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As there is still only limited research about expectation formation in destination marketing, the aim of this paper is to enhance this body of knowledge by providing theoretical and empirical evidence about the role of different factors which generate tourist expectations. In particular, since expectations may significantly condition not only the tourist choice process but also the perceptions of experiences, the objective of this paper is to examine the factors contributing to the expectations of a tourist destination. Based on service expectations literature, a theoretical framework postulates the main factors generating tourist expectations.

Empirical research tests the research hypotheses. More specifically, several in‐depth interviews and focus groups (qualitative research) and a survey conducted in a holiday destination (quantitative research) led to data collection.

Tourist expectations are a second‐order factor based on inter‐correlations among several first‐order factors (i.e. past experience, external communication, word‐of‐mouth communication and destination image). In addition, image can be considered as the main factor generating expectations of a destination.

The main limitation of this study is the geographic area (tourist site) of the research process. The tourist destination under investigation significantly influences the characteristics of the sample, of which national tourists are the main constituent.

Managing the destination image and the quality of experience is critical to induce favorable expectations of the destination in the tourist's mind. In addition, the coherence and reliability of destination communication need to be controlled in expectations management.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between tourism service quality and destination loyalty through investigating the mediation effect of destination image in the Dead Sea tourism destination, Jordan, from international tourists perspectives. The paper also investigates the tourism service quality dimensions from international tourists’ viewpoints.

A structured and self-administered survey was used targeting international tourists who were visiting the Dead Sea tourism destination, Jordan. The authors delivered 300 questionnaires to international tourists from which 237 were retained and valid for the analysis. A series of exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were performed to assess the research constructs dimensions, unidimensionality, validity and composite reliability. Structural path analysis was also used to test the hypothesised relationships of the research model.

The empirical findings indicate that tourism service quality is, in fact, a four-dimensional (4D) construct as opposed to five as proposed by the original hypothesised model. The 4D model consists of four facets: assurance-responsiveness, tangible facilities-empathy, reliability and reliability-quality of directions. Also, the results indicate that brand image loaded onto two dimensions named as “physical environment” and “people characteristics”. The structural findings indicate that the four dimensions of tourism service quality have positively and significantly affected destination image. Further, brand image has positively and significantly affected destination loyalty. Finally, destination image fully mediates the relationship between tourism service quality and destination loyalty.

This paper has examined only five dimensions of tourism service quality that affected destination loyalty directly and indirectly; meanwhile, other service quality dimensions such as technical quality may affect both destination image and destination loyalty. Further, destination image is the only mediator investigated in this paper. Other consumer-based brand equity factors such as brand salience my act as another mediator. Also, this paper investigated international tourists’ perspectives in the Dead Sea tourism destination only, which means that its generalisation to other tourism destinations is limited. Therefore, comparative studies inside and outside Jordan’s tourism destinations are potential areas of future research. Other limitations and future research areas are also outlined.

The paper highlights the strategic importance of brand image on the relationship between tourism service quality and destination loyalty. Tourism service quality acts as an antecedent to brand image and the later is essential to destination loyalty. In other words, brand image of the physical environment and people friendless and kindness are the critical linkage that create destination loyalty. Further, an integrated model of tourism service quality, destination image and destination loyalty is required by tourism organisations operating in the Dead Sea destination to win international tourists again.

This paper represents one of the very few attempts that investigate tourism service quality and destination loyalty through understanding the mediating role of brand image in the Dead Sea destination. Accordingly, it should shed more light into the strategic role of brand image dimensions and how they affect destination loyalty. Further, the paper is the first of its kind to investigate an integrated model of tourism service quality and destination loyalty from international tourist perspectives in Jordan. The main issue here is that tourism organisations operating in the Dead Sea tourism destination have now valuable empirical evidence concerning the drivers of destination loyalty in an integrated manner.

The purpose of this study is to understand the destination image perceptions about Australia – a Western culture country – as held by the rapidly increasing, high spending, culturally dissimilar new segment of travellers, the Emiratis[1] from the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

A qualitative methodology was used to understand the cognitive, affective and conative images of Australia. A structured categorisation matrix was used to analyse the data so that only aspects fitting the matrix were selected.

