Authors: Pedro Jimenez-Arpiza Trilce Ahtziri Dávila-Navarrete Ricardo Salazar Javier Jiménez-Hernández Javier Saldaña-Almazán Yanik Ixchel Maldonado-Astudillo

Gastronomy is a factor in destination competitiveness; however, studies addressing the integrated role of gastronomic identity and perceived authenticity as determinants of tourist satisfaction remain insufficiently explored. This systematic review examines how both constructs jointly shape satisfaction in gastronomic tourism destinations. Following the PRISMA 2020 guidelines, a systematic literature search was conducted in Scopus and Web of Science using a Boolean search strategy based on four conceptual blocks. After applying eligibility criteria and assessing methodological quality using JBI protocols, 12 empirical articles published between 2017 and 2026 were selected. This relatively small corpus reflects the concept-driven focus of the review, which required the simultaneous presence of terms related to gastronomic identity, perceived authenticity, and experience satisfaction, thereby increasing the specificity of the search and reducing its sensitivity. It should therefore not be interpreted as an exhaustive representation of all research on gastronomic tourism. Findings reveal that gastronomic identity operates as a multidimensional cultural stimulus, while perceived authenticity (objective, constructive, and existential) plays a mediating or interpretive role in the relationship between culinary stimuli and satisfaction. Together, these constructs enhance tourist satisfaction and strengthen destination loyalty. Key gaps were identified, including geographic concentration in Europe and Asia, sampling biases, and the absence of hospitality as a moderating variable. The reviewed evidence suggests that both constructs function as interrelated determinants within the Stimulus-Organism-Response model, highlighting the need for destination managers to articulate local culinary heritage to maximize tourism competitiveness coherently.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080235

Authors: Abderrazaq Lissaneddine Fatima Touhami Abdelrhani El-Bir

This study examines the role of digital transformation in strengthening organizational resilience in Moroccan tourism accommodation firms operating in crisis-prone environments. Successive economic, health, and environmental disruptions have highlighted the need to better understand how entrepreneurial orientation contributes to organizational resilience and whether digital transformation acts as a mediating mechanism. Data were collected from 137 owners and managers of Moroccan tourism accommodation firms and analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). Entrepreneurial orientation was operationalized through its three dimensions (innovativeness, proactiveness, and risk-taking), while organizational resilience was assessed across the readiness, response, and recovery phases to provide a multidimensional perspective. The results show that digital transformation plays a significant mediating role in enhancing organizational resilience. Among the entrepreneurial orientation dimensions, proactiveness emerged as the strongest predictor, exerting significant direct and indirect effects on all resilience phases through digital transformation. Innovativeness contributed primarily through its indirect effect via digital transformation, whereas risk-taking showed no significant direct or indirect influence. These findings suggest that digital transformation constitutes a key organizational capability through which entrepreneurial orientation strengthens resilience. The study contributes to the literature by adopting a multidimensional approach to both entrepreneurial orientation and organizational resilience, and provides practical insights for managers seeking to enhance resilience through digital transformation.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080234

Authors: Cathrine Linnes Giulio Ronzoni Reza Saneei Moghadam Joseph Lema Babu George Jerome Agrusa

Historic urban districts face growing challenges in balancing visitor activity with the needs of residents, local businesses, accessibility, and mobility. This study investigates whether short-term visitor forecasts can support destination management and planning in these complex environments. Unlike most visitor-forecasting studies, which focus on large cities and major tourist destinations, this study examines forecasting in a small historic urban district where visitor activity is more variable and management resources are limited. Using hourly pedestrian counts, weather data, and temporal data from the historic urban district of Fredrikstad, Norway, this research forecasts pedestrian activity up to 24 h in advance. The sensors record all pedestrians and do not distinguish tourists from residents or other users. Consequently, pedestrian counts are treated as an operational proxy for overall visitor activity at this heritage destination. Forecasting performance was evaluated using statistical, machine-learning, deep-learning, and benchmark forecasting models. Random Forest achieved the strongest overall forecasting performance (MAE = 209.52; RMSE = 357.18), outperforming the seasonal naïve benchmark (MAE = 247.44; RMSE = 421.70). Random Forest and GRU both outperformed the seasonal naïve benchmark on MAE, demonstrating the value of incorporating weather, temporal, and sensor variables into short-term forecasting. The findings suggest that short-term visitor forecasts may support operational planning, mobility management, service coordination, and other day-to-day destination management decisions. By anticipating periods of increased visitor activity, destination managers, local authorities, and government officials will be better able to allocate resources and coordinate services. This study demonstrates the potential of predictive analytics and sensor technology to support visitor management and operational planning in historic urban districts.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080232

Authors: Hermann Kimo Boukamba

Overtourism management increasingly uses public communication to frame how visitors are expected to move, behave, and understand their responsibilities in pressured destination spaces. Yet, in heritage cities, such communication is often examined through isolated signs, etiquette campaigns, visitor advisories, or congestion notices rather than as part of a wider visitor-management communication system. This paper examines Kyoto as a case of overtourism communication in an urban heritage setting. Using document-based content analysis supported by exploratory statistical tests, it maps 64 public-facing communication artifacts published between 2016 and 2025 and codes them by message orientation, artifact type, source environment, and spatial focus. The findings show that exclusionary messaging does not dominate Kyoto’s public-facing overtourism communication within the analyzed corpus. Dispersal and behavioral guidance is the most common orientation, while restriction is targeted and secondary, and invitational place guidance remains comparatively limited. Message orientation is significantly associated with artifact type, with restriction concentrated in signs and posters and invitational place guidance appearing mainly in guides and brochures. Semi-institutional actors account for most artifacts, indicating the central role of destination-management organizations and other visitor-facing tourism bodies in translating management concerns into public guidance. Spatially, guidance-oriented communication appears broadly across the city, while restriction has its clearest place-based concentration in Eastern Kyoto, especially Gion-related areas. A smaller set of messages invites visitors to explore wider Kyoto or less conventional places beyond standard guidebook routes. Drawing on the lens of soft urban governance, the paper argues that public-facing overtourism communication can be understood as one visible layer through which visitor-management expectations are framed, spatially differentiated, and made publicly legible. As a document-based analysis, the study does not measure visitor reception, compliance, or behavioral effects, which remain priorities for future research.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080233

Authors: Mauricio Carvache-Franco Aracelly Núñez-Naranjo Orly Carvache-Franco Mónica Torres-Naranjo Wilmer Carvache-Franco

Studying sustainability in marine and coastal tourism within national parks is essential to balance visitor use with the conservation of fragile ecosystems and biodiversity. In this context, the Galápagos Archipelago is a major coastal and marine destination in Ecuador, recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The aim of this empirical study was (i) to identify the principal motivational dimensions in sustainable coastal and marine destinations; (ii) to determine which motivations significantly predict tourist satisfaction in these contexts; and (iii) to establish which motivations influence loyalty in sustainable coastal and marine destinations. The research was conducted in situ, obtaining 407 valid questionnaires. Multiple regression analysis and exploratory factor analysis were applied. The results reveal six motivational factors: learning; heritage and nature; sun and beach; sports; authentic coastal experience; novelty; and social interaction. The motivation that most strongly predicts satisfaction is heritage and nature, followed by novelty. Likewise, the motivation that most strongly predicts loyalty is heritage and nature, with additional influence from sun and beach and sports motivations. These findings provide practical guidance for the development of sustainable destination management plans and contribute to the academic literature on sustainability, satisfaction, and loyalty in coastal and marine tourism contexts.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080231

Authors: Ivan Ružić Tanja Gavrić

Tourism seasonality remains one of the most persistent structural challenges of Mediterranean destinations, intensifying environmental, economic and social pressures during peak months while leaving tourism capacity underused in the remainder of the year. This paper examines the level, spatial distribution and structural determinants of tourism seasonality in 61 Mediterranean EU NUTS–2 regions from Croatia, Spain, Greece, Portugal and Italy over the period 2020–2024. Using harmonised Eurostat data, annual Gini coefficients are calculated from monthly overnight stays and analysed within a balanced panel of 305 region-year observations, testing whether seasonality is associated with international tourism dependency, hotel accommodation share and island geography, while controlling for regional GDP per capita, tourism intensity and the COVID-19 disruption period. Fixed and random effects models are estimated, with model choice guided by the Hausman test and cluster-robust standard errors applied at the regional level, complemented by a correlated random effects (Mundlak) specification. The results show substantial regional heterogeneity: Greece and Italy record the highest average seasonal concentration, while Spain and Portugal display more balanced patterns, partly due to regions with year-round demand, and Jadranska Hrvatska emerges as the most seasonally concentrated non-island region in the sample. A higher hotel accommodation share is significantly associated with lower seasonality, while the COVID-19 years significantly increased seasonal concentration, with concentration levels returning to recovery-phase values from 2022 onwards; as the panel does not include pre-pandemic baseline years, the findings compare the pandemic phase (2020–2021) with the recovery phase (2022–2024) and do not directly test a return to pre-pandemic equilibrium. The study contributes to comparative destination research by operationalising the Gini coefficient as a dependent variable in a multi-country regional panel framework and provides policy-relevant evidence for supply-side deseasonalisation strategies embedded in integrated destination management.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080230

Authors: Krisztina Palkovics Tímea Csákvári Henriette Pusztafalvi Imre Boncz

The COVID-19 pandemic severely disrupted tourism globally, with considerable variation in impact and recovery across regions. This study examines how tourism demand, revenue, employment, and transport evolved in the Visegrád Four (V4) countries—Czechia, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia—between 2015 and 2025, assessing recovery speed and sectoral resilience across nine indicators. The modelled window varies by indicator: 2015–2023 for revenue indicators, 2015–2024 for visitor-flow indicators, and 2015–2025 for employment and air passenger indicators. Annual data from Eurostat and the Hungarian Central Statistical Office were analysed using descriptive comparative methods, linear mixed-effects models, and interrupted time series analysis with counterfactual projections. All indicators showed sustained pre-pandemic growth followed by a statistically significant 2020 shock. International demand fell roughly twice as sharply as domestic demand, and air passenger traffic suffered the largest absolute collapse. Revenue recovered fastest, surpassing pre-pandemic levels by 2023–2024 in all countries, while guest-volume recovery is projected only by 2025–2027. Part-time employment remained below 2015 levels in three of four countries despite volume and revenue recovery, indicating structural labour market adjustment. Slovakia consistently showed non-significant post-shock recovery slopes in seven of nine indicators, emerging as the region’s weakest performer. These findings indicate that COVID-19 produced uneven, revenue-led recovery across V4, and the employment paradox and Slovakia’s underperformance underscore the need for diversified, evidence-based tourism crisis management.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080229

Authors: Bart G. J. Knols Nabeel Siddiqui Akib Jahir Sonu Shivdasani Martin Geier

Mosquito control is a critical operational requirement for tropical resort islands, where guest comfort, staff wellbeing, and public health depend on effective management of biting insects. In many island tourism destinations, including the Maldives, mosquito control programs rely heavily on routine insecticide space spraying (fogging or misting). While such interventions can temporarily reduce adult mosquito abundance, their effects are often short-lived. High-frequency applications are therefore common practice but may create risks for human health, biodiversity, and fragile island ecosystems. Here, we examine how mosquito control in the Maldivian tourism and hospitality sector could transition from pesticide-dependent approaches toward ecological mosquito management practices. Drawing on operational experience from fourteen Maldivian resort islands and current knowledge of mosquito ecology, we compare conventional insecticide-based control with alternative approaches including surveillance-based management, larval habitat reduction or modification, biological control, mass trapping of mosquitoes, or combinations thereof. The geographically bounded nature of resort islands, combined with centralized management and strong sustainability commitments within the tourism sector, creates unusually favorable conditions for implementing integrated mosquito management strategies. We propose a practical transition framework that prioritizes monitoring, habitat management, and sustained population suppression while reducing or eliminating routine insecticide applications. Importantly, our operational experience demonstrates that implementation can be simple and practical, requiring only modest adjustments to existing resort operations. Such approaches can improve guest and staff safety, protect island biodiversity, reduce dependence on chemical pesticides, minimize the noise, olfactory and visual disturbances associated with routine fogging and mist-blower operations, and strengthen the environmental sustainability credentials of tropical tourism destinations.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080228

Authors: U. Bhojanna Archana P G. V. Mruthyunjaya Sharma Anitha G. H

I-driven recommendation systems are widely assumed to ease decision-making in online hotel booking, yet little is known about whether two of their defining characteristics—perceived serendipity (unexpected but relevant suggestions) and perceived similarity (resemblance among suggested properties)—impose cognitive costs that contribute to booking cart abandonment. Objective: This study examines how perceived serendipity and perceived similarity in AI recommendations influence cognitive load, and how this load in turn affects booking abandonment, drawing on Cognitive Load Theoryand Information Foraging Theory. Methodology: Cross-sectional survey data were collected from 624 Indian consumers with recent AI-assisted hotel booking experience, sampled from the user communities of three online travel platforms, and analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) in SmartPLS 4.0. Results: AI-driven personalization increased both perceived serendipity (β = 0.777) and perceived similarity (β = 0.824), each of which independently elevated cognitive load (β = 0.518 and β = 0.464, respectively); cognitive load in turn was significantly associated with greater booking abandonment (β = 0.530), and the indirect effects of serendipity and similarity on abandonment via cognitive load were also significant. Conclusions: In this exploratory, single-sample study, AI personalization did not uniformly ease booking decisions: when recommendations were perceived as highly serendipitous or excessively similar, the associated cognitive load coincided with greater cart abandonment. These preliminary, cross-sectional associations tentatively suggest that hospitality platforms may benefit from calibrating personalization intensity rather than maximizing it, pending confirmatory replication with stronger measurement-invariance and discriminant-validity testing.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080227

