Repository logo
 
Publication

Monitoring the quality of tourism experience

dc.contributor.authorMendes, Júlio
dc.contributor.authorManuela Guerreiro, Maria
dc.contributor.authorMatos, Nelson
dc.date.accessioned2017-04-07T15:57:27Z
dc.date.available2017-04-07T15:57:27Z
dc.date.issued2016
dc.description.abstractThe new economic era the experience economy that we entered in the XXI century is challenging the overall tourism industry and destinations to respond to visitor expectations in a radically different way, demanding a new vision on what is truly being delivered to them. Within the current era, tourism businesses and destinations, in order to thrive and compete globally, are bound to recognize that experience, not goods or services, are what motivates visitors to travel, repeat visits to the destinations and recommend it to friends and relatives. Being so, a research agenda for tourism development and quality should place at its centre the nature of tourist experience and meanings of quality tourist experience from the stakeholders point of view, so that the industry actors can take joint action supported by in-depth knowledge of meanings attached to experience. With few exceptions, in tourism related literature, quality tourism experience has been largely overlooked. However, tourist experience and tourism experience have been discussed by Clawson [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9] among others. Clawson[1] wrote about recreation experience; Boorstin[2] discoursed on authenticity in tourist experience; Cohen[3], [4] studied the phenomenological tourist experience frames; MacCannell's[5] presented contemporaneous writings on tourist experience and authenticity. Pearce and Caltabiano[7] further extended consideration of traveller and tourist experience and authenticity with connections to motivations. Smith [6], Smith and Brent [8] addressed the interaction of host and guest in travel experience. Ryan [9] focused particularly on the `tourist experience'. Tourism and tourist experience past research have also focused on temporary and activity-based relationships [1] and some only on activity [10], [11]. Borrie and Birzell[12] presented four ways used to understand tourist and tourism experience. Those four ways include (1) meaningsbased[13], (2) benefits, (3) satisfaction[14], and (4) experience based means[4], [15]. Urry[16] introduced the notion of 'gaze' into considerations of tourist experience albeit 'his gazes' were challenged by Perkins and Thorns[17]. Although there has been considerable theoretical thinking on the subject, not much empirical research is available. One reason for this to happen is the multidimensional, complex and highly diversified nature of the tourist experience. Another reason is related to the fact that supporting constructs, namely satisfaction, quality and value, continue relatively ambiguous and are not always part of an integrated vision and consistent research. And yet, understanding of major and relevant dimensions of the tourist experience are of utmost importance to construct operationalization for effective experience management at destination level. The article proposes an integrated vision on how to monitor the quality of tourism in a mass tourism coastal destination the Algarve (Portugal). While analyzing the quality of the tourism experience from tourists' perspective represents the overall purpose of this paper, and the specific objectives are threefold. Firstly, the research intends to assess the tourists' perceptions on the four dimensions of the experience destination, attributes and compares them with satisfaction felt in terms of the same attributes. Secondly, it expects to provide an overall assessment of tourism experience. Thirdly, the study proposes to establish the relationship between tourist satisfaction and the tourist experience and destination loyalty.The questionnaires were based on the work of Oh, Fiori and Jeong [18], after having been adapted to the Algarve tourist destination context, and refer to the four areas of the Experience Economy: Education (items a, b, c, d), aesthetics (items e, f, g, h), Entertainment (i, j, k, l) and Escapism (m, n, o, p). The last three items- q, r, s are related to memory and memories. To that end, a survey was carried out sampling 405 individuals. Of the 397 valid questionnaires obtained, 90% were answered by tourists from Portugal, Germany, Spain, the Netherlands, Ireland and the United Kingdom. The results show about 95% of the respondents are satisfied and very satisfied. Approximately 95.3% of the respondents say they are satisfied and very satisfied with their stay in the Algarve. About the quality of lived experience, 77.3% classified very good and excellent. One of the important findings of this research is that the majority of the respondents (93`)/0) intends to recommend the Algarve to friends and relatives. With this research, the team expects to contribute to a thorough understanding of tangible and intangible activities and attributes that form the underlying basis of the tourist experience in coastal tourism.
dc.identifier.isbn978-94-6252-201-5
dc.identifier.issn2352-5428
dc.identifier.otherAUT: JME00456; MMG01163;
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/10400.1/9716
dc.language.isoeng
dc.peerreviewedyes
dc.publisherAtlantis Press
dc.relation.isbasedonWOS:000384639100044
dc.titleMonitoring the quality of tourism experience
dc.typejournal article
dspace.entity.typePublication
oaire.citation.conferencePlaceBandung, Indonesia
oaire.citation.endPage304
oaire.citation.startPage294
oaire.citation.titleAsia Tourism Forum 2016 – The 12th Biennial Conference of Hospitality and Tourism Industry in Asia (ATF-16)
oaire.citation.volume19
person.familyNameda Costa Mendes
person.familyNameMartins Guerreiro
person.familyNamede Matos
person.givenNameJúlio
person.givenNameMaria Manuela
person.givenNameNelson Manuel da Silva
person.identifier.ciencia-id5713-4693-71D2
person.identifier.ciencia-id0616-9DC2-CCD3
person.identifier.ciencia-idC71C-19F4-A193
person.identifier.orcid0000-0003-2900-418X
person.identifier.orcid0000-0002-6398-9712
person.identifier.orcid0000-0002-6263-5007
person.identifier.ridAAP-1169-2020
person.identifier.scopus-author-id38361439300
person.identifier.scopus-author-id57195062461
rcaap.rightsopenAccess
rcaap.typearticle
relation.isAuthorOfPublication241da1df-cabc-41d3-952a-8cbcb2c07777
relation.isAuthorOfPublication170ced6a-52fd-43de-8d15-69b01a11edfe
relation.isAuthorOfPublicatione8fd6121-7383-47ef-b228-a5c871939d14
relation.isAuthorOfPublication.latestForDiscovery170ced6a-52fd-43de-8d15-69b01a11edfe

Files

Original bundle
Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
Loading...
Thumbnail Image
Name:
9716feito.pfd.pdf
Size:
1.61 MB
Format:
Adobe Portable Document Format