Within the cognitive variable, Australia was found to be pleasant, family oriented, a fun place, laid back and the local people friendly. From an affective factor perspective, Australia was seen as being exciting, because of the variety of activities available for these tourists. Exciting was expressed by words like fantastic, amazing and extreme experience. In terms of the conative variable most of the Emirati tourists expressed strong feelings to go back to Australia and to even re-visit with friends. They also mentioned that they would recommend Australia to family and friends.

A limitation of this study was that our sample comprised informants mainly from the Emirates of Abu Dhabi and Dubai, the two largest Emirates of the nation. The study offers destination marketing organisations’ (DMOs) insights into Emirati travellers’ perceptions about Australia, which would benefit destination marketing.

This study examines the under researched area of how Australia – with its liberal Western culture – could be better marketed to the growing numbers of culturally conservative, high spending Emirati outbound tourists from the officially Islamic UAE, and also more generally to the socio-culturally homogeneous Gulf Cooperation Council region that the UAE is part of. Whilst destination image is an intensively analysed topic within the realm of tourism research, and reportedly a powerful influence on destination choice, the extant literature on how Australia is perceived as a travel destination by Emiratis is scant. For DMO’s attempting to attract wealthy Emirati tourists into Australia, this research is valuable and timely, as several Emiratis are seeking newer travel destinations away from the Western hemisphere, where the general anti-Arab/Islamic sentiments are currently quite strong.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate and develop an integrated theoretical relationship by including destination image and attitudes into the quality-value-satisfaction-loyalty paradigm in the context of beach tourism.

A personal-administered survey was conducted using a convenient sampling technique to collect data from 601 tourists who had visited popular beach destinations in Bangladesh. Then, the structural relationships between the factors likely to affect tourist attitudes and loyalty were examined.

The findings reveal that both service quality and perceived values have a direct effect on destination image, tourist attitudes and satisfaction. Additionally, destination image and satisfaction significantly affect tourist attitudes and loyalty.

The direct relationship of perceived service quality and perceived value with tourist loyalty was ignored in the model due to reporting consecutive indirect relationship between them in prior studies.

These findings contribute to the extension of theoretical and managerial knowledge, especially in a beach tourism setting, where little research has been done to investigate the proposed relationships.

The originality of this study lies in providing theoretical and empirical evidence regarding the effect of service quality and perceived value, especially on destination image and tourist attitude to behaviour in the loyalty model, which has been scarcely examined in the prior tourism literature.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the influence of the confirmation of the motivations of tourists in changing image of a tourist destination pre- and post-visit. That is, considering whether once the tourist has made the trip, depending on whether their expectations have been met and confirmed motivations, will have a more or less image gap.

The authors conducted an empirical study with a representative sample of leisure tourists to Tenerife (Canary Islands, Spain) of both sexes, 16 or more years of age, and visiting the island of Tenerife for the first time from abroad and from the rest of Spain. The final sample was 411 participants.

The results verify that the confirmation of the intellectual and escape motivations influences directly and positively change cognitive image pre- and post-visit. The fact that the affiliation motivations do not influence the cognitive image gap may be due to that tourists who visit a destination stay with friends or family and for this they interact less with the destination, which will imply that the cognitive image pre- and post-visit do not vary.

This research has sought to contribute towards a better understanding of the area, which is concerned, with the image of destinations and, more specifically, the concept of how the image changes after a visit to the destination. In this sense, and given the of lack empirical evidence about how confirmation of motivations influences on destination image gap, this research aims to contribute to the improvement of knowledge about the personal factors that influence the change of the pre- and post-visit destination image.

The tourism industry is experiencing a tremendous growth with an everincreasing pressure from a variety of types of competition. The change of tourism market in Asia and the ever‐increasing competitive nature of the tourism industry require tourist destinations to develop an effective marketing plan and strategy. This article identifies the relationship between destination cues of Asian countries and Korean tourist images of destinations, the differences of Korean tourist images on revisiting and recommend intention for destinations, and the differences of demographic factors on destination cues and Korean tourist images and revisiting/recommend intention for destinations.

