Search results
1 – 2 of 2Stephen W. Litvin, Daniel Guttentag, Wayne W. Smith and Robert E. Pitts
Travel decreased dramatically during the initial wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, only to return rapidly to prepandemic levels once the degree of fear toward the virus began to…
Abstract
Purpose
Travel decreased dramatically during the initial wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, only to return rapidly to prepandemic levels once the degree of fear toward the virus began to diminish among potential travelers. This USA-based 16-month repeated-measure cross-sectional survey study aims to explore the degree to which fear of COVID affected people’s decisions to stay home rather than to travel during the pandemic.
Design/methodology/approach
The research used survey data. An extensive data set, composed of over 9,500 respondents, collected through Mechanical Turk over a 16-month time period, was used to compare respondent fear of the pandemic both with their attitudes toward future travel and with Smith Travel Research data reflecting actual pandemic travel patterns.
Findings
The results demonstrate how fear of COVID was closely and negatively linked to both travel intentions and travel behavior.
Research limitations/implications
Data were collected from US respondents only.
Practical implications
The findings significantly extend earlier studies and provide guidance for those studying travel consumer behavior regarding trends that should be monitored in the case of a future pandemic or other fear-inducing crisis. For hospitality and tourism managers and marketers, understanding fear as a leading indicator of future travel behavior can result in more timely promotional efforts and staffing and training decisions.
Social implications
Measuring and understanding consumer fear levels as this relates to travel decisions can help in the future to adjust the message that is sent to the public, perhaps reducing the amount of travel taken during periods when this is unwise and or unsafe.
Originality/value
This paper extends previous work that had been based upon cross-sectional reviews, providing a broader and more valuable study of an important and timely consumer behavior travel topic.
Details
Keywords
Mildred Arevalo, Jonathon Day, Sandra Sotomayor and Nancy Karen Guillen
Specifically, this study aims to examine residents’ perceptions regarding the following: the sociocultural, environmental and economic impacts generated by the presence of Airbnb…
Abstract
Purpose
Specifically, this study aims to examine residents’ perceptions regarding the following: the sociocultural, environmental and economic impacts generated by the presence of Airbnb and the irritability caused by the presence of Airbnb based on Doxey’s Doxey (1975) irritation index (i.e. index).
Design/methodology/approach
Twenty-one semistructured in-depth interviews were conducted between February and March 2021 with residents of three condominiums in the Huancaro residential complex. Data were analyzed using the qualitative data analysis software ATLAS.ti 8.
Findings
Results showed that participants perceived negative economic impacts regarding investments, jobs, real estate prices and overall cost of living; negative sociocultural impacts regarding criminality, social conflicts and cultural exchange; and negative environmental impacts regarding sanitation in the context of the pandemic and the state of the Airbnb apartments. Further, it was found that participants related to the following three of the four stages of irritability: euphoria, apathy and annoyance.
Research limitations/implications
It is necessary to complement the information with the perceptions of the residents about the city’s authorities and managers in the hotel business before the stage of the COVID-19 pandemic and the current stage.
Practical implications
The study identifies improve Airbnb operations like establishing health paraments and defining cohabitation rules at the condominiums.
Social implications
The residents consider that visitors’ returns produce positive and negative impacts on the quality of life being important for understanding their perceptions.
Originality/value
Short-term rental companies, such as Airbnb, generate a range of impacts on urban residents, particularly when travelers encroach on areas of the city beyond the traditional “tourist bubbles.” This study explored the perceptions of Airbnb’s impacts on activities among residents of Huancaro, a residential section of Cusco-Peru, in the context of tourism reopening after a year of an almost complete halt in tourism activities because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The study also highlighted the heterogenetic responses to Airbnb within the community.
Details