COVID or VOID: A systematic literature review of technology adoption and acceptance in hospitality and tourism since the breakout of COVID-19

Abstract

The purpose of this study was twofold. The first goal was to review and synthesize research pertaining to ‘technology acceptance and COVID-19’ from the years 2020, 2021, and early August 2022 in the realm of hospitality and tourism. The second goal was to dwell on the relevant technology adoption studies in order to provide a critical analysis and extract insights for future research theoretically and practically. A systematic literature review was performed. Findings indicate that some constructs were not properly used like perceived enjoyment and some constructs were overlooked like perceived interaction. Additionally, besides technology features, the characteristics of consumers need to be investigated to reveal the true underpinnings of the technology adoption behavioral process. However, inquiries regarding consumers’ traits need to be expanded beyond basic demographics (e.g. age and gender). The paper systematically garnered technology acceptance research from the COVID-19 era in order to provide insights for future research directions in the post-COVID era. This work identified a lack of consensus over the theoretical underpinnings of technology acceptance research among tourism hospitality researchers. The study revealed the narrow research lenses focusing