Authors: Siqi Cao Songyu Jiang Nutteera Phakdeephirot

Zhangjiajie National Forest Park, widely associated with the landscapes depicted in Avatar, attracts tourists from around the world and has become an important film tourism destination. Film tourism destinations are not only physical places but also mediated symbolic spaces shaped by cinematic imagery, media memories, and symbolic expectations formed before travel. This study investigates how film tourists transform cinematically mediated expectations into situated engagement during their visits to Zhangjiajie. It adopts a qualitative process design informed by grounded theory and draws on semi-structured interviews with 30 film-aware tourists who had visited Zhangjiajie. The findings show that engagement unfolds through pre-visit cinematic imagination, embodied encounters, cinematic–real-world comparisons, social interpretation, authenticity negotiation, emotional connection, and cultural place-making. The study develops the concept of cinematic-place negotiation to explain how a screen-mediated place is transformed into a lived place through tourists’ comparison, verification, revision, and extension of media-shaped expectations.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080226

Authors: Wagih Mohamed Salama

Despite the growing adoption of AI-enabled green hospitality services, limited research has examined how these services influence customer loyalty through the sequential mediating roles of service quality and green trust. This research investigates the influence of AI-enabled green hospitality services on customer loyalty in Egyptian four- and five-star hotels, mediated sequentially by service quality and green trust. A cross-sectional survey was conducted using convenience sampling, and data were collected from 432 guests staying in four- and five-star hotels in Egypt. The proposed model was analyzed using PLS-SEM. Results indicated that AI-enabled green hospitality services enhance service quality (β = 0.796, p < 0.001), which positively impacts green trust (β = 0.244, p < 0.001). Green trust also showed a positive influence on customer loyalty (β = 0.208, p < 0.001). Both service quality and green trust mediated the relationship between AI-enabled green hospitality services and customer loyalty, both individually and sequentially. The findings also confirmed a significant sequential mediation effect of service quality and green trust in the relationship between AI-enabled green hospitality services and customer loyalty. The study concludes that technological innovation coupled with enhanced service experiences and credible environmental practices increases customer loyalty. Hotels should integrate AI with sustainability initiatives, improve service quality, and communicate environmental commitments transparently to encourage trust and long-term loyalty.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080225

Authors: Kasin Ransikarbum Woramol C. Watanabe Patchanee Patitad Jettarat Janmontree

Tourism is a key driver of regional development, particularly in emerging destinations around the globe. Despite its critical role, aligning tourism services with tourists’ needs requires effective planning and management that reflect key stakeholder perceptions and resource allocation to enhance the overall competitiveness of a destination. This study aims to integrate the perspectives of tourists and tourism service providers using a logistics performance framework to support data-driven tourism management. Using the Best–Worst Method (BWM), stakeholder-based evaluations are conducted to prioritize key decision criteria, including economic efficiency, reliability, responsiveness, and safety, which are essential for supporting operational efficiency and tourism planning. Next, a Multi-Objective Traveling Salesman Problem (MOTSP) model is applied to evaluate travel routing and ensure efficient resource allocation. Data collection and analysis are conducted for popular tourist attractions, using a case study of Ubon Ratchathani, Thailand. The findings provide practical insights for regional planners and tourism managers seeking to enhance infrastructure planning through stakeholder-informed and logistics-driven decision-making for regional tourism development.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080224

Authors: Nilna Muna Ni Komang Intan Lestari Ni Komang Ayu Lestari Ni Made Diva Cahya Pratiwi

Brands increasingly rely on digital peer communication to promote environmentally friendly products. Whether electronic word-of-mouth (EWOM) actually shifts green purchase intention (GPI), though, is far from settled. Some studies have found no reliable word-of-mouth effect; others have examined green trust and anticipated guilt separately, leaving the joint operation of these parallel mediators poorly specified. This is especially true in Bali, Indonesia, where environmental pressures, heavy social media use, and Tri Hita Karana values coexist. Working under the stimulus–organism–response (SOR) framework, this study tests a dual-mediation model that routes EWOM to GPI through anticipated guilt and green trust among eco-conscious social media users. Survey responses from 393 participants were analysed with partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM). EWOM related positively to GPI, directly and through both mediators. Anticipated guilt and green trust each partially mediated the effect, so the mediation was partial rather than full. The EWOM-to-guilt path was the stronger of the two. The EWOM-to-trust path was weaker, yet both mediators connected to GPI at similar strength. This study contributes a dual-pathway SOR specification by incorporating anticipated guilt into digital peer communication within a tourism-heavy cultural setting. Interpreted with caution, the pattern indicates that credible EWOM aimed at greener, more responsible consumption may operate through two mechanisms simultaneously, validating trust and prompting moral anticipation among digitally exposed, eco-conscious consumers. However, this interpretation still needs experimental and longitudinal testing before these relationships can be treated as causal.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080223

Authors: Miguel Orden-Mejía Mauricio Carvache-Franco Orly Carvache-Franco Wilmer Carvache-Franco Scarlett Sarmiento-Victor María Alejandro-Lindao

Although recreational experience segmentation is widely used in coastal tourism research, existing motivational frameworks have been developed primarily in island and protected-area destinations, leaving urban, open-access, developing-country contexts theoretically underexplored. This study addresses that gap by identifying the dimensions of recreational experience and market segments for the city of Salinas, Ecuador—an accessible, family-oriented, urban coastal destination—to advance sustainable tourism management. Using a quantitative, cross-sectional design, data were collected through a structured questionnaire administered to 385 tourists; 374 cases with complete scale responses were retained for analysis. An exploratory factor analysis (EFA) identified seven motivational dimensions: environment and sustainable recreational resources, learning and knowledge, affective well-being and creative harmony, interest and enjoyment in the experience, aquatic natural resources and wildlife, cognitive stimulation and emotional connection, and hedonic well-being. A K-means cluster analysis, validated through the elbow method (inflection at k = 3) and silhouette coefficient (0.25), revealed three distinct tourist segments: intensive recreational tourists (n = 183; 48.9%), moderate recreational tourists (n = 136; 36.4%), and passive recreational tourists (n = 55; 14.7%). Chi-square tests confirmed significant associations between clusters and sociodemographic variables including gender, marital status, and number of visits. This study offers four theoretical contributions: it reports a more detailed motivational factor structure than previously documented three- and four-factor models for coastal destinations; it proposes recreational amotivation—grounded in self-determination theory—as a candidate visitor profile that merits further theoretical and empirical validation; it advances a destination-type-sensitive motivational framework; and it provides boundary condition evidence clarifying the contextual scope of recreational experience theory. These findings offer actionable segmentation tools for destination managers seeking to differentiate and sustain coastal tourism markets.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080222

Authors: Nicole Leeper Piquero Erin A. Orrick Alex R. Piquero

Safety perceptions are central to destination choice and visitor satisfaction at tourist venues, yet research on crime and public safety in theme park settings remains sparse. This study examines visitor perceptions of public safety at the two most-attended theme park destinations in the United States—Walt Disney World (Orlando, FL, USA) and the Disneyland Resort (Anaheim, CA, USA)—across three domains: within the parks, in parking lots, and on shuttle buses. Using data from a Qualtrics survey, this brief report compared safety perceptions by gender across both destinations. Findings indicate that visitors overwhelmingly perceive themselves as safe within the parks; however, safety perceptions are somewhat lower in parking lots and on shuttle buses. Importantly, while males and females report comparable perceptions of safety within the parks, females report significantly lower safety perceptions in parking lots and on shuttle buses, especially at Disney World. Implications for future research and practice are noted.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080221

Authors: Noppharuj Praphasiri Somchai Lekcharoen Sumaman Pankham

The continuous expansion of digital tourism has increased the need to understand tourists’ intentions to book hotels online in competitive digital marketplaces. Previous studies have generally relied on symmetric analytical approaches, which have limited the understanding of the complex causal mechanisms underlying online hotel booking intention, especially in emerging tourism markets such as Thailand. This study aimed to investigate the determinants of online hotel booking intention (OBI) among Thai tourists by integrating partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) and fuzzy-set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (fsQCA). The study collected data from 1884 Thai tourists who had prior experience with online hotel booking. Furthermore, PLS-SEM was used to examine the linear relationships among the study constructs, whereas fsQCA was employed to identify multiple causal configurations leading to OBI. The findings indicate that electronic word of mouth (E-WOM) was the strongest direct driver of OBI, while customer experience (CEX) significantly enhanced perceived value (PCV). Trust (TRU) emerged as a key relational mechanism that strengthened perceived usefulness (PU) and facilitated the development of E-WOM, while electronic promotion (EPM) indirectly influenced OBI. In addition, fsQCA identified multiple sufficient configurational pathways leading to high OBI, supporting the principle of equifinality. Collectively, these findings advance the theoretical understanding of OBI by demonstrating that the integration of symmetric and asymmetric analytical approaches provides complementary insights into tourists’ decision-making processes.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080220

Authors: Andrés Romero Montero

Since its founding in 2007, Airbnb has articulated its corporate identity around the mission “Belong Anywhere”, anchoring its brand promise in peer-to-peer hospitality, host empowerment, and authentic local experience. While this declared mission has remained stable, the platform’s economic, operational, and symbolic architecture has changed substantially: by 2026 it incorporates boutique hotels, car rentals, grocery delivery, and global sporting experiences while launching rural campaigns framed as territorial revitalization. This paper introduces the Authenticity Commodification Cycle (ACC), a conceptual framework that traces Airbnb’s discursive evolution across six phases (2007–2026) through the lens of corporate authenticity discourse and platform financialization. Drawing on a qualitative content analysis of a purpose-built corpus of 23 coded documentary units (derived from 33 retrieved source captures, with 3 contextual sources), and supported by an interpretive Ratio A/F index, the findings suggest that authenticity is not abandoned as the platform financializes but preserved and strategically redeployed as narrative capital. This dynamic is interpreted as a proposed form of “authenticity washing”—a symbolic legitimacy mechanism analogous to greenwashing in hospitality. The ACC contributes to research on platform tourism, brand authenticity, the collaborative economy, and destination governance, with implications for the regulation of platform-based tourism.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080219

Authors: Glykeria Myrovali George Tzanis Maria Morfoulaki

In the current era, the tourism sector faces interconnected challenges that require a rapid transition toward sustainable and smart management models. Within the framework of the project ‘Tourism as a Service’ (TAAS), this paper examines the transferability potential of good practices across nine diverse European areas. The study adopts a dual methodological approach that integrates technical feasibility with local relevance. First, the identified practices are clustered into seven thematic pillars. Second, a Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA), employing the PROMETHEE method, is applied to assess transferability based on five key dimensions: institutional complexity, financial requirements, technical infrastructure, human resources capacity and regulatory constraints. This quantitative evaluation is complemented by qualitative insights from local stakeholders, ensuring that the proposed solutions align with regional priorities. The findings indicate that communication-oriented practices, such as online marketing campaigns, demonstrate high transferability across most contexts, whereas infrastructure-dependent tools encounter significant implementation requirements. By reconciling constraints rankings with stakeholder perspectives, this paper provides a roadmap for policy improvements aimed at fostering digital transformation in European tourism.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080218

Authors: Shamima Akter Farhana Foysal Satata Nandita Rani Saha Nitu Kanis Fatema Syeda Khadiza Akter Farzana Akter Syeda Tanjila Shahnewaz

This paper examines how the travel intention of students is correlated with their mental health, in terms of stress reduction and psychological wellbeing. The study employs a combined model that integrates the Theory of Planned Behavior and Stress Recovery Theory to determine the role of travel intention. Travel self-efficacy, the pressure of social influence, the value of the travel experience, the perception of affordability, and the attitude towards tourism determines travel intention, leading to stress reduction and psychological wellbeing of students. The paper examines the mediating capacities of travel involvement and social connectedness and the moderating capacities of nature connectedness and travel frequency. Semi-structured interviews with 15 university students and a survey among 604 students in various universities in Bangladesh were used to collect data. Hypotheses were tested using PLS-SEM. Findings indicate that travel intention enhances psychological wellbeing and reduces stress, and travel involvement and social connectedness are important mediators. These relations are mediated by nature connectedness and frequency of travel, which increases the restorative effect of travel. The results indicate that tourism could be a viable approach to student mental health promotion, which has both practical and theoretical consequences on university policy and future tourism psychological studies.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080217

Authors: Khalid El Houcine Lhoussaine Alla

In the context of the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and current regional development strategies, tourism is increasingly viewed as a potential driver of economic and infrastructural transformation across regions. While the literature has largely focused on the influence of infrastructure on tourism growth, the reverse relationship—in which tourism may stimulate infrastructure development—remains insufficiently conceptualized. This article therefore examines the tourism–infrastructure development (TLID) thesis through two research questions: (1) To what extent can tourism growth contribute to the development of regional infrastructure beyond strictly tourism-related infrastructure? (2) What theoretical mechanisms explain the relationship between tourism dynamics and infrastructure investment? The study employs a bibliometric analysis of the recent literature, combined with a theoretical synthesis inspired by Grounded Theory, to identify emerging conceptual relationships in recent scientific contributions. The results highlight three main contributions. First, they confirm the bidirectional nature of the relationship between tourism and infrastructure. Second, the analysis identifies several key explanatory mechanisms, notably economic incentives, territorial competitiveness strategies, and public governance dynamics. Third, the study proposes an integrative conceptual framework for tourism-led infrastructure development. These findings enrich the literature on tourism and territorial development and have useful implications for the design of public policies related to infrastructure investment.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080216

Authors: Alexis-Raúl Garzón-Paredes

Heritage tourism is central to Spain’s cultural and territorial development, but its spatial distribution and intensity are still unevenly understood. This study analyzes heritage tourism in Spain as a territorially differentiated phenomenon by comparing provincial differences in tourism intensity, heritage tourism density, and cultural heritage concentration. Drawing on official experimental statistics from the National Institute of Statistics of Spain, the analysis integrates mobile phone geolocation data from 181,670,728 devices across 3214 destinations, tourism expenditure information, and a Heritage Concentration Index constructed for architectural cultural heritage. Four one-way ANOVA models were applied to assess differences among Spain’s 52 provinces in the Internal Tourism Intensity Index, External Tourism Intensity Index, Heritage Tourism Density, and Heritage Concentration Index. Hochberg-adjusted post hoc comparisons and Tukey HSD robustness checks were used to examine interprovincial differences, while Welch ANOVA and Moran’s I were added to assess robustness and spatial structure. The results show statistically significant territorial differences across all four indicators, indicating that heritage tourism in Spain is not spatially homogeneous. The study contributes an integrated, data-driven approach for measuring heritage tourism at the provincial scale and provides diagnostic evidence that may inform differentiated tourism planning, destination management, and more balanced heritage-based territorial strategies.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080215

