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- New avenues for business competitiveness: the case of a community of practice in the hotel sectorPublication . Almeida, Sofia; Campos, Ana CláudiaPurpose This paper aims to better understand community of practice (CoP)'s dynamics with a focus on the hotel sector and perceived benefits to members and business performance. Design/methodology/approach This is a case study research focusing on a successful experience within a CoP found in the hotel sector. The study reports in detail how a CoP was created and how it evolved to a digital platform to give birth to a fully co-designed tourism product. It analyzes this CoP's social dynamics, processes of communication and interaction, as well as digital evolution. To collect rich data, method triangulation was applied by mixing quantitative and qualitative analyses. Findings The community is highly participated and valued because it is perceived as a dynamic system contributing to rapid information exchange and diffusion, efficient context for knowledge transfer and individual responsiveness to daily professional activities and challenges. The reasons why members perceive Amigas do Trade as a distinctive community include shared values and attitudes; professional area and position; and group composition. The majority of members acknowledged that belonging to this CoP has helped in making an informed decision with impact on business practice. The sub-theme more intensely participated and discussed concentrated on human resources issues. Research limitations/implications A case study brings useful insights into the understanding of CoP members' behaviour; however, findings are not generalizable to other communities. Practical implications This study contributes in several ways to business practice and management. Hotel businesses pertain to a sector in which CoPs easily thrive. This seems to happen because businesses in the tourism and hospitality industry are highly dependent on networks, people, communication channels and technologies. Engagement with technological platforms is stimulated because of the unproblematic integration of these digital platforms into other technologies members already use in their daily work and life. Moreover, digital platforms are not expensive and potentially increase motivation levels within CoP, and consequently in companies. This example inspires the use of digital platforms to exchange knowledge in other CoPs in the hotel sector. Social implications CoPs are contexts of good interaction within a group of people by nurturing a good value system (comprehending trust, cohesion and good communication climate). Thus, a non-hierarchical and non-biased approach to CoP by managers could be accomplished by fostering an organizational culture based on joint innovation, coopetition and open communication principles. Expectedly, in this respect, intensive use of digital technologies in the business arena will keep playing a key role. Originality/value To the best of the authors' knowledge, this is the first study on CoP applied to the hotel sector. Additionally, it is also the first time a CoP composed only by women working in the hotel sector was analyzed. One other element of novelty links to the fact that a CoP with physical and virtual dimensions was studied, introducing the use of digital platforms to the analysis of CoP dynamics.
- Co-creation experiences: attention and memorabilityPublication . Campos, Ana Cláudia; Mendes, Júlio; do Valle, Patricia Oom; Scott, NoelThis study examines the on-site co-creation experience from a tourist perspective. A review of the literature and in-depth interviews with tourists who participated in a 'swimming with dolphins' experience are used to explore the importance of co-creation in enhancing attention and the memorability of the experience. Findings suggest that the co-creation experience influences memorability by focusing the tourist's attention. This study contributes to the conceptualization of co-creation in the field of tourism by substantiating the usefulness of a psychologically based approach to experience design.
- Attention, emotion and hedonic service experiences Managing and delivering services in the Asian CenturyPublication . Ma, Jianya; Campos, Ana Cláudia; Li, Shanshi; Gardiner, Sarah; Scott, NoelPurpose - This paper aims to address the central guiding questions: What principles of services management need urgent re-thinking in the Asian Century? What opportunities and challenges lie ahead?Design/methodology/approach - This paper provides a review of relevant literature on hedonic consumption and related issues of emotion, attention, mental time travel and, importantly, how these phenomena may be measured.Findings - The paper addresses this question from a psychological and customer perspective. Services managers are well-positioned and have a great future for two reasons. First, services in general are the growing part of the global economy. Second, services managers provide the experiences required by increasingly affluent consumers. On the other hand, there is in general within the services sector, a lack of knowledge and expertise in understanding the consumer psychology of hedonic consumption. Additionally, and especially in Western countries, there is lack of knowledge about the cultural differences in experiential requirements of Asian consumers.Originality/value - The paper provides directions for future research in the area of tourism experiences and emotion.