This paper aims to analyse the influence of the cultural sensitivity of tourists on the change in image that occurs for tourist destinations prior to and after a visit; understanding cultural sensitivity as the recognition of and respect for different beliefs, values and customs.

A structural equations model is carried out with a representative sample of 411 tourists from Tenerife (Canary Islands).

Cultural sensitivity directly and positively influences the gap in the global image of the destination, so greater cultural sensitivity improves the post-visit image compared to the pre-visit image at a global level. Likewise, there are significant differences in cultural sensitivity according to the sociodemographic characteristics of tourists.

Although this study is based on a single case (Tenerife) and the generalisation of the results must be treated tentatively, the developed model could be applied in other destinations.

This study contributes to a better understanding of the influence of cultural sensitivity on the image gap in tourist destinations, as there is still little empirical evidence on the subject.

The results of this study represent an advance in the literature, as there are few studies in the tourism marketing literature that studied the effect of the cultural sensitivity on the image of a tourist destination.

El presente trabajo tiene por objeto analizar la influencia de la sensibilidad cultural de los turistas en el cambio de imagen de un destino turístico pre y post-visita, entendiendo por sensibilidad cultural el reconocimiento y el respeto a las creencias, los valores y las costumbres diferentes.

Se utilizó un Modelo de Ecuaciones Estructurales con una muestra representativa de 411 turistas de Tenerife (Islas Canarias).

La sensibilidad cultural influye directa y positivamente en el gap de la imagen global del destino, por lo que la mayor sensibilidad cultural mejora la imagen post-visita frente a la imagen pre-visita a nivel global. Igualmente, se observan diferencias significativas en la sensibilidad cultural en función de las características sociodemográficas de los turistas.

Dado que este estudio se basa en un único caso (Tenerife), lo cual afecta a la generalización de los resultados, el modelo desarrollado podría aplicarse a otros destinos.

Este trabajo contribuye a una major comprensión de la influencia de la sensibilidad cultural en el gap de la imagen de un destino turístico, ya que todavía hay poca evidencia empírica sobre el tema.

Los resultados de este trabajo representan un avance en la literatura ya que existen pocos trabajos en la literatura de marketing turístico que estudien el efecto de la sensibilidad cultural en la imagen de un destino turístico.

This paper aims to present a case study investigating Chinese tourists’ perceptions of North Korea which is regarded one of the most unique tourism destinations in the world.

This exploratory study reports findings based on semi-structured interviews with 30 Chinese tourists. This study uses the cognitive-affective model to categorise destination image proposed by respondents. Data were analysed using content analysis.

The study found that the cognitive image focusses on attributes such as the country’s unique economic/political situation, unspoiled natural environment and poor infrastructure construction. Affective components centre on the friendly relationship between China and North Korea, and a comparison between North Korea’s current situation and that of China during the period of the cultural revolution.

Given the qualitative approach and exploratory nature, the results may not be generalised to the wider literature of the Chinese outbound market. This article’s theoretical contribution to destination image may be limited to Chinese cultural contexts. This study provides practical implications for promoting North Korea’s images to attract more Chinese visitors.

Cognitive-affective model, as one of the most commonly used models, was used to explore North Korea’s destination image in Chinese tourists’ eyes. In addition, this study highlights the importance of politics in influencing a country’s destination image.

这篇文章探究朝鲜作为世界上最神秘的旅游目的地之一在中国游客心目中的形象。

这个探索性研究报告的发现是基于和30位中国游客的半开放式访谈。认知情感模型被用来概括访谈对象提出的目的地形象。内容分析用来进行数据分析。

这个研究发现认知影响主要关注于国家特殊的经济、政治情况, 未受污染的自然环境和落后的基础设施建设。情感印象主要关注于中朝鲜友谊和目前的朝鲜与文化大革命时期的中国相比较。

作为探索性研究, 这篇文章的发现可能没法通用于中国出境游的市场。这篇文章的理论贡献可能局限于中国文化。这篇文章也为如何宣传朝鲜作为旅游旅游目的地来吸引中国游客提出了实际建议。