Authors: Zeynep Bayramoğlu

Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly transforming tourism management by improving operational efficiency, enhancing visitor experiences, and supporting sustainability objectives. However, existing studies primarily focus on individual AI technologies and lack a comprehensive framework for comparing their sustainability performance. Therefore, this study evaluates and ranks major AI applications used in tourism management from a sustainability perspective. An integrated Entropy–TOPSIS framework was developed to assess six AI applications: Generative AI Systems, AI Chatbots, Digital Twin Systems, Smart Destination Management, Smart Governance, and Open Data Tourism Platforms. Ten evaluation criteria covering economic, environmental, social, managerial, and ethical dimensions were identified through a comprehensive literature review. The Entropy method was employed to determine objective criterion weights, while the TOPSIS method was used to rank the alternatives. The results indicate that personalization capability, privacy and ethical risk, and energy efficiency are the most discriminating evaluation criteria, with weights of 0.2217, 0.2190, and 0.2108, respectively. Smart Destination Management achieved the highest sustainability performance (CC = 0.5968), followed closely by Digital Twin Systems (CC = 0.5950) and Open Data Tourism Platforms (CC = 0.4978). The findings suggest that AI applications integrating sustainability-oriented destination management, operational intelligence, and personalized visitor services outperform solutions focusing on isolated technological functions. The proposed framework offers a practical decision support tool for tourism managers and policymakers seeking to prioritize AI investments that maximize sustainability outcomes while supporting responsible digital transformation.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080214

Authors: Mohammad Ashequr Rahman Rashed Al Karim Dewan Niamul Karim Mukti Talukdar Anwar Hossain

Employee empowerment is critical in today’s globalised era because it helps employees make rapid decisions and adapt swiftly to workplace changes and boosts both employee and organisational performance. However, it remains a commonly misunderstood term in the workplace, as many managers view empowerment practices as a threat to their control. Many managers fail to recognise the importance of employee empowerment and how it affects satisfaction, commitment, learning, and organisational performance, believing that empowering subordinates would weaken their authority and influence. Using social exchange theory, this study examined the mediating roles of job satisfaction and organisational commitment, and the moderating role of organisational learning, in the relationship between employee empowerment and organisational performance. The study gathered data from 362 employees working in five-, four-, and three-star hotels in the Chattogram and Cox’s Bazar regions. Using Smart-PLS, structural equation modelling was applied to analyse the data. Employee empowerment is positively associated with job satisfaction, organisational commitment, learning, and performance. Similarly, job satisfaction and organisational commitment mediate the relationship between employee empowerment and organisational performance. Finally, organisational learning moderates the same relationship. This study contributes significantly to the literature by being one of the few studies on the hotel industry in Bangladesh that provides a comprehensive overview of employee empowerment and its impact on organisational performance, particularly emphasising the mediating roles of job satisfaction and organisational commitment and the moderating role of organisational learning.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7080213

Authors: Jangheon Han Kabsoo An

This original empirical study examines how online discourse on fair tourism in Korea was structured and transformed during the post-pandemic tourism transition. Using unstructured online text data collected from Korean digital platforms, the study compares two periods: the pandemic continuation and early tourism recovery period (1 June 2020–31 May 2023) and the post-endemic tourism restructuring period (1 June 2023–31 May 2026). Fair tourism is conceptualized as a practical and policy-oriented discourse that connects local participation, benefit distribution, market fairness, destination governance, and tourism justice, rather than as a simple synonym for sustainable or responsible tourism. After text cleaning, morphological analysis, and keyword refinement, the top 50 core keywords for each period were analyzed using frequency analysis, degree and closeness centrality analysis, semantic network visualization, and CONCOR analysis. The results show that first-period discourse centered on regions, public policy, support projects, fair ecotourism, the social economy, resident participation, and local recovery. In contrast, second-period discourse was more strongly associated with foreign tourists, international tourism recovery, accommodation and service use, price fairness, overcharging and unfairness controversies, and sustainable destination governance. This study extends fair tourism research by revealing how fair tourism is constructed and rearticulated through digitally mediated public discourse.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070212

Authors: Aleksandar Racz Ljerka Armano

Guided forest bathing is increasingly incorporated into resort wellness portfolios, yet tourism evaluations often report average programme outcomes without examining how guests differ at entry or what the findings imply for product and service design. This prospective one-group pre–post field study examined a three-day guided forest bathing programme delivered as part of the organised wellness offer of a forest-rich Northern Adriatic resort. Of 150 enrolled adults, 132 provided matched questionnaires. Six study-specific experiential and relational dimensions were assessed before and after the programme: nature connectedness, restorative perception, sensory awareness, environmental-ethical sensitivity, planetary health orientation, and intention to continue nature-based self-care. All six post-programme scores were higher after Holm adjustment. The largest standardised differences were observed for sensory awareness (mean difference = 0.91, Cohen’s dz = 1.42), restorative perception (mean difference = 0.61, Cohen’s dz = 1.17), and future nature-based self-care (mean difference = 0.59, Cohen’s dz = 1.04). Change in sensory awareness correlated with change in restorative perception (r = 0.62) and nature connectedness (r = 0.58). Previous nature contact, nature-related hobbies, and spiritual-existential orientation predicted baseline nature connectedness, whereas integrative health orientation, wellness self-care, spirituality, and expectations predicted baseline future self-care. In baseline-adjusted models, lower previous forest contact was associated with higher post-programme sensory awareness. Because the study had no control group, these differences cannot be attributed specifically to guided forest bathing rather than to the wider resort stay, time away from routine, recreation, social interaction, expectancy, or repeated measurement. Co-created restorative value is proposed only as an interpretive framework and was not measured as a construct. For tourism and hospitality management, the findings generate testable decisions concerning guest onboarding, adaptive facilitation, guide training, expectation management, and the development of low-infrastructure nature-based wellness products.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070211

Authors: Aleksandar Racz Ljerka Armano

Experience has become a central source of competitiveness in wellness tourism, yet natural features in resorts often remain passive scenery rather than deliberately designed service content. This prospective, four-group randomised controlled service-evaluation study examined whether brief nature-based wellness micro-interventions developed from natural elements already present in a coastal health and wellness resort were associated with more favourable immediate evaluations of experience quality, satisfaction, perceived innovativeness, added value, and recommendation intention. Of 120 adult hotel guests randomly allocated in equal proportions to cloud noticing, forest therapy elements, active control, or standard stay, 114 completed the final evaluation. A contextually adapted 22-item instrument based on service-performance logic and tourism-experience research was used. The forest-therapy-elements and cloud-noticing conditions showed the most favourable overall evaluation profiles, followed by active control and standard stay. The clearest differentiation concerned perceived innovativeness, while recommendation intention was most strongly associated with perceived added value and satisfaction. These findings are relevant to wellness-tourism development because they indicate that natural elements already present in a resort may acquire additional perceived service value when translated into structured, facilitated, and place-sensitive guest activities. Because outcomes were immediate self-reports obtained in a single resort and participants and facilitators could not be blinded, the findings should not be interpreted as proof of lasting behavioural effects. They suggest a promising low-infrastructure service-development pathway whose effects on actual recommendation, repeat visitation, willingness to pay, loyalty, and destination outcomes require confirmation in multi-site and longitudinal research.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070210

Authors: Chutimant Boonnual Tawat Boonnual

Community-based tourism (CBT) destinations create sustainability value that tourists may not fully observe during short visits. This study examines how perceived sustainability communication is associated with tourist support. Its originality lies in showing that sustainability communication in CBT is not directly associated with destination image or behavioral intention but appears to operate through destination personality as a symbolic interpretation mechanism before destination evaluation. Drawing on signaling theory and the stimulus–organism–response framework, perceived sustainability communication is conceptualized as a sustainability signal, destination personality as symbolic interpretation, destination image as cognitive–affective evaluation, and behavioral intention as tourist support. Data from 390 domestic tourists visiting six CBT destinations in Surat Thani Province, Thailand, were analyzed using PLS-SEM. The results show that perceived sustainability communication was associated with destination personality, which was subsequently associated with destination image and behavioral intention. Destination image was also associated with behavioral intention, while the direct associations with destination image and behavioral intention were not significant. Destination personality and destination image sequentially mediated the relationship. IPMA identified destination personality as the primary managerial priority, followed by destination image. The findings suggest that sustainability messages become behaviorally meaningful through symbolic interpretation and destination evaluation.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070209

Authors: Paula C. Ferreira-Gomes Miguel Fuentes-Collado David Algaba-Navarro José E. Ramos-Ruiz

The growth in the number of half-marathon participants reflects a transformation from performance-centred participation towards sporting experiences of a social and hybrid nature, with a great capacity to generate tourism flows. This study examines the social motivational structure of participants in the Bidasoa Half Marathon and identifies distinct profiles based on their social motivations. In this event, with a strong tourism appeal, 59.15% of respondents reside outside the Bidasoa region, a characteristic already recognised by the organisers, who promote parallel social activities aimed at enhancing the participant experience and encouraging overnight stays. A self-administered questionnaire was distributed to all runners registered for the 2025 edition (N = 1496), yielding 284 valid responses (an 18.98% response rate). The instrument measured three specific dimensions: event inclusivity, face-to-face socialisation, and digital interaction/validation. Exploratory and Confirmatory Factor Analyses validated a robust three-dimensional model explaining 85.04% of the total variance, with adequate reliability and convergent and discriminant validity indices. Inclusivity emerged as the primary motivational driver, followed by digital interaction and physical socialisation. Furthermore, cluster analysis identified three segments: the Inclusive Runner (38.03%), characterised by a high valuation of inclusivity and low digital interest; the Connected Runner (31.34%), with high and balanced scores across the three dimensions and a peak score in digital interaction; and the Autonomous Runner (30.63%), displaying low levels across all social dimensions. Significant associations with age, gender, and educational attainment evidence the inherent heterogeneity of the participants. Consequently, the findings extend traditional models by integrating social and digital dimensions, thereby providing strategic implications for the contemporary management of sporting events.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070208

Authors: Wanbao Ge Suraiyati Binti Rahman

AI-based interpretation is increasingly used in heritage tourism, yet its relationship with stewardship-relevant visitor responses remains insufficiently theorised. Drawing on the stimulus-organism-response framework, this study examines how visitor-perceived AI-based interpretation is associated with emotional experience and conservation-oriented behavioural intention at the Emei Mountain-Leshan Giant Buddha World Heritage Site in China. Survey data from 418 adult visitors collected in 2025 were analysed using partial least squares structural equation modelling. AI-based interpretation was positively associated with perceived authenticity (β = 0.657), parasocial interaction (β = 0.530), emotional experience (β = 0.355), and conservation-oriented behavioural intention (β = 0.117). The direct association with conservation-oriented behavioural intention was small. Approximately four-fifths of the total AII-CBI association was accounted for by statistically significant indirect pathways through authenticity, parasocial interaction, and emotional experience. Emotional experience was the strongest proximal predictor of conservation-oriented behavioural intention (β = 0.422). Supplementary indirect-effect and moderation analyses further indicate that authenticity-based and relation-based pathways link AI interpretation with stewardship-oriented intention, and that the AII-authenticity association is stronger among first-time visitors. These findings extend smart-tourism research beyond technology acceptance by showing how AI interpretation can operate as a heritage-communication resource when it is perceived as authentic, socially engaging, and emotionally meaningful.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070207

Authors: Juergen Weimann Marie Schönlein

This study investigates how restaurant guests in Germany evaluate digital service technologies and examines whether perceived digital service quality contributes to overall perceived service quality. Drawing on SERVQUAL, DINESERV, the Technology Acceptance Model, and self-service technology research, a quantitative cross-sectional online survey was conducted with N = 235 restaurant guests across Germany. Seven digital touchpoints along the restaurant customer journey were assessed, ranging from online reservation and contactless payment to chatbots and service robots. Data were analyzed using Spearman rank-order correlations, hierarchical linear regression, and Welch-corrected one-way ANOVAs. Results show that contactless payment and online reservation are the most frequently used and most positively evaluated digital services, whereas chatbots and service robots are rarely used and broadly rejected. Perceived digital service quality was significantly and positively associated with overall service quality (ρ = 0.32, p < 0.01), perceived experience improvement (ρ = 0.39, p < 0.01), and recommendation intention (ρ = 0.24, p < 0.01). Quality perceptions were stable across demographic subgroups, while general digital attitudes varied by gender and technology affinity. The findings suggest that restaurant operators should prioritize investment in transactional digital tools while maintaining human service as the experiential core of the dining experience, as digital technologies function as complements to rather than substitutes for personal service.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070206

Authors: Marko Šostar Emiliano Gallaga Murrieta Ayodele Christoper Oniku

This study examines the role of smart digital systems in shaping the tourist experience, with a particular focus on perceived safety, comfort, and convenience, and their relationship with satisfaction and future intention to use digital services. The research was conducted on a sample of 104 respondents using a structured questionnaire and a quantitative research design. Data were analyzed using Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient and the Mann–Whitney U test. The results show that perceived comfort and convenience had the strongest positive association with satisfaction with the tourist experience, whereas perceived safety showed a weaker positive association. Satisfaction, perceived effectiveness of smart technologies in larger destinations, and comfort were positively associated with the intention to use smart digital services. The findings also indicate that perceived digital competence positively affects perceived safety and comfort, while gender differences were not statistically significant. The study contributes to the smart tourism literature by proposing and empirically examining an integrated conceptual framework that simultaneously considers perceived safety, comfort and convenience, satisfaction, and behavioral intention in the context of smart tourism technologies. The results highlight the importance of developing simple, intuitive, and user-oriented digital solutions in tourism.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070205