- Bottom-up factors of attention during the tourist experience: an empirical studyPublication . Campos, Ana Cláudia; Valle, Patrícia Oom do; Scott, NoelTourism, by definition, involves travel outside one's usual environment. This means that a tourist's attention cannot rely only on previously experienced known symbols and markers and instead derives meaning from paying attention to their surroundings. In this context, management of a visitor's attention processes is a key issue in the design of memorable tourist experiences and business success. Psychological research highlights two types of attention processes: bottom-up and top-down. This research is the first to identify factors influencing bottom-up attention during on-site experience and to examine the moderating impact of top-down factors of attention. The empirical research used questionnaires obtained from tourists participating in two animal-based experiences at a theme park. The results show that of the bottom-up factors analyzed, only two influenced attention, Rarity and Environment stimulation. Concerning the moderating influence of top-down factors, the research found that Interpersonal interaction and Task performance/Goal achievement affect the way external factors impact on attention, and that the intensity of this relation varies according to the relevance of this moderation.
- Capturing eudaimonic feelings in tourism experience: A construct proposal and preliminary empirical evidencePublication . Medeiros, Sandro Alves de; Campos, Ana Cláudia; Freitas, Lara Brunelle Almeida; Mondo, Tiago Savi; Sthapit, EroseDespite the increasing interest in eudaimonic tourism experiences in recent years, research in tourism studies is fragmented. In addition, studies most often lack conceptualization, not clarifying whether the construct refers to state or trait level and what psychological mechanism is analysed, whether experience, functioning, behaviour or motivation. This pilot study aims to contribute to a better understanding of eudaimonia in tourism experiences by proposing the construct of Eudaimonic Feelings as a proxy for eudaimonia. Eudaimonic Feelings is considered a state-level construct defined as the cognitive-affective appraisals towards self-fulfilment, authenticity, truthful social interactions, and personal meaningfulness concerning a tourism experience. Adopting a multi-item approach, items found in prior research were adapted to explore and measure Eudaimonic Feelings through a survey using a convenience sample. Results support data unidimensionality, items' reliability, and construct robustness and replicability.
- Co-creating animal-based tourist experiences: Attention, involvement and memorabilityPublication . Campos, Ana Cláudia; Mendes, Júlio; Valle, Patrícia Oom do; Scott, NoelIn this study co-creation, defined as a tourist's subjectively lived on-site experience involving actively participation and interaction, is found to enhance attention, involvement, and memorability. A conceptual model of on-site co-creation is proposed and empirically tested in the context of two experiences with dolphins in a marine life park. Results were analysed using SEM and reveal that co-creation significantly influences attention and involvement and also that the higher levels of attention and involvement generated are associated with memorability. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
- Socio‐cultural impacts of peer‐to‐peer accommodation on host communitiesPublication . Petruzzi, Marina A.; Marques, Catarina; Campos, Ana CláudiaPeer-to-peer accommodation has recently emerged as a central focus of research in tourism and hospitality. However, research on socio-cultural impacts of peer-to-peer accommodation is fragmented. This study reviews the relevant literature on the socio-cultural impacts of peer-to-peer accommodation on host communities and proposes an integrative framework and a working definition for goal socio-cultural impacts of peer-to-peer accommodation. This literature review contributes to knowledge of how this business paradigm affects and frames host communities and integrates the factors that should be explored by researchers, policymakers, and organizations to manage the impacts of peer-to-peer accommodation on host communities.