认知情感模型作为最常用的模型用来探索朝鲜在中国游客心里的目的地形象。除此之外, 这个研究强调了政治作为影响目的地形象的因素。

este documento presenta un estudio de caso que investiga las percepciones de los turistas chinos sobre Corea del Norte, considerado uno de los destinos turísticos más singulares del mundo.

este estudio exploratorio informa resultados basados en entrevistas semiestructuradas con 30 turistas chinos. Este estudio utiliza el modelo cognitivo-afectivo para clasificar la imagen de destino propuesta por los encuestados. Los datos se analizaron mediante análisis de contenido.

el estudio encontró que la imagen cognitiva se enfoca en atributos tales como la situación económica/política única del país, el entorno natural virgen y la construcción de infraestructura deficiente. Los componentes afectivos se centran en la relación amistosa entre China y Corea del Norte, y una comparación entre la situación actual de Corea del Norte y la de China durante el período de la Revolución Cultural.

de la investigación: dado el enfoque cualitativo y la naturaleza exploratoria, los resultados pueden no generalizarse a la literatura más amplia del mercado emisor chino. La contribución teórica de este artículo a la imagen de destino puede estar limitada a los contextos culturales chinos.Este estudio ofrece implicaciones prácticas para promover las imágenes de Corea del Norte para atraer a más visitantes chinos.

el modelo cognitivo-afectivo como uno de los modelos más utilizados se utilizó para explorar la imagen de destino de Corea del Norte a los ojos de los turistas chinos. Además, este estudio destaca la importancia de la política para influir en la imagen de destino de un país.

This study aims to shed some light on destination image formation by exploring whether image is altered as a result of tourists’ experience intensity with a destination.

A visitor experience intensity index was developed based on the amount of events and attractions visitors have already attended/visited or were planning to attend/visit during their stay. The data were collected using self-administered questionnaires and the total sample consisted of 400 tourists in Linz, Austria. Principal component analysis, multivariate analysis of variance and discriminant analysis were applied to analyse the data.

The findings indicate that the higher the experience intensity score, the more favourable the cognitive and affective evaluations of destination image, indicating that tourists’ experiences are central in the formation of the in situ image.

The “level of psychological involvement” with the destination should be considered by future studies, as this paper focussed on level of experience intensity.

This paper supports the effective and innovative solutions for place marketing and branding of tourist destinations such as promoting experiences that further enhance destination image. The study also assists places with bad reputation or negative image, like the selected case study (Linz, Austria), in repositioning themselves as attractive experience providers.

The paper’s originality lies in applying “mere exposure theory” in tourism and using an innovative way of measuring tourists’ experience through an intensity index. The study addresses a significant, but still neglected image determinant, that of experience intensity, contributing to a better understanding of the in situ destination image formation process.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the impact of destination image on satisfaction level and tourist loyalty toward the various tourist destinations in Jammu and Kashmir. The study, also, attempted to investigate the mediating role of satisfaction and moderating role of gender, past experience and tourist origin in the proposed model.

The study was carried out in the state of Jammu and Kashmir spread over three divisions, i.e., Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh. The study employs questionnaire survey method for data collection. Purposive sampling was adopted for data collection and data analysis was carried out through exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling techniques.

The study has found that cognitive image, affective image and unique image are the significant dimensions of destination image, which in turn has a positive effect on satisfaction level and tourist loyalty. It was also found that destination image has both direct and indirect effect on tourist loyalty.

The state of Jammu and Kashmir has been badly affected by ongoing political instability, which has caused huge losses to the tourism industry. The results of the study will be helpful to policymakers in designing various strategies and programs for maximizing tourist inflow and growth of tourism industry in the state of Jammu and Kashmir.

Further, finding of the study will assist destination managers in understanding consumer behavior for promoting destination shopping activities. This will enhance tourist expenditure at destinations and thus provides direct benefits to the local economy.

Very little research has been conducted on moderating role of gender, past experience and tourist origin in the destination image and its association with satisfaction and tourist loyalty in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. Managing destination image and quality of tourist experience are critical to induce favorable expectations of destination in the tourist’s mind.