Authors: Irina Canco Drita Kruja

This study examines green skills and sustainability readiness in Albania’s tourism sector using survey data from 224 tourism organizations operating across five subsectors and several regions of the country. The analysis focuses on current environmental management capabilities, future skill requirements, environmental training, and green investment. The conceptual framing combines the literature on green skills and Green Human Resource Management. Descriptive statistics, reliability analysis, paired-samples t-tests, independent-samples t-tests, one-way analysis of variance, Spearman correlations, and ordinary least squares regression were employed. The findings show that current green skills are moderate, while future skill requirements are significantly higher, indicating a substantial skills gap. The largest gaps are observed in sustainable transport promotion and climate change knowledge. Organizations providing environmental training report stronger current green skills and greater sustainability readiness than those that do not. Green investment is also positively associated with current environmental capability. In addition, significant differences emerge across tourism subsectors, while size effects appear less consistent. The regression results confirm that environmental training and green investment are important predictors of current green skills. The study contributes to the literature by extending empirical evidence on green skills to an underexplored Southeast European context and by linking green skills with sustainability readiness in tourism organizations. The findings suggest that the green transition in tourism depends not only on environmental intent but also on organizational learning and investment.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070204

Authors: Merita Gecaj Emiljan Mustaqe Edmond Kadiu

Agritourism has emerged as an increasingly important strategy for rural diversification and multifunctional agricultural development, particularly in transition economies characterized by fragmented farm structures, limited rural investment capacity, and growing tourism demand. Despite the expansion of agricultural support schemes aimed at promoting rural diversification, empirical evidence on their effectiveness in supporting agritourism development at the farm level remains limited, especially in Southeast European contexts. Against this background, the study addresses the following research question: To what extent have agricultural support schemes contributed to agritourism development, rural diversification, and rural resilience in Albania, and what factors constrain their long-term effectiveness? To answer this question, the study examines the role of agricultural support schemes in shaping agritourism development in Albania, with particular emphasis on farm diversification, rural resilience, and implementation constraints. The study adopts a mixed-methods case study approach, combining secondary policy and statistical analysis with primary field research. The fieldwork involved 60 semi-structured, face-to-face interviews with agritourism farm owners across the regions of Korçë, Berat, Vlorë, Shkodër, and Lezhë, conducted during September–October 2025. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and thematic analysis to assess investment patterns, perceived socio-economic impacts, and institutional barriers associated with agricultural support schemes. The results show that agricultural support schemes primarily function as catalysts for investment and diversification rather than stand-alone drivers of sustainable rural transformation. However, persistent structural constraints were identified, including administrative complexity, limited marketing capacity, infrastructure deficiencies, and a strong dependence on seasonal tourism demand. These factors reduce the long-term sustainability and scalability of agritourism enterprises. The paper contributes to the literature on agritourism and rural development by providing empirical evidence from the context of a transition economy and demonstrating that financial support alone is insufficient to ensure sustainable rural transformation.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070203

Authors: Alessandro Munoz JdeS

Hotel distribution decisions are commonly analysed through objective performance indicators such as costs, profitability, and revenue outcomes. However, in multichannel environments characterised by attribution challenges and overlapping customer journeys, managerial evaluations and realised booking outcomes may reflect different dimensions of channel importance. This study examined the relationship between perceived channel efficiency and realised booking allocation in urban hotels. Survey data were collected from 54 three- to five-star hotels in Madrid, Spain, of which 49 provided complete channel-level information. Using non-parametric analyses, the study investigates whether managers’ evaluations of channel efficiency are associated with observed booking-share allocations across distribution channels. The results reveal two complementary patterns. First, perceived channel efficiency is positively associated with realised booking share within individual channels. Second, a notable divergence emerges between perceived channel efficiency and realised booking allocation: direct channels receive the highest efficiency evaluations, whereas online intermediaries account for the largest share of bookings. This finding suggests that channels most valued by managers are not necessarily those generating the greatest booking volumes. The study contributes to hospitality distribution research by linking managerial evaluations to observed allocation outcomes and by highlighting a distinction between perceived channel efficiency and realised channel dependence. Rather than viewing channel allocation solely as a performance-optimisation problem, the findings suggest that managerial evaluations are closely associated with observed allocation patterns in multichannel environments. The results also underscore the value of complementing managerial judgement with systematic channel-performance benchmarking.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070202

Authors: Seung Chul Yoo

Food festivals have become important instruments of regional tourism development, destination branding, agricultural promotion, and cultural policy. Yet the authenticity of food festivals is often evaluated through visitor perception or promotional discourse, leaving limited room for scalable assessment across large festival systems. This study develops a Location Quotient (LQ)-based framework for measuring agricultural embeddedness as a supply-side structural condition that can support objective material authenticity claims. Using a dataset of 277 South Korean regional food festivals, the study examines how featured food materials are connected to regional agricultural specialization and how this structural connection compares with budget scale, infrastructure, and material-duplication factors in explaining administrative visitor attendance and portfolio-level governance patterns. The results show that agricultural embeddedness is unevenly distributed across the national festival portfolio. Festival budget is the strongest predictor of log-transformed visitor attendance, whereas agricultural embeddedness is not significantly associated with visitor attendance after budget and infrastructure controls are included. Material-level duplication is useful as a portfolio diagnostic for identifying crowded food categories where place-product credibility may become strategically important. Scenario-based portfolio comparisons provide planning benchmarks suggesting that targeted restructuring and reallocation would be associated with higher average agricultural embeddedness under specified portfolio assumptions, although these scenarios should not be interpreted as causal forecasts. The study contributes to food tourism, event governance, and destination branding research by offering a reproducible way to assess the material grounding of food festival authenticity claims and by shifting policy discussion from festival proliferation toward portfolio quality.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070201

Authors: Fabiano Llanaj Dejsi Qorri Krisztián Kovács

Agritourism is increasingly intersecting with digital technologies to foster rural resilience, economic growth, and sustainable development. This study conducts a comprehensive systematic bibliometric review to map the intellectual structure, thematic evolution, and collaborative networks characterizing the digitalization of agritourism from 2010 to 2025. Guided by the PRISMA framework, data from the Scopus database were analyzed using scientific mapping techniques, including keyword co-occurrence, thematic evolution tracking, and spatial collaboration analysis. The findings reveal a paradigm shift categorized into three evolutionary phases: an incubation period of basic web adoption (2011–2017), a disruptive phase catalyzed by the COVID-19 pandemic (2018–2022), and an exponential maturation phase driven by Industry 4.0 technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), Big Data, and Virtual Reality (2023–2025). Four primary thematic clusters emerged: digital marketing and connectivity, smart tourism and advanced analytics, immersive technologies for heritage preservation, and macro-level sustainability policies. Geopolitically, research is driven by two distinct networks: an Asian-centric hub led by China focusing on state-sponsored smart villages, and a Western hub anchored by the USA and Italy emphasizing entrepreneurial diversification. The study concludes that digitalization has transitioned from a reactive survival mechanism to a proactive strategic necessity. It highlights the critical need to bridge the digital divide through human capital investment and provides a future research agenda focusing on the ethical application of AI, the circular economy, and the preservation of rural authenticity in emerging ’phygital’ environments.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070200

Authors: Ana-Maria Dinu Ana-Irina Nicolau Doina Maria Tilea

Dark tourism (travel to sites of death, disaster and collective trauma) is increasingly mediated by AI-driven content systems, but the conditions under which visitors accept AI interpretation tools in emotionally sensitive heritage contexts remain empirically unexplored. Our study examines the cultural, experiential and affective predictors of AI/immersive technology acceptance among Romanian dark tourism consumers. A quantitative cross-sectional survey (n = 232, predominantly urban respondents, January–March 2026) measured cultural belonging, prior visit experience, dominant emotional response, perceived educational value and technology acceptance; data were analyzed using non-parametric inference and bootstrapped mediation. The results are organized within a descriptive framework we term the Interpretive Legitimation Mechanism (ILM): perceived educational value fully mediates the effect of prior experience on AI acceptance (95.5% of total effect) and partially mediates the effect of cultural belonging (36.4%), while emotional state and gender conditionally moderate receptivity (fascination-dominant visitors show the highest openness and sadness-dominant visitors the lowest). These findings characterize the conditions of receptivity to AI mediation, a necessary precondition for any subsequent influence, and indicate that acceptance in dark tourism is primarily an interpretive and cultural phenomenon rather than a technological one.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070199

Authors: Pil Nhut Le Thuong Khac Vo Han Dinh Pham

This study examined the extent to which corporate social responsibility (CSR) dimensions shaped hotel reputation (REP) through customer trust (TRU), and whether customer engagement (ENG) moderated this relationship in the Mekong Delta context. Although prior studies had acknowledged the importance of CSR in shaping customer perceptions, they had paid limited attention to the distinct effects of multidimensional CSR and the conditions under which TRU was transformed into REP. A structured questionnaire survey was administered to 874 hotel guests in the Mekong Delta, Vietnam. The measurement scales were adapted from previous studies and refined through a pilot test. Partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM), together with bootstrapping, was used to test the direct, mediating, and moderating effects. CSR dimensions exhibited heterogeneous effects. Customer-oriented responsibility had the strongest impact on both TRU and REP, followed by environmental and economic responsibilities. Legal responsibility directly enhanced REP but did not significantly affect TRU, whereas community responsibility strengthened TRU without directly influencing REP. TRU significantly improved REP and mediated most CSR–REP relationships. ENG positively moderated the TRU–REP link, amplifying reputational outcomes. The study contributed to CSR and hospitality research by modeling CSR as a multidimensional construct and by identifying ENG as a boundary condition that strengthened the TRU–REP mechanism. Managers should prioritize customer-focused CSR and enhance engagement to maximize reputational gains.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070198

Authors: Onur Akbulut Yakin Ekin Tunahan Celik Gulnihal Sakrak Ekin

In the literature on dark tourism, conceptual diversity has often been addressed as a definitional or thematic problem. This study was conducted to identify the dominant epistemological orientations in a focused corpus of 172 English-language, open access articles indexed in Scopus that explicitly use the term dark tourism. An additional aim was to describe the temporal and methodological distributions of these articles. The articles were analysed using qualitative content analysis on a systematically constructed corpus. They were coded in terms of representational/heritage-centred, functional/social practice, motivational/audience-typology, experiential/affective, and activity-based/performative visitor orientations. Thirty-five randomly selected articles were re-coded by a second researcher, who was blind to the initial coding decisions. The percentage agreement for the dominant orientation was 71.4%, with Cohen’s κ = 0.641, and the percentage agreement for method classification was 94.3%, with κ = 0.888. In the post-consensus distribution, the representation/heritage orientation was the largest category, with 54 articles. Motivation, experience, and performative visitor orientations together constituted 52.3% of the corpus. These findings do not indicate a linear paradigm shift but rather a descriptive pattern in which different forms of knowledge production coexist within the corpus examined. This study extends beyond thematic classification by providing evidence for and explaining how dark tourism is constructed as an object of inquiry. The results should be interpreted only with respect to the defined Scopus-based open access corpus.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070197

Authors: Jorge Alexander Mora Forero

This research aims to analyze audiovisual productions related to the development of tourism at the Armero ruins and the visitor experience in the area. The methodology used is qualitative and was carried out in two phases. This research began in August 2023 with interviews with visitors to Armero and a content analysis of YouTube videos that recount the Armero tragedy. The impact on collective memory and the sense of belonging among visitors is highlighted. The visitors’ personal productions show that the experience in Armero becomes an emotional journey, where history is tangled with the hope of rebuilding the social fabric and honoring the memory of the thousands who lost their lives. This research reveals a range of emotions: from awe at the natural beauty to respect and sadness when remembering the tragedy that buried this prosperous Colombian city in 1985. In conclusion, the importance of preserving historical memory is evident, so that tragedies like Armero’s are not forgotten and can promote reflection on natural risk management and community resilience.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070196

Authors: André Riani Costa Perinotto Ángel Rodríguez-Pallas Priscila Cembranel

Official tourism websites play an important role before travel, when potential visitors look for information and begin to form expectations about a destination. However, studies of these websites have often followed separate lines of analysis, treating marketing, communication, and tourism management as distinct fields. This article proposes a framework for examining these dimensions within a single analytical structure. The study is qualitative and exploratory, and is based on documentary analysis of institutional tourism websites. The framework draws on three theoretical foundations: established website evaluation criteria from international tourism organizations, a communicational and participatory approach to digital media, and the integrated 7Cs + 1C marketing model. From these sources, dimensions, categories, and indicators are defined for the analysis of official destination websites. The findings suggest that these portals shape destination image before travel through content, images, navigation, interaction resources, and institutional discourse. The illustrative application of the framework suggests weaknesses in direct interaction, multilingual provision, and international reach. The proposed framework can support comparative research on digital tourism and future assessments of official tourism websites. As an exploratory and qualitative proposal, however, it should be understood as an initial analytical structure that still requires further testing and validation.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070195

Authors: Tao Mei Mahachai Sattayathamrongthian

Artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping tourism service operations, smart tourism ecosystems, and digital customer engagement, yet many tourism SMEs still struggle to convert AI readiness into operational capability and firm performance. This study develops a staged capability-conversion model that integrates the Technology-Organization-Environment (TOE) framework, Social Cognitive Theory, the Resource-Based View, and Dynamic Capabilities Theory. Using a quantitative cross-sectional design, data were collected from employees and managers of tourism SMEs, particularly small and medium-sized travel agencies in mainland China. After data screening, 433 valid responses were analyzed using exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, covariance-based structural equation modeling, and 5000-resample bootstrap mediation testing. The results suggest that organizational readiness is the most consistent readiness-related antecedent, digital self-efficacy is positively associated with AI adoption and operational capability, and operational capability shows the strongest direct association with perceived firm performance. These findings are consistent with the view that AI-enabled value in tourism SMEs is associated less with technology adoption alone than with the conversion of readiness into behavioral and operational capabilities.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070194

