Studies have suggested that positive emotions may occur in mature adult tourists' experiences, but the processes linking participants' social contexts and positive emotions are unknown. The study used an interpretive ethnographic approach with participant observation and conversations with key informants to document positive emotions in two mature adult tourism experiences, an educational tour of a Civil War battlefield and a model airplane contest. Interpretive thematic analysis revealed amusement from humor, warmth of friendship, interest in activities, and sublime reactions to loss. These processes explain how participants' social contexts produced positive emotions, and why particular emotions occurred. Furthermore, findings show the importance of positive emotions to building a sense of community among participants, fostering regular repeat participation.
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Previous work on tourists' positive and negative affect has mainly used cross-sectional data. Consequently, little is known about how motivations are related to tourists' emotions over an extended period of time. The purpose of this study was to understand the impact of travel motivation on tourists' emotions and whether the impact would remain the same across different time points. The sample consisted of a panel of approximately 2000 leisure travelers in the Netherlands. After eliminating missing data, 412 panelists completed all seven questionnaires over the nine months of the study. The results indicated that motivation does not have a significant impact on tourists' emotions over a relatively long period of time. Specifically, the study found that travel motivations or a cluster of travel motivations do not seem to have significant within-subject or between-subject impacts on tourists' emotions over a nine-month period. The findings demonstrate the complex relationships between tourists’ travel motivation and emotions and highlight the importance of a longitudinal approach to studying emotions in the tourism context. Managerial implications for destination marketers are discussed.
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There is ample evidence to suggest that positive emotions lead to valuable life outcomes. This study examines daily positive emotion development before, during, and after a leisure travel experience. The study measured positive emotions on a daily basis in 25 mature adult participants before, during, and after two leisure travel experiences. Consistent with the "peak" model in previous research, positive emotions overall-and joy and interest in particular-increased before leisure travel, were elevated during travel, and declined afterward. Implications for practice include managing positive emotions before and after leisure travel. Future research should consider positive emotions in other populations and other leisure experiences.
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The purpose of this study was to examine changes in specific positive and negative emotions during a vacation, as well as their interactions with personality. Using a questionnaire and diary, 39 American and Dutch vacationers' emotions high in both positivity and arousal exhibited an inverted U-shape curve, suggesting that they felt better during the second section rather than the end of their vacation. None of the negative emotions exhibited significant changes over time. When the impacts of personality on specific emotions were addressed, personality was found to determine the baseline levels of fear and sadness and moderate change in disgust across individuals' vacations. The results suggest that tourism managers and researchers must acknowledge and address the change of emotions tourists experience during a vacation and the role of personality in influencing that change.
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Purpose: This paper aims to stimulate the discussion in the fields of hospitality, tourism and leisure on what exactly constitutes “an experience” and how to measure it; the authors unpack the experience construct into its core constituent elements, namely, emotions. Design/methodology/approach: The paper reviews insights from psychology and cognitive neuroscience that define experiences as a fine-grained temporal succession of emotions that occur during an experiential episode. Limitations of current methods for measuring experiences are discussed, after which biometric and neuroscientific methods are reviewed that are optimally geared toward measuring emotions, as they occur during an experience with fine temporal detail. Findings: An overview is presented of the available studies within the fields of hospitality, tourism and leisure that use these methodologies. These studies show that using these methodologies provides a fruitful methodological approach to measuring experiences in real time. Practical implications: Companies are constantly seeking to create memorable experiences for their customers. The proposed research methodologies allow companies to get a more fine-grained image of what impacts customers over the course of their experience and to actively integrate the use of emotions into creating experiences, as emotions are key to making them memorable. Originality/value: The paper sketches the contours of a rapidly emerging framework that unpacks memorable experiences into their constituent element – emotions. It is proposed that this will contribute to a deeper understanding of how consumers experience offerings in the hospitality, tourism and leisure industry.
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Visits to sites associated with death and suffering are considered emotionally laden. Few studies empirically investigated visitor emotions at such sites. This study examines emotional responses of 241 visitors to concentration camp memorial Neuengamme and assesses how emotions are associated with long-term consequences of revisit intentions and positive word of mouth. Tourists experience negative emotions more intensely compared with positive emotions. Negative emotions predict long-term behavioral intentions more than positive emotions do. Shock and sadness are of particular importance. This study suggests that certain negative emotions also have the power to broaden-and-build and may have long-term behavioral consequences.
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Visits to sites associated with death and suffering are considered emotionally laden. Few studies empirically investigated visitor emotions at such sites. This study examines emotional responses of 241 visitors to concentration camp memorial Neuengamme and assesses how emotions are associated with long-term consequences of revisit intentions and positive word of mouth. Tourists experience negative emotions more intensely compared with positive emotions. Negative emotions predict long-term behavioral intentions more than positive emotions do. Shock and sadness are of particular importance. This study suggests that certain negative emotions also have the power to broaden-and-build and may have long-term behavioral consequences.
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The emotions of 39 American and Dutch vacationers were investigated. Their emotions were tracked daily during their vacation using a diary. Findings indicated that fluctuations in emotions are related to length of vacation. Vacationers on an 8- to 13-day trip experienced significant changes in the balance of their emotions over the course of their trip. In general, they felt good; but this feeling began to decline at the end of the vacation. The findings demonstrate that there is no clear peak in holiday happiness, which presents challenges to tourism suppliers. Implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.
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This paper is about Grūtas, a Lithuanian park museum near Druskininkai featuring recovered Soviet-era artifacts. This study fills the gap in literature on people's emotions and reactions dealing with an unwanted past, and an undesirable heritage. Visits to sites associated with occupation, death and suffering are considered emotionally laden. Data were collected from visitor comment books employing a qualitative content analysis as well as quantitative data analysis techniques such as word frequency and semantic network analysis. Few studies empirically investigated visitor emotions to “unwanted” heritage sites. This research provides insights into the interpretive complex by discussing the content of visitor comment books. Three hundred and seventy-nine visitor comments from Lithuanians to the Grūtas park museum were examined. Results reveal that visitors experience both negative and positive emotions after visiting the site, such as unpleasantness, discomfort, surprise, admiration and delight. This is the first study to examine visitor's emotions and reactions to the Grūtas park museum, a site related to difficult heritage.
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Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the motives and emotions of Western tourists visiting Tuol Sleng Genocide Prison Museum in Phnom Penh, Cambodia and further contribute to a deeper understanding of the dark tourism consumption. Design/methodology/approach: Data were collected from popular travel blog sites. This study employs various qualitative and quantitative methods, such as netnography, semantic network analysis and critical content analysis in order to gain a deeper insight into the visitors’ emotions and motivations. Findings: This study reveals that people visit Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum mainly for “remembrance”, “worth visiting”, “learning and understanding”, “paying respect” and a “must visit” attraction. Emotions revealed in this study were “shocking“, “sadness“, “horror” and “depressive”. Research limitations/implications: This paper is limited to the analyses of travel blogs sites. Further research could include interviews with Western visitors, and professionals managing the site. Originality/value: To the best of the knowledge, this is the first study to examine the emotions of visitors in Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum.
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