Research On Relationship Between Cultural Distance And Tourists' Destination Choice

As an important part of tourists' consumption decision,destination choice behavior has attracted great attention from both academics and industries in tourism.Many scholars contribute to investigate factors that influence tourists' destination choice behavior.And they have made certain achievements.However,among those influential factors,the cultural difference between origins and destinations is rarely mentioned.Most pervious studies focus on the origins culture or destination culture separately,discussing its effect on tourists' destination choice.Some scholars claimed that while tourists from different countries behave differently when in the same country,tourists from the same country also behave differently when in different countries.Neither the origins culture nor the destination culture itself could fully explain tourists' behaviors.Under this kind of situation,this study introduces the concept of cultural distance to understand tourists' destination choice behavior.Reviewing the existing research,scholars could not reach a consensus about the relationship between cultural distance and tourists' destination choice behavior.There are three different viewpoints:Firstly,based on travel motivation theory,some scholars hold that destinations could better satisfy tourists' demand of novelty seeking with cultural distance increase.In this way,cultural distance is positively associated with tourists' destination choice.Secondly,some other scholars find theoretical support from self-congruity theory,which means tourists will choose destinations that share similar personality with themselves.For this reason,cultural distance is negatively related to tourists' destination choice.Finally,few papers report that in statistics,cultural distance and tourists' destination is not linearly correlated to each other.To address the core problem about relationship between cultural distance and tourists' destination choice behavior,three empirical studies have been conducted in the context of Chinese outbound tourism.In study 1,by utilizing two-factor theory in tourists' destination choice,we theoretically framed and empirically tested the influencing path from cultural distance to tourists' destination choice intention via novelty perception and risk perception.In study 2,based on the optimal arousal theory,we further discussed the nonlinear relationship between cultural distance and tourists' destination choice intention.Inverted-U shaped relationship hypothesis was proposed and tested.In study 3,we turned from individual-oriented to group-oriented research,focusing on the whole group of Chinese people.Integrating the tourists'personality type theory,we stepped forward to identify the optimal cultural distance that Chinese people prefer when choosing outbound travel destination.Through the three studies mentioned above,three main conclusions have been made in this dissertation as follows:(1)From individual level,tourists' perception of cultural distance influence tourists' destination choice intention via novelty perception and risk perception.(2)From individual level,relationship between tourists' perception of cultural distance and their destination choice intention shows an inverted U-shape curve.(3)From country level,relationship between cultural distance and tourists'destination choice behavior shows an inverted U-shape curve.When choosing outbound travel destination,the optimal cultural distance for Chinese tourists is 2.8480.This paper focused on tourist's destination choice in outbound travel.By utilizing two-factor theory in tourists' destination choice,we developed the relationship path between cultural distance and tourists' destination choice.In addition,by lending theoretical support from optimal arousal theory and tourists' personality type theory,we further investigated the nonlinear relationship between cultural distance and tourists' destination choice from both individual level and group level.Conclusively,this paper made certain contributions in aspects of theory implication as well as theory development.In practice,the conclusions of this research provide some insights for destination marketing.For a long time,when conducting marketing activities in international tourism market,destination countries always emphasize their cultural uniqueness,neglecting the risks brought by cultural distance.It is proved that cultural distance is like double-edged sword.Destination countries should make good use of cultural distance by first locating themselves in the origins country tourism market.After that,marketing strategy of emphasizing cultural difference or emphasizing cultural affinity could be identified.