Authors: Loan Thanh Thi Dang

Tourism destinations increasingly operate through digital platforms, real-time data, and online connectivity tools, yet service coordination among stakeholders remains constrained. This study analyses how tourism logistics information is created, updated, verified, shared, and used in service coordination at coastal destinations in Vietnam’s South Central Coast subregion. The study adopts a multi-stakeholder qualitative case study design, in which qualitative data from 42 participants provide the main source of evidence, while a supplementary descriptive survey of 358 participants is used only to contextualise and clarify selected issues within the sample. The findings show that existing digital tools and information channels support information search, transaction confirmation, operational coordination, and service feedback. However, coordination at the destination and inter-provincial levels remains limited when information flows are fragmented across stakeholders, channels or platforms, data or procedures, and local or regional spaces. On this basis, the study conceptualises the Tourism Logistics Information System (TLIS) as a socio-technical, inter-organisational, and coordination-oriented structure in which the value of information depends on the extent to which data are updated, verified, shared, and translated into coordinated action among stakeholders. The paper contributes to research on smart destinations, destination governance, and tourism supply chains by clarifying information fragmentation (IF) as a mechanism that constrains service coordination in inter-provincial coastal destination contexts.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070193

Authors: Wiparat Suralai Thittarat Pimpaporn Nuthawut Sabsombat

The rapid growth of the pet-humanisation trend has generated a distinct segment of tourists who regard pets as family members and seek travel experiences that accommodate both human and animal needs. This study examines the causal relationships among service quality, destination image, perceived value, and travel intention among Thai pet-humanising tourists. Using a quantitative approach, data were collected from 280 Thai respondents with experience or interest in pet-friendly tourism and analyzed via Structural Equation Modelling (SEM). The findings indicate that service quality and destination image significantly enhance perceived value, which subsequently exerts the strongest positive effect on travel intention. While service quality directly increases travel intention, destination image demonstrates a significant negative direct effect but a positive indirect effect through perceived value, highlighting a competitive mediation mechanism. By extending value-based behavioural models to this emerging segment, the study suggests that tourism and hospitality operators should prioritise tangible pet-friendly infrastructure and value-enhancing experiences over mere destination image, supporting the strategic development of inclusive pet-friendly destinations.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070192

Authors: Pietro Radaelli Antonella Senese Maurizio Maugeri Guglielmina Adele Diolaiuti

The Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympic Games represent a significant departure from traditional mega-event models due to their markedly polycentric territorial structure. This study investigates the sustainability of this “decentralized” model by analyzing the environmental impact of mobility flows across a vast geographic area. Adopting a methodological approach, the research integrates historical attendance data from previous Winter Games with official projections and travel time simulations to model the event’s carbon footprint. Specifically, the framework quantifies gas emissions by categorizing mobility flows into external international travel and internal inter-cluster transit. The analysis highlights a significant discrepancy between the stated sustainability objectives and the actual implementation of the infrastructural plan. Findings reveal that the total carbon debt is heavily driven by international travel, yet the localized impact on Alpine clusters remains critical due to a persistent reliance on road infrastructure over rail systems. The results suggest a “paradox of decentralized sustainability”, where the benefits of reusing existing sporting venues are offset by the environmental costs of connecting geographically fragmented sites. We conclude that without a robust and efficient public transport network, territorial dispersion acts as a catalyst for widespread anthropogenic pressure on fragile mountain ecosystems, challenging the long-term ecological legacy of the event. By empirically exposing these dynamics, this study offers a novel evaluative framework for assessing the true sustainability of distributed governance in future mega-events.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070191

Authors: Riefky Krisnayana Engkus Kuswarno Feliza Zubair Evi Novianti

Sustainable rural tourism governance in the Global South faces a persistent challenge: enabling genuine community participation in destination management while protecting environmental assets and cultural heritage. This study examines participatory governance practices at Kampung Senyum Homestay, Cibeusi Village, West Java, Indonesia, a community-based tourism (CBT) initiative that has sustained operations for over eight years, despite a 60% failure rate among comparable initiatives. A qualitative case study design was employed, with data collected over six months (November 2022–May 2023) through participant observation (12 days), in-depth interviews with 14 stakeholders, and document analysis. Data were analyzed using Miles et al.’s interactive model and critical discourse analysis. Findings reveal three interrelated participation layers shaping tourism governance outcomes: interpersonal engagement fostering horizontal host–guest relationships (89% of tourists report kinship-based experiences); deliberative governance through musyawarah desa enabling community-led environmental stewardship, including the collective rejection of a proposal to bring 100 tourists monthly to protect waterfall ecosystems; and digital storytelling by youth extending local heritage narratives globally (150 posts, 7.2% engagement rate). The study proposes a ‘layered participation’ model demonstrating that tourism sustainability depends on participatory governance mechanisms that build social trust, integrate traditional ecological knowledge, and balance economic development with environmental conservation and cultural heritage management. The study also critically examines structural inequalities, including gender asymmetries, unequal benefit distribution, and linguistic barriers, that persist within participatory governance structures, offering a contextually grounded governance framework for rural tourism destinations in the Global South.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070190

Authors: Reyner Pérez-Campdesuñer Yaumara González-Sainz Carlos Zambrano-Cancañón Gelmar García-Vidal Rodobaldo Martínez-Vivar Alexander Sánchez-Rodríguez

This study assesses perceived changes associated with the application of a structured co-creation process to the redesign of an authentic rural tourism product by aligning local resources, stakeholder knowledge, and potential users’ expectations. The empirical context is Salinas de Guaranda, Ecuador, where a tourism product was redesigned and evaluated through an applied one-group pretest–posttest design involving a purposive evaluation panel of 28 participants, including tourism stakeholders, local representatives, and potential users with direct knowledge of the product and destination. The assessment covered perceived preference fit, learning opportunities, participation in activities, social interaction potential, memorability, purchase intention, and willingness to share experiences, all measured using five-point Likert scales. The results show statistically significant perceived improvements across all indicators after the redesign, even after applying the Bonferroni correction for multiple comparisons (p < 0.00556). The largest increases were observed in satisfaction with interests and preferences (Δ = 1.32; dz = 2.78), purchase intention (Δ = 1.21; dz = 1.32), and learning (Δ = 1.07; dz = 2.83). Significant increases were also found in perceived interaction with the local community (Δ = 0.64), participation in activities (Δ = 0.55), memorability (Δ = 0.82), and willingness to share experiences. These findings suggest that structured co-creation may help strengthen the perceived fit between rural tourism products and user expectations while enhancing the anticipated experiential and relational potential of authentic tourism products, including situated learning, active participation, and social interaction. The article contributes applied pre–post evidence on how participatory tourism design may support more marketable, memorable, and locally grounded rural tourism experiences, while recognizing that the design does not establish definitive causal effects.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070189

Authors: Xinyan Zhang Pimtong Tavitiyaman Mingfang Zhu

By linking the technology–organization–environment (TOE) framework with dynamic capabilities, this research investigates the various organizational enablers for Industry 4.0 technology (I4T) adoption in the hotel industry, and the relationship between I4T and overall hotel performance during the supply chain disturbances. The proposed model was tested using data collected from hotel executives in Hong Kong and Shenzhen, China. Results revealed that perceived benefits, technology readiness, and supply chain partner pressure were significant predictors for I4T adoption by hotels. The direct positive relationship between I4T and overall hotel performance during disruptions was not found. This relationship was mediated by the hotel’s supply chain resilience (SCR) capability, highlighting the importance of I4T and SCR for improving performance during disruptions. This study provides both theoretical insights and practical implications regarding the adoption of I4T in the hospitality sector.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070188

Authors: Mariska Prijanka Diena M. Lemy Jacob D. Tan

Crisis management has become a critical strategic concern in hospitality, particularly following the COVID-19 pandemic, which exposed limitations in conventional approaches to preparedness, response, and recovery. Although existing hospitality crisis management research has generated valuable insights into individual crisis phases, a limited understanding exists regarding how preparedness, crisis response, and organizational learning interact as an integrated strategic process across the crisis lifecycle. Addressing this gap, this study examines strategic crisis management within Jakarta’s five-star hotel sector and develops an integrated understanding of crisis management across pre-crisis, during-crisis, and post-crisis phases. A constructivist grounded theory approach was employed based on in-depth semi-structured interviews with 25 senior hospitality leaders, including hotel executives, owners, and industry association representatives. The findings suggest that crisis management is best understood as an integrated strategic capability rather than a series of discrete emergency responses. Three interrelated theoretical dimensions emerged: Continuous Strategic Preparedness, characterized by adaptive readiness, environmental sensemaking, decision readiness, and financial preparedness; Coordinated Strategic Crisis Response, encompassing liquidity discipline, operational adaptation, workforce adaptability, leadership coordination, and cross-functional alignment; and Strategic Renewal Through Organizational Learning, involving the retention of effective crisis practices, capability strengthening, and strategic reorientation toward ongoing uncertainty. The study proposes an Integrated Strategic Crisis Management Framework for Hospitality Organizations that explains the mechanisms linking preparedness, response, and organizational learning as a cyclical capability-building process. By reconceptualizing crisis management as an integrated strategic capability rather than a phase-based operational response, the study contributes to hospitality crisis management scholarship and provides practical insights for hospitality organizations operating in increasingly uncertain environments.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070187

Authors: Romina Dhora Arjeta Anamali

The concept of dark tourism has obtained significant attention in recent years, and its appeal to younger generations is a topic of great interest. This study examines the behavioral intentions of Generation Z towards dark tourism in Albania, a country with a strong cultural and historical heritage. Using a quantitative research design, the study collected data from 312 respondents and analyzed them using exploratory factor analysis and multiple regression. The results found several key variables that influence the behavioral intentions of Generation Z towards dark tourism, including attitude, motivations, social media, and perceived psychological risk. Interestingly, the study found that attitude is the strongest predictor of behavioral intentions towards dark tourism. This suggests that if young people have a positive attitude towards dark tourism, they are more likely to visit dark tourism sites. On the other hand, the variable of perceived psychological risk was found to have a negative influence on the behavioral intentions of Generation Z to visit dark tourism sites. This implies that if young people perceive dark tourism as risky or threatening, they are less likely to participate in it. The study contributes to dark tourism research by offering empirical evidence from Albania and by highlighting the importance of educational, reflective and ethically sensitive interpretation for Generation Z visitors. The findings of the study reveal the importance of developing tourism experiences that are not only educational and emotionally engaging, but also ethically based. This is particularly relevant for emerging destinations like Albania, where dark tourism remains underdeveloped despite its significant cultural and historical potential. By shaping tourism experiences for younger audiences, destinations like Albania can tap into the potential of dark tourism and offer unique, meaningful experiences for visitors.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070186

Authors: Pirapong Wongsaensee Pintusorn Onpium Chakkrapong Kuensaen Nantawan Muangyai

Social media platforms and user-generated content (UGC) have become central to how travelers discover and evaluate cultural destinations, yet lesser-known second-tier heritage sites remain substantially underrepresented in digital tourism research. This study investigates how Chinese tourists perceive and engage with the intangible cultural heritage (ICH) of Lamphun, Thailand, through UGC collected from three major Chinese social media platforms (WeChat, Douyin, and Rednote) spanning the period from 2019 to 2023. A total of 642 relevant posts were analyzed using a mixed-methods analytical framework comprising SnowNLP-based Chinese-language sentiment analysis, rule-based tourism intention classification, and TF-IDF-driven K-means thematic clustering. Results indicate an overall predominance of positive sentiment, with sentiment score emerging as the strongest predictor of tourism intention. Thematic clustering revealed three distinct experiential dimensions, with culinary heritage and contemporary local lifestyle and cafe exploration generating the highest sentiment distribution and within-cluster tourism intention rate. These findings demonstrate the analytical value of integrated UGC data mining for underrepresented ICH destinations and offer empirical insights to support data-driven destination marketing strategies and destination management organization (DMO) decision-making for the promotion of secondary cultural heritage destinations.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070185

Authors: Banji Rildwan Olaleye Bayode Olusanya Babatunde Oluwatobi Solomon Olaleye Joseph Nembo Lekunze Tshediso Joseph Sekhampu

This study claims that the Nigerian tourism and hospitality industry must shift from traditional business practices to innovative, knowledge-based approaches to remain competitive and achieve long-term wealth creation. Facing volatility, evolving consumer demands, technological change, and sustainability pressures, the sector cannot rely on outdated models. Through a quantitative survey of 391 staff and top-level managers from the Nigerian Tourism Development Corporation and tourism organizations in Southwest and North-Central Nigeria, this research tests how creativity, knowledge management, and innovation operations, defined as value creation, environment, and capability, drive wealth creation. Findings through the Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling show that innovation and knowledge management both directly and, through the mediating role of innovation operations, significantly enhance wealth creation. By highlighting how these factors interact, the study advances understanding of wealth creation dynamics between emerging and developed economies and delivers actionable recommendations for managers and policymakers to institutionalize innovation for sustainable industry growth.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7070184

Authors: Richmond Yeboah Mary Acquaye Moore Emmanuel Dornyoh Samuel Otoo Ophelia Mensah

Cape Coast is a prominent tourism destination in Ghana, distinguished by its historical landmarks, coastal ecosystems, and cultural heritage. Yet the city faces mounting threats from environmental hazards such as coastal erosion, flooding, extreme heat, and lagoon degradation, which directly compromise the sustainability of its tourism sector. Guided by the Sustainable Tourism Development Theory (STDT) and the Tourism Resilience and Adaptation Theory (TRAT), this study investigates the impacts of these hazards on tourism development, the effectiveness of current disaster risk reduction (DRR) strategies, and the roles of key stakeholders in building sectoral resilience. Using a qualitative research design, data were collected through in-depth interviews with eighteen stakeholders comprising four policymakers, six community leaders, five tourism business operators, and three representatives from non-governmental organisations, alongside documentary analysis of four institutional reports. The study contributes to the literature by demonstrating that fragmented, reactive DRR strategies and weak stakeholder coordination undermine Cape Coast’s tourism resilience, and by showing how urban natural assets, a dimension largely neglected in existing tourism–DRR scholarship, are central to both hazard exposure and adaptive capacity. The findings call for integrated, ecosystem-based DRR frameworks that align governance mechanisms with sustainable tourism imperatives.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060183

Authors: Sangkae Punyasiri Hathaichanok Chimbanrai Kornkamon Musikachat Narinsiree Chiangphan

This study examines the structural relationships among vendor competency, perceived sanitation and safety, high-value gastronomy experiences, and behavioral intentions in Bangkok’s street food tourism. Using survey data and PLS-SEM, the results indicate that vendor competency significantly enhances both perceived sanitation and safety and high-value gastronomy experiences. Perceived sanitation and safety further strengthens experiential value and partially mediates this relationship. However, contrary to conventional expectations, high-value gastronomy experiences exhibit a significant negative effect on behavioral intentions, suggesting a novelty-seeking paradox in exploratory tourism contexts. This study contributes in three ways: (1) by positioning vendor competency as a foundational driver of experiential value in informal food settings, (2) by integrating sanitation and safety into experiential value formation, and (3) by challenging the linear satisfaction–loyalty assumption through evidence of paradoxical tourist behavior. The findings offer theoretical and managerial implications for gastronomy tourism and destination management.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060182

Authors: Sinh Hoang Nguyen

In the published publication (Nguyen, 2026), there was an error regarding the affiliation; the author requested to only display his primary affiliation and remove the second affiliation (School of Marketing and International Business, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington 6140, New Zealand) in the published article [...]