- Co-creation of tourism experience: attention, involvement and memorabilityPublication . Campos, Ana Cláudia; Mendes, Júlio; Pinto, PatríciaIn recent years, facilitation of memorable tourism experiences has been claimed strategic in the context of the competitive development of tourism businesses and destinations. At the same time, trends in consumer behaviour are consistently showing the tourists’ willingness to become more involved in the design, production and consumption of their experiences by getting closer to producers and other consumers, and also their growing desire of enhancing opportunities to extract from hedonic consumption positive enduring memories. As extant literature on tourism experience continues to stress the role of the tourist as co-creator of the experience, research on cocreation from the tourist perspective is still scarce. Accordingly, this thesis examines co-creation adopting the tourist point of view and explores psychological processes emerging from it. In this work, co-creation is described as the tourist’s experience of actively participating and interacting on-site, and its direct and indirect influence on attention, involvement and memorability is empirically examined in the context of animal-based experiences at Zoomarine Park, Algarve, Portugal. This thesis is composed of three independent though interrelated studies. The first study is conceptual and reviews literature on co-creation in tourism, aiming at highlighting prior contributions to conceptualization, and how these help building up a definition of co-creation of use in empirical research. The second study explores this definition and applies it in a qualitative research which relates on-site co-creation with attention and memorability, through analysis of 22 interviews conducted to tourists following an experience. The last study of this thesis is based on a quantitative approach and design and examines the relationship between tourist on-site co-creation, attention, involvement and memorability using a model which is tested through Structural Equation Modelling (SEM). With data obtained from 385 tourists participating in two experiences characterized by different levels of co-creation, a connection was found between co-creation and experience memorability through the mediating effects of attention and involvement. The thesis main findings include the following: (i) the growing interest observed in the study of co-creation in the field of tourism, which is consequently leading to more investigation being done, diversifying approaches, contexts and methods employed; (ii) the fairly extended agreement among researchers on characterizing co-creation, from the tourist point of view, through the concepts of active participation and interaction; and (iii) the tourists’ perception of a relation between co-creation, attention and experience memorability; also quantitatively substantiated findings comprise: (iv) the direct effect of co-creation on tourist attention and involvement; (v) the indirect effect of co-creation on the memorability of the experience; (vi) the effect of the level of cocreation on the level of attention, involvement and memorability, leading to the conclusion that the more co-creative is the tourist experience, the more attentive and involved the tourist will be with events, and therefore the more memorable the tourist experience is expected to be. Based on the preceding findings, contributions to theory on co-creation in tourism are identified and clarified, and implications to experience management and design are discussed.
- How about meeting Fernando Pessoa? a journey into hotel brand anthropomorphism and personality on social mediaPublication . Ruppelt, Hans; Almeida, Sofia; Campos, Ana CláudiaCompetition in the hospitality industry is fierce and hotels need to enhance guest engagement in order to remain competitive. Building brand anthropomorphism (BA) and personality is acknowledged as a marketing strategy for achieving this goal. More and more, this engagement is taking place online, with hotels' social media playing a critical role in the process. However, it is acknowledged that there is scarce knowledge on how hotels build BA and personality in online settings. Accordingly, this research aims at examining the implementation of BA and personality in hotels adopting a qualitative approach, by focusing on the study of the case of Lisboa Pessoa Hotel (Portugal) and its use of social media for this purpose. Netnography was applied in the analysis. Results provide evidence that developing BA and personality are strategies with the potential to increase guest engagement. As implications, hotel managers are recommended to attend to the need of humanising their hotel brand. This study is one of the first to examine implementation of hotel BA and personalisation through social media.
- Stimulating customer participation behaviour and boosting value co-creation in hotelsPublication . Sadighha, Jinous; Pinto, Patrícia; Guerreiro, Manuela; Campos, Ana CláudiaConsidering the competitive environment of the hospitality industry in delivering superior value to customers, customer participation in value co-creation with the service provider through interaction becomes pivotal. By bonding the co-creation theory with the equity theory, this study proposes a model for stimulating customer participation behaviour (CPB), which includes customer co-creation perception (CCCP) composing DART activities (dialogue, access, risk assessment, and transparency), CPB, co-production, and value-in-use. The collected data from tourists staying in hotels in Portugal was analysed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM). The results confirm that CCCP predicts CPB, co-production, and value-in-use. Moreover, CPB improves co-production and value-in-use and mediates the associations between CCCP and co-production/ value-in-use. This research contributes to co-creation theory by confirming CCCP as a driver of CPB and provides practical implications to enhance co-production and value-in-use in hotels.