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060181

Authors: Tetyana Kalaitan Iryna Danchevska Natalya Yaroshevych Iryna Kondrat

The paper investigates tourists’ willingness to pay (WTP) an increased tourist tax to support the development of accessible tourism. To achieve the research objective, a structured survey was conducted among 452 tourists who spent their holidays in the Ukrainian Carpathians. It has been confirmed that the WTP a higher tourist tax that varies significantly depending on the possible direction of its use. It has been established that in the context of a humanitarian crisis, social inclusion is a more powerful factor of tax loyalty than a traditional environmental programme. A statistically significant relationship was found between WTP an increased tourist tax for the development of accessible tourism and several factors, including respondents’ level of education, income level, frequency of tourist trips over the past five years, current trip expenditure, and perceived accessibility of infrastructure. Consumers’ willingness to voluntarily pay a tourist tax for a specific purpose may suggest that higher tax rates would be publicly acceptable, potentially generating financial resources to support the development of accessible tourism.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060180

Authors: Georgios Konstantopoulos Grigoris Giannarakis Maria Xenaki Georgios Thanasas Alexandros Garefalakis

Operational labor shortages have become a pressing challenge for hospitality organizations, especially in highly seasonal tourism destinations such as Greece, where service experiences are deeply tied to cultural identity and authentic hospitality. While much of the existing research has examined understaffing from operational or human resource management perspectives, limited attention has been paid to its impact on the organizational capacity to sustain authentic hospitality experiences. Using Service-Dominant Logic (SDL) as an interpretive framework, this study views authentic hospitality as an organizational process shaped by employee interaction, cultural transmission, and service delivery practices. Drawing on survey data from 201 hotel employees in Greece, it investigates the relationship between operational labor shortages, organizational pressures, and perceived threats to authentic hospitality within hotel operations. The findings reveal significant positive relationships between work stress and service quality decline, as well as between cultural knowledge and perceived challenges in maintaining authentic hospitality. Multiple regression analysis further shows that reactive hiring, serious understaffing, and payroll cost pressure are significantly linked to perceived challenges in sustaining authentic hospitality, while service quality decline exhibits a positive but statistically non-significant effect in the final model. The study contributes to hospitality authenticity literature by emphasizing employee perceptions of authenticity as an organizationally supported process rather than merely a guest-centered outcome. The results also highlight the importance of workforce planning, recruitment quality, and cultural onboarding in supporting authentic hospitality within Greek hotel operations.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060179

Authors: Antun Marinac Barbara Pisker

Circular economy principles are increasingly influencing tourism development strategies, particularly in rural destinations characterized by strong linkages between agriculture, gastronomy, and local economic systems. This study develops and empirically examines a conceptual model investigating the relationship between circular economy practices, gastronomy integration, perceived authenticity, and destination competitiveness within rural tourism economies. The research focuses on the role of gastronomy as a circular tourism resource capable of connecting local sourcing, sustainability, and experiential value creation. Data were collected through a stakeholder-based survey targeting tourism enterprises, local producers, destination management organizations, and hospitality providers operating in rural tourism destinations. The proposed relationships were analyzed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) implemented in SmartPLS 4 and bootstrapped mediation analysis. The findings indicate that circular economy practices positively influence gastronomy integration, while gastronomy integration significantly enhances perceived authenticity. Furthermore, authenticity demonstrates a strong positive effect on destination competitiveness. The mediation analysis confirms that gastronomy integration and perceived authenticity function as intermediary mechanisms through which circular economy practices contribute to competitiveness outcomes. The study contributes to tourism economics and destination competitiveness literature by developing and empirically testing a mediation-based framework linking circular gastronomy, authenticity, and rural tourism competitiveness. The findings provide theoretical and practical implications for destination managers and policymakers seeking to strengthen sustainability, local value creation, and competitiveness through circular gastronomy strategies.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060178

Authors: Petra Karanikić Svetlana Sokolov Mladenović Ivana Kostadinović

This study revisits the tourism–economic growth nexus in the EU-27 over 2014–2024 by combining an integrative conceptual synthesis of transmission mechanisms with a multi-method empirical strategy. We move beyond a single fixed-effects regression by integrating: (i) a dynamic panel System Generalized Method of Moments (System GMM) estimator that addresses endogeneity and persistence in growth, (ii) interaction terms between tourism intensity and moderating factors (institutional quality, human capital, trade openness), (iii) sub-sample analyses across mature versus emerging tourism destinations and Mediterranean versus Continental economies, and (iv) a Hansen-type threshold model that identifies non-linearities in the tourism–growth relationship. The baseline fixed-effects results confirm a positive and statistically significant tourism elasticity, while the dynamic and threshold specifications reveal that this effect is highly heterogeneous: it is amplified in economies with stronger institutions and higher human capital, but becomes statistically indistinguishable from zero in destinations with very high tourism intensity, consistent with congestion and overtourism mechanisms. Evidence on heterogeneous post-pandemic resilience is treated as exploratory rather than as a confirmed empirical contribution, since the present specification relies on a COVID-19 dummy and sub-sample patterns rather than a dedicated COVID-19 interaction model. The findings reposition tourism not as a uniformly positive growth engine, but as a moderated and bounded driver whose contribution depends on absorptive capacity and management quality.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060177

Authors: Meitolo Hulu Juliana Juliana

Tourism destinations increasingly rely on digitalization and innovation to strengthen their competitive position and stimulate tourists’ post-visit behaviors. However, empirical evidence explaining how tourists’ perceptions of digitalization and innovation are translated into sharing intentions, particularly from an integrated competitiveness perspective, remains limited. Addressing this gap and grounded in Service-Dominant Logic, this study investigates the relationships between digitalization perceptions, innovation perceptions, destination competitiveness, and tourists’ sharing intentions. Using a quantitative approach, data were collected from Generation Z domestic tourists who had visited digitally enabled destinations within the past 12 months. The proposed research model was tested using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM). The findings reveal that perceptions of digitalization and innovation significantly enhance destination competitiveness, which in turn positively influences tourists’ sharing intentions. Moreover, destination competitiveness is confirmed as a partial mediator in the relationships between digitalization perceptions and sharing intentions, as well as between innovation perceptions and sharing intentions. The novelty of this study lies in conceptualizing destination competitiveness as a behavioral transmission mechanism that converts perceived digital and innovative destination attributes into tourists’ voluntary sharing behavior, rather than treating digitalization and innovation as direct antecedents alone. The theoretical contribution of this study lies in reconceptualizing destination competitiveness as a dynamic value co-creation mechanism that mediates the transformation of digitalization and innovation into tourists’ sharing intentions within a Service-Dominant Logic framework.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060176

Authors: Brigitta Pécsek Ádám Gyurkó

This research explores how a multifunctional and multi-experience music institution can thrive in the 21st century. It takes the case of the House of Music Hungary that has evolved into a cultural hub over the recent years, equally appealing to locals, professionals, employees, and tourists. To lay the foundation of tying architecture and music together, this highly exploratory study used a holistic approach by discussing issues related to tangible and intangible heritage, heritage tourism, and music tradition. Data collection included official state statistics, on-site experiences, and interviews. Interviews with the architect of the project, a music historian, a musician, a cultural manager, and a tourism professional were analysed, applying interpretive phenomenological analysis. The result are presented in a kaleidoscopic framework comprising the core elements identified in the analysis. This paper contributes to the knowledge of developing heritage tourism through the interplay of architecture and music. It shows how they reinforce one another to generate complex experiences, while highlighting the importance of respecting local cultural, social and environmental circumstances. Its exploratory nature did not necessitate the inclusion of visitor interviews at this stage; however, investigating visitor satisfaction may be one of the new directions that scholars can embark on.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060175

Authors: Van Anh Thi Nguyen Thanh Tung Hoang Anh Tuan Tran Tuan Van Lai Bang Dinh Kieu

This study aims to explore and evaluate the factors influencing Gen Z’s intention to choose green tourism destinations in Hanoi, Vietnam. The paper proposes a comprehensive analytical framework by integrating the Stimulus-Organism-Response (S-O-R) model and the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB). A mixed-method approach was employed, in which quantitative data were collected from 269 Gen Z respondents in Hanoi and analyzed using the Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) technique through SmartPLS. The findings reveal that external environmental stimuli, including green destination image (GDI) and social media influence (SMI), positively affect individuals’ internal psychological states, namely environmental awareness (EA), attitude toward green tourism (ATT), and subjective norms (SM). These psychological states, in turn, exert positive effects and strongly promote Gen Z’s intention to choose green tourism destinations in Hanoi. This study not only contributes to filling the theoretical gap in sustainable tourism consumption behavior in the digital era but also provides practical managerial implications for policymakers and tourism businesses in developing communication strategies and tourism products that align with the preferences and expectations of younger generations.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060174

Authors: Duangrat Tandamrong Waraphon Klinsreesuk Jakkawat Laphet Somnuk Aujirapongpan

This study examines how international tourists’ perceptions of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) practices influence their willingness to pay a premium for community-based homestays. Grounded in signaling theory, ESG perception is conceptualized as a credibility signal that reduces perceived uncertainty in community-based accommodation settings. Data were collected from 300 international tourists visiting Mae Kampong Village, Chiang Mai, Thailand, and analyzed using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). To strengthen predictive assessment, the model was additionally evaluated using PLSpredict, Q2_predict, and the Cross-Validated Predictive Ability Test (CVPAT). The results indicate that ESG perception significantly enhances community sustainability image, trust, and booking intention. Trust partially mediates the relationships between ESG perception and both booking intention and willingness to pay a premium, while booking intention demonstrates the strongest effect on willingness to pay a premium. Community sustainability image does not directly influence booking intention but instead operates indirectly through trust. Environmental concern significantly influences willingness to pay a premium, although its moderating effect is not supported. The findings suggest that tourists in community-based homestay environments rely heavily on trust-based psychological assurance when making accommodation decisions. This study extends ESG tourism research into community-based accommodation contexts and highlights the importance of trust in high-uncertainty tourism environments. The findings also emphasize the importance of transparent ESG communication and trust-building strategies for strengthening sustainable tourism competitiveness.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060173

Authors: Carlos Jurado-Rivas Marcelino Sánchez-Rivero Antonio Hidalgo-Mateos Montaña Granados-Claver

Research on post-COVID tourism behaviour has expanded rapidly, yet inland UNESCO World Heritage cities remain underexamined, particularly in Mediterranean contexts. This study examines whether the pandemic produced durable changes in tourist behaviour and in willingness to pay for sustainable services in Cáceres, Spain. A structured face-to-face survey was administered to 421 visitors in March 2023, after public-health restrictions had been lifted. The analysis covered self-reported behavioural change, perceived impacts on different destination types, perceived effects on local sustainability objectives and changes in willingness to pay (WTP) for sustainable services. Descriptive statistics were complemented by an exploratory binary logistic regression predicting increased WTP. Because the model includes only sociodemographic predictors and shows modest fit, it is used to describe associations rather than to predict. Reported behavioural change was limited: mean scores for crowd avoidance, health–safety preferences, shorter stays and substitution towards rural and nature tourism ranged from 1.73 to 1.91 on a five-point scale. Respondents nevertheless perceived substantial spatial effects of the pandemic, particularly on natural parks (92.6%) and rural destinations (84.1%). Most believed that the pandemic had accelerated sustainability efforts mainly through greater institutional and business awareness (54.9%). WTP proved relatively stable, with 62.7% reporting no change and 26.1% an increase. Women and respondents with university education showed higher odds of reporting increased WTP. Because constructs such as institutional trust and pro-environmental values were not measured directly, these attitudes are interpreted—rather than demonstrated—as reflecting governance-related confidence and value orientations more than lingering health concerns. This governance-and-values reading is the study’s main interpretive contribution and requires confirmation with direct measures of the underlying constructs.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060172

Authors: Lucía Moreno-Rodríguez Andrés Fernández Martín Ricardo Díaz-Armas

Musical tourism has established itself as a growing segment within cultural tourism, particularly among younger generations who prioritise the experiential value of travel. Whilst prior research has focused predominantly on multi-day music festivals, other event formats remain comparatively underexplored, and their influence on how tourists perceive a destination has received limited scholarly attention. This study examines how the experiential dimensions of musical events shape event satisfaction and, in turn, relate to overall destination satisfaction. An online questionnaire was administered to 205 participants who had attended a musical event whilst visiting a tourist destination. The analysis followed a two-stage approach: first, multiple linear regression was used to identify which experiential factors drive event satisfaction; second, a partial least squares structural equation model (PLS-SEM) was employed to test the relationships between these dimensions, event satisfaction, and destination satisfaction. Findings indicate that only the musical and event atmosphere dimensions are significant predictors of event satisfaction, whereas the social and separation dimensions did not reach statistical significance in this context. Furthermore, event satisfaction is a positive predictor of destination satisfaction and acts as a mediating variable between experiential dimensions and the overall appraisal of the destination. These findings suggest that musical events may be strategically employed by tourist destinations to enhance their image and foster visitor loyalty.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060171

Authors: Thowayeb H. Hassan Amany E. Salem Ahmed Tawhid Eissa Mahmoud I. Saleh

Despite growing attention to artificial intelligence-driven job displacement, limited empirical research has examined whether and how tourists would accept AI replacing human tour guides—nor which psychological barriers drive resistance most strongly. Existing technology acceptance models assume functional evaluations predict adoption, yet this logic may fail in emotionally grounded service contexts. To address this gap, we conducted a multi-site survey testing Disappearing Jobs Theory using structural equation modeling, incorporating the constructs of Perceived Functional Equivalence, Perceived Affective Deficit, Experience-Seeking Orientation, and willingness to substitute. Results show that Perceived Functional Equivalence has a near-zero direct effect on willingness to substitute, challenging core assumptions of technology acceptance predictions. Instead, Technological Comfort and Perceived Affective Deficit emerge as the dominant predictors. Perceived Affective Deficit also suppresses job-disappearance acceptance. Experience-Seeking Orientation did not yield a statistically significant direct path in the structural model (β = −0.043, p = 0.348); however, subgroup analysis reveals that high-ESO tourists exhibit consistently lower willingness to substitute across all levels of perceived functional equivalence, indicating that ESO operates as a dispositional-level resistance factor rather than a significant individual-level structural predictor. Our core contribution is redefining Perceived Affective Deficit as a structural—not moderating—barrier to AI adoption and extending Disappearing Jobs Theory by integrating demand-side attitudinal constraints. These findings demonstrate that functional equivalence alone cannot drive substitution in experiential tourism; affective deficits must be addressed as independent adoption barriers.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060170

Authors: Eda Oruç Erdoğan Ozan Özdemir Murat Erdoğan Eren Durmuş Özdemir Şefika Özdemir

This study evaluates the demand dynamics of the 20 leading strategic destinations in the global tourism market by modeling the interactions between traditional macroeconomic determinants and climate-linked environmental sustainability indicators. The primary objective is to assess the predictive capacity of physical and structural environmental factors—including water stress, air pollution, renewable energy adoption, and sanitation infrastructure—relative to established economic metrics like GDP per capita. Employing non-parametric predictive frameworks on a panel dataset of 400 observations (2000–2019), the empirical analysis suggests that tree-based ensemble models, notably Extra Trees (90.54%) and CatBoost (84.75%), yield higher predictive accuracy than conventional multiple linear regression (73.97%). Interpretations derived from cooperative game theory via SHAP analysis suggest that environmental determinants may serve as important predictive drivers of tourism demand. Specifically, variables such as water stress (28.20%), renewable energy share (27.12%), and sanitation infrastructure carry substantial predictive weight, whereas the benchmark macroeconomic indicator (2.30%) exerts a relatively marginal influence within the model architecture. These findings imply that environmental sustainability metrics may capture international tourism demand variations more effectively than traditional economic variables. The results suggest that acute environmental vulnerabilities may be associated with reduced tourism inflows, potentially reflecting limitations in destination sustainability thresholds. Broadly, the evidence is consistent with the notion that contemporary global tourism demand may be increasingly interdependent with ecological resilience and low-carbon transition policies. It is important to note that the findings reported here reflect predictive associations derived from machine learning models and should not be interpreted as evidence of causal relationships.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060169

Authors: Wai Ming To Jennifer H. Gao Billy T. W. Yu

Virtual reality (VR) is transforming heritage tourism, yet understanding how specific technological attributes drive on-site visitation remains critical for destination marketers and policymakers. Grounded in the Stimulus–Organism–Response (SOR) model, this study investigates how VR vividness and interactivity (stimuli) influence perceived usefulness, immersion, ease of use, enjoyment, and certainty (organisms), ultimately shaping users’ on-site visitation intentions and behavioral involvement (responses) regarding Macao’s cultural heritage sites. Analyzing data from 230 users recruited via snowball sampling, the results indicate that the Ruins of St. Paul’s VR experience was the most popular (n = 113), followed by the Macao Museum (n = 95) and the Guia Fortress (n = 75). Structural equation modeling demonstrates that VR vividness and interactivity significantly influence user perceptions, which in turn impact on-site visitation intentions and behavioral involvement, with the sole exception of perceived enjoyment. These findings suggest that the “sense of presence” generated by VR significantly shapes on-site visitation intentions through internal cognitive (perceived usefulness, certainty) and combined cognitive–emotional (perceived immersion) organismic states. Conversely, perceived enjoyment has an insignificant effect on responses, while perceived ease of use, surprisingly, exerts a significant negative impact. The research offers actionable insights for developing immersive digital tools that bridge virtual engagement with tangible cultural heritage tourism in Macao.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060168

Authors: Angelo Minelli Naresh P. Nayak Senthilkumaran Piramanayagam Evan Michelson George Jarjoura

Food waste remains a persistent sustainability challenge within independent restaurants, where operational pressures, cultural norms, and resource constraints limit systematic waste management. This study examines how an industry–academia partnership enabled the co-creation of food-waste reduction practices between hospitality students and sixteen independent restaurant operators in Wellington, New Zealand. Adopting the Participatory Action Research (PAR) approach, data were gathered through semi-structured interviews with operators and focus group discussions with hospitality students. Findings reveal that food wastage in the study units is shaped by time pressure, customer service expectations, tacit kitchen routines, and uncertainty in forecasting the demand. The study identifies three mechanisms—emotional disruption, shared reflection and experimentation—through which sustainability competencies become a part in professional identity. It offers theoretical grounded and practically actionable insights for industry–academia collaboration in resource-constrained hospitality environments.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060167

Authors: José Magano

Research on dark tourism and industrial heritage has largely evolved in parallel, despite their shared focus on sites shaped by death, suffering, and socio-environmental transformation. This study aims to map and synthesise the empirical and conceptual literature at this intersection in order to clarify how the darker dimensions of industrial and mining heritage are conceptualised, experienced, and interpreted, and to develop an integrated framework for their analysis. Following the PRISMA 2020 framework, it systematically reviews 33 peer-reviewed studies published between 2009 and the first quarter of 2026. Three main findings emerge. First, sanitisation—the marginalisation of suffering and exploitation in favour of narratives of technological achievement—is a dominant feature of industrial heritage interpretation and research. Second, visitors consistently experience emotional responses to dark heritage, with distinct affective profiles linked to environmental damage, human suffering, and labour histories. Third, labour exploitation remains under-theorised despite its centrality, reflecting its structural and long-term character, which challenges event-based dark tourism models. Building on these findings, the study proposes a tripartite typology of industrial darkness and introduces the concept of the evidence landscape to explain how sites communicate difficult pasts beyond formal interpretation.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060166

Authors: Gulnihal Sakrak Ekin Yakin Ekin Onur Akbulut Tunahan Celik

The intersections between memory, space, and mobility have become increasingly prominent in tourism studies in recent years. This article examines the relationship between religious tourism and social memory by conceptualizing religious tourism as an active process of collective remembrance. While realizing this aim, it conceptualizes faith tourism as an active process of collective memory. Faith tourism possesses a wider area than the traditional classification of religious travel. This article adopts a conceptual and thematic narrative review approach. Rather than offering a systematic or meta-analytic review, it develops a theory-based interpretive framework by synthesizing interdisciplinary literature from sociology, memory studies, anthropology, and tourism studies. The article argues that faith tourism constitutes essential memory work. This review does not contribute by presenting the relationship between memory, space, identity, and tourism as an entirely new field of research. Instead, it proposes an integrative analytical framework specific to faith tourism that brings social memory theory into closer dialogue with sacred space, ritual mobility, visitor interpretation, and the formation of collective identity. By organizing these dimensions not as separate themes, but as interacting mechanisms, the article clarifies how sacred sites and faith-based tourism practices contribute to the production, transmission, and reinterpretation of collective memory. Moreover, it provides a conceptual contribution by clarifying the role of religious sites as memory spaces that link past, present, and future.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060165

Authors: Piranun Juntapoon Krit Sittivangkul Amnuayporn Yaiying Kassaraporn Tirawong Parnprae C. Udomraksasup Tiparad Sahatrongjit

Community-based tourism (CBT) destinations are increasingly expected to align visitor experiences with climate responsibility, yet local managers often lack product-level carbon evidence that can guide practical route redesign and service decisions. This study addresses this aggregation-to-action gap by developing a route-level carbon footprint baseline for a CBT itinerary in Ban Boonjaem, Phrae Province, Thailand. Using an exploratory and applied case study design, the study treats one completed six-hour, non-overnight itinerary as the functional unit and applies a life-cycle-informed operational boundary covering transportation, food and beverage consumption, and solid waste generated during the route test. Primary activity data were collected from one organized route test involving 20 Thai domestic volunteer tourists and were matched with relevant emission factors to estimate total and per-tourist emissions. The tested itinerary generated 0.2234 tCO2e, equivalent to 223.4 kgCO2e in total and approximately 11.2 kgCO2e per tourist per trip. Transportation was the largest emission domain, accounting for 55.89% of total route emissions, followed by food and beverage consumption at 38.55%, while waste contributed 5.56%. Together, transportation and food and beverage represented 94.44% of measured emissions, indicating that the route’s carbon profile was shaped mainly by mobility arrangements and service provisioning rather than waste generation alone. The study contributes a transparent, route-specific operational baseline for low-carbon CBT management. The findings should be interpreted as case-specific decision-support evidence rather than as a destination-wide carbon inventory or statistically generalizable estimate.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060164

Authors: Alexandra Lavaredas Bárbara Pereira Paulo Almeida

Understanding how consumers perceive the value of travel packages is essential for pricing and product design. Grounded in behavioral economics frameworks, such as Prospect Theory and Mental Accounting, this study analyses satisfaction across three progressive travel packages before and after explicit price disclosure, exploring multi-attribute service valuation and the moderating influence of traveller profiles. Using a quantitative approach with 387 higher education participants, expected satisfaction was measured through a two-phase price disclosure design. Inferential statistical analyses revealed that satisfaction levels decreased significantly for all packages once prices were revealed, with the sharpest decline occurring in the highly comprehensive, all-inclusive option, validating a psychological threshold of value saturation. Packages comprising only essential elements (flights, accommodation with breakfast and insurance) yielded the highest consistent post-price satisfaction, with these core structural components identified as the absolute most valued attributes. Findings suggest that explicit price disclosure acts as a negative moderator of expected satisfaction, triggering an immediate psychological pain of paying, particularly among independent travellers who exhibit higher price sensitivity and remain more analytical of bundled configurations than users of physical travel agencies. This study provides a framework for stakeholders to avoid over-bundling and optimize product efficiency. Furthermore, it contributes to academic discourse on generational consumer behaviour by highlighting how individual travel organization profiles within an emerging European cohort shape the perceived utility and fairness of tourism pricing.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060163

Authors: Sinh Nguyen

Culinary tourism is increasingly conceptualized as a strategic domain of destination competitiveness, in which gastronomic experiences serve as mechanisms for cultural representation and localized value creation. However, existing research remains fragmented in explaining how multidimensional culinary motivations translate into specific consumption behaviors, particularly in emerging destinations. Addressing this gap, this study develops and tests a motivation–behavior linkage framework grounded in push–pull motivation theory, conceptualizing culinary motivations as heterogeneous drivers with differential effects on intention to purchase local food. A sequential mixed-methods design was employed, beginning with an initial qualitative phase to refine measurement constructs, followed by a quantitative survey of 396 domestic tourists with prior culinary experience in Vietnam’s Mekong Delta. Data were analyzed using reliability assessment, exploratory factor analysis, and multiple regression modeling. The findings reveal a differentiated structure of influence: cultural experience, sensory appeal, and health concerns significantly enhance purchase intention, with cultural experience and sensory appeal emerging as the most influential predictors. In contrast, interpersonal and prestige motivations are non-significant, indicating that experiential and functional values outweigh social-symbolic drivers in this context. The study contributes by advancing push–pull theory through a behavior-specific, mechanism-based linkage; identifying context-dependent boundary conditions in an emerging destination; and refining culinary motivation by distinguishing experiential–functional from social-symbolic drivers. These insights inform more targeted strategies for promoting local food consumption and sustainable culinary tourism development.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060162

Authors: Chandan Singh Zakir Hossen Shaikh Bibhu Prasad Sahoo Nitin Mishra Akash Gupta Mohit Anand Shrivastava Ankit Kumar Garg

The purpose of this study is to investigate the extent to which tourists appreciate sustainable tourism and what effect eco-friendly practices have on the decision-making process of selecting a hotel. Through the use of large-scale analysis of online reviews of hotels and the application of sentiment analysis techniques, the research investigates the impact of environmental factors (e.g., energy usage reduction, minimising waste, and promoting nature experiences) on customer perspectives and decision-making processes for lodging. This research adopts an approach that utilises machine-learning-based sentiment analysis as its source of understanding. The results of this research demonstrate that while more individuals are becoming aware of sustainable tourism, sustainability often plays a secondary role in determining whether or not to stay at a specific hotel compared to lodging attributes such as comfort, price, and quality service. Based upon these findings, this research indicates that while many tourists value sustainable tourism and make an effort to choose eco-friendly lodging establishments, the influence of sustainability on tourists’ lodging decisions is not as strong as other attributes. These results indicate important implications for hotel managers that will help them balance environmental stewardship with a competitive stance.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060161

Authors: Kazım Dağ Sinan Çavuşoğlu

This research focuses on the effects of online destination brand experience on destination brand authenticity, destination brand engagement, and external search behavior and behavioral intention. It also investigates the mediating effect of destination brand authenticity on the relationship between online destination brand experience and destination brand engagement. The research population consisted of visitors who had experienced the Zeugma and Gaziantep cultural tourism destinations. The Smart PLS (Partial Least Squares) statistical program was used for data analysis. The analysis results showed that online destination brand experience positively affected destination brand authenticity and destination brand engagement. Destination brand engagement influenced external search behavior and behavioral intention positively. However, the findings revealed that the social engagement dimension of destination brand engagement did not have a significant effect on external search behavior. Furthermore, the effect of the cognitive engagement dimension on behavioral intention was also insignificant. Finally, it was found that destination brand authenticity partially mediated the relationship between online destination brand experience and destination brand engagement.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060160

Authors: Mira Zovko Luka Valožić Lidija Srnec Ivana Havrle Kozarić Sara Ivasić

Small Mediterranean islands relying on the sun–sea–sand (3S) tourism model face growing climate risks that threaten their tourism-dependent economies. This study evaluates climate suitability for 3S tourism on the Island of Vis by integrating the Climate Index for Tourism (CIT) with land- use and land-cover (LU/LC) spatial analysis. The integration is operationalized by overlaying CIT-derived seasonal suitability windows with LU/LC-based spatial vulnerability maps, enabling identification of micro-zones where natural buffers (forest cover and elevation) can offset thermal discomfort during peak heat stress periods. Observed data reveals declining ideal 3S conditions from July to October, with the island already exceeding 50 days per year of Physiologically Equivalent Temperature (PET) above 35.1 °C, increasing by 0.7 days per year. Regional climate models tend to exhibit a cold bias over small Adriatic islands, largely related to their limited spatial horizontal resolution (12.5 km grid spacing). However, they robustly reproduce the direction of recent and projected warming trends. Future projections indicate that the annual number of strong heat stress days with PET above 35.1 °C increase from approximately one per year in the reference period to six under RCP4.5 and nine under RCP8.5, with both scenarios reducing ideal peak-summer conditions while extending favorable periods into transitional seasons. Spatial analysis shows that coastal zones have higher sealed surfaces and less forest cover, reducing natural shade and cooling capacity, while the island interior offers higher elevations, forest buffers, hiking trails, and a UNESCO Global Geopark. Drawing on social–ecological resilience theory, we conceptualize the island’s tourism system as an adaptive unit whose long-term viability depends on spatially diversified resource use and temporally extended seasonality. The integrated analytical framework identifies not only when conditions deteriorate but where alternative tourism resources exist, enabling more targeted adaptation planning and supporting diversification toward outdoor tourism forms. The novelty of this study lies in the systematic spatial integration of bioclimatic suitability assessments (CIT and PET) with LU/LC analysis at the micro-island scale. Such an approach moves beyond temporally focused climate–tourism indices to produce actionable, location-specific adaptation strategies.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060159

Authors: Predrag Tošić Bojana Kalenjuk Pivarski Velibor Ivanović Stefan Šmugović Dragana Novaković Tamara Stošić Sofija Vujasinović

This paper explores the importance of local food in tourism development in the Republic of Srpska by analyzing the perceptions of hospitality employees in relation to the characteristics of the food service establishments in which they work. The aim of this study is to determine how local food influences tourism development and whether such effects are conditioned by specific factors. Although previous studies have extensively examined local food through the lens of consumer behavior, there remains a significant research gap regarding the internal perspective of hospitality employees as co-creators of the gastronomic experience. This study addresses that gap by applying Social Exchange Theory (SET) to explain how employees’ perceptions of economic, social, and environmental benefits shape their willingness to support the integration of local food. By placing employees at the center of the analysis, the paper provides insight into the mechanisms through which authentic ingredients are transformed into symbolic capital and strengthen destination identity. In this context, the analytical Local Food model was adapted and applied to a sample of 480 respondents, evenly distributed across the mesoregions of the Republic of Srpska. Using exploratory factor analysis (EFA), three key dimensions of influence were identified—economic, environmental, and social. In addition, independent-samples t-tests and one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) confirmed that employees’ perceptions vary significantly depending on the production capacity of the establishments, whereas the type and location of the establishments were not identified as significant determinants of these differences. The findings further indicate that the intensity of these factors varies according to location, production capacity, and ownership type, while other characteristics of the hospitality establishments in which the respondents were employed were not found to be significant. A strong interrelationship among the identified factors was confirmed, with the social factor emerging as the most dominant. Overall, the findings highlight the importance of local food in strengthening the tourism attractiveness and sustainability of the hospitality sector in the Republic of Srpska.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060158

Authors: Miguel Fuentes-Collado Miguel Ángel Alcaide-Sillero Paula C. Ferreira-Gomes David Algaba-Navarro

In this study, the researchers aim to analyse the motivations of active golf tourists in Spain using the AFE-CFA-Cluster methodology. To this end, a survey was conducted in Spain amongst 381 players, both in person and online, who stated that they had undertaken one golf trip at least once in their lives. The survey consisted of three sections of questions: the first concerned preferences regarding both the destination and the golf courses; the second comprised 20 questions relating to motivations, divided into five categories: business opportunities, financial benefits, escape and relaxation, learning and challenge, and social interaction and camaraderie; and, finally, the third section focused on socio-demographic aspects. The results obtained from the exploratory factor analysis, which were subsequently confirmed by confirmatory factor analysis, revealed the composition of four motivational constructs: business opportunity, financial savings, escape and relaxation, and learning and challenge, resulting in a total of five homogeneous groups of golf tourists: experiential golfers, wellness-oriented golfers, multifunctional golfers, low-involvement golfers and learning-oriented golfers. These results may be useful for companies in the sector and marketing managers in defining the various existing segments of golf tourists and applying specific marketing strategies for each.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060157

Authors: Zhanar Dulatbekova Kuralay Tukibayeva

The COVID-19 pandemic caused an unprecedented disruption to global tourism, exposing the structural vulnerability of tourism-dependent economies and leading to a sharp decline in international mobility. This study examines post-pandemic tourism recovery in Kazakhstan, focusing on the association between travel expenditure and tourism demand, and on regional disparities in recovery patterns. The empirical strategy combines time-series econometric modelling, infrastructure index construction, and regional cluster analysis. Using annual data for 2000–2023, a parsimonious autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) model is applied to estimate both short-run dynamics and long-run relationships. The results show a positive and statistically significant association between tourism demand and travel expenditure, supporting the interpretation of expenditure-related recovery dynamics. They also indicate persistence in demand and a significant negative association with the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) shock. The error correction mechanism indicates rapid adjustment toward long-run equilibrium. Infrastructure and regional analyses highlight substantial post-pandemic capacity expansion alongside pronounced spatial disparities, with activity concentrated in major urban centres. The findings suggest that recovery is closely associated with demand-side dynamics and accompanied by persistent structural and regional constraints, highlighting the need for coordinated policies that combine demand stimulation, infrastructure development, and balanced regional growth.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060156

Authors: A. Azwardi M. Shabri Abd. Majid A. Apridar Taufiq C. Dawood

Tourism is an important driver of regional development, yet its benefits remain uneven across destinations despite continued infrastructure investment. This study examines how economic infrastructure affects domestic tourism performance across Indonesian provinces and whether destination risk moderates this relationship. Using a balanced panel of 34 provinces from 2018 to 2024, the study applies a panel ARDL–PMG approach to distinguish short-run adjustments from long-run equilibrium effects. Domestic tourism performance is measured by domestic tourist trips and average domestic tourist expenditure per trip. Economic infrastructure is represented by energy infrastructure, transport infrastructure, and basic digital access, while destination risk is captured through crime and corruption indicators. Inflation and the COVID-19 shock are included as control variables. The findings show that infrastructure improves domestic tourism performance mainly in the long run, with limited short-run effects. However, these benefits are not uniform. Higher levels of crime and corruption weaken the positive effects of infrastructure on both tourist volume and expenditure. The study contributes to tourism and hospitality research by showing that the infrastructure–tourism relationship is dynamic, conditional, and institutionally embedded. The findings imply that infrastructure development should be accompanied by stronger public safety, governance quality, and sustainable destination management.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060155

Authors: Pedro Fernández Carrasco Clara Matutano Molina Alicia García Galiana

This study evaluates the potential of motorhome tourism to catalyze socioeconomic development in rural municipalities of southeastern Spain (provinces of Jaén, Granada, and Almería). Addressing the critical challenge of rural depopulation in “Empty Spain” (España Vaciada), the research employs a mixed-methods approach covering the period 2022–2024. The methodology is centered on a two-tier empirical design: (i) a provincial-level analysis of eight municipalities, and (ii) an in-depth case study of Vélez-Blanco. A fundamental component of the research was the direct ethnographic validation and field audit conducted by the Fernández-Dutto family during an extensive journey from March to September 2025. By staying two to three nights at each location, the researchers performed in situ assessments of infrastructure quality and bioclimatic efficiency, providing a primary “ground-truth” dataset. These observations calibrate the longitudinal data obtained from the National Statistics Institute (INE) and digital platforms, which were utilized strictly as secondary screening tools for site selection. The results indicate statistically significant correlations between infrastructure quality, proximity to heritage attractions, and increases in local tourism-related expenditure. The study highlights how experiential fieldwork captures nuances in traveler behavior and site functionality that official records often overlook. The paper concludes by identifying strategic investment opportunities, specifically recommending the development of a motorhome service area in the municipality of María (María-Los Vélez area). This intervention is proposed as a vital catalyst to complete the regional tourism circuit and foster economic resilience in the heart of Almería’s rural landscape.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060154

Authors: Stefanos Balaskas Kyriakos Komis

Digital nomads blur the boundaries between tourism, work, and temporary residence, yet little is known about how local businesses interpret this ambiguous population. This study examines how Greek SMEs classify digital nomads and how these classifications shape perceived business benefits and harms, support for protective policy guardrails, and firm-level adaptation intentions. Using survey data from 747 SME owner-managers and managers in tourism-linked and adjacent sectors, the study tests an integrated framework with PLS-SEM and multi-group analysis. The findings show that SME responses are interpretive rather than automatic. Residency-Based Visitor Beliefs positively predicted support for protective policy guardrails (β = 0.334, p < 0.001), but did not directly predict adaptation intentions. Perceived Touristness positively predicted both guardrail support (β = 0.110, p < 0.001) and adaptation intentions (β = 0.181, p < 0.001). Perceived Business Benefits was the strongest predictor of adaptation intentions (β = 0.390, p < 0.001), while Perceived Business Harms also increased both guardrail support (β = 0.175, p < 0.001) and adaptation intentions (β = 0.310, p < 0.001). Mediation results showed that the effects of Residency-Based Visitor Beliefs on adaptation were fully transmitted through benefits and harms, whereas Perceived Touristness operated indirectly only through harms. Multi-group analysis further revealed significant heterogeneity across firm size, years in operation, and tourism dependence. The study contributes to digital nomad and tourism research by introducing a business-side classification perspective and by linking classification, evaluation, and response in a single model. Overall, the findings show that whether digital nomads are classified as tourists by businesses has measurable implications for regulatory preferences and market adaptation.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060153

Authors: Can Olgun Brijesh Thapa

This study investigates how parasocial interactions with travel influencers shape consumer–brand identification and purchase intention within hospitality-related virtual communities. Grounded in social influence theory and the literature on parasocial interaction, the study examines the mediating roles of perceived information quality and a sense of belonging in influencer-led digital environments. Data were collected from 940 consumers and analyzed using confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling. The findings demonstrate that parasocial interaction significantly enhances perceived information quality and consumers’ sense of belonging to influencer-led virtual communities, thereby strengthening consumer–brand identification and purchase intention. The results further suggest that influencer-led social environments function not only as promotional channels but also as psychologically meaningful communities that shape consumer perceptions and behavioral outcomes. By integrating parasocial interaction, virtual community belonging, and consumer–brand identification within a hospitality context, this study contributes to the growing literature on influencer marketing and digital consumer behavior.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060152

Authors: Cátia Rodrigues Alexandra Lavaredas Paulo Almeida

Tourist guides remain understudied in tourism workforce research, particularly regarding the conditions shaping satisfaction and career retention. This study examines how cultural tourism itinerary characteristics are associated with tourist guides’ job satisfaction and career retention intentions. Data were collected through a convenience sample survey of 127 active tourist guides in Portugal. Grounded in the Job Satisfaction Survey and the Theory of Planned Behaviour frameworks, the study utilised exploratory factor analysis and multiple linear regression to analyse the data. Results indicate positive associations between itinerary characteristics, job satisfaction and career retention intentions, with Components (accommodation, meals, accessibility) and Sustainability emerging as the strongest predictors. These findings extend the Job Demands–Resources model to a supervisory-free work context and highlight itinerary design as a previously underexplored human resource management mechanism shaping workforce outcomes in tourism, with implications for tour operators, destination managers and policymakers.

Tourism and Hospitality doi: 10.3390/tourhosp7060151

Authors: Vilma Trigoso-Guevara Kasandra Lisset Torres-Cortez Fiorely Margoth Peralta-Córdova Joel Cruz-Tarrillo Robin Alexander Diaz-Saavedra

Despite growing interest in destination branding, empirical evidence is still limited in explaining how brand personality influences tourist behavior mediated by integrated aspects. This study addresses this research gap by proposing and testing a structural model that considers the mediating role of tourist experience, authenticity, and trust in the relationship between brand personality and tourist behavior. The methodology used was quantitative and causal–correlational, using structural equation modeling and a sample of 514 Peruvian tourists selected through non-probabilistic convenience sampling. The results show that brand personality significantly influences tourist experience and destination authenticity, while its direct effect on trust is weak. In addition, experience positively influences trust and authenticity. Significantly, authenticity and experience show direct and positive effects on tourist behavior, while trust has a negative effect. These findings contribute to the advancement of the literature by integrating a single explanatory model with experiential, cognitive, and relational variables, broadening the understanding of the indirect role of brand personality in the tourism context. From a practical standpoint, the results suggest that destination managers should focus on enhancing brand personality and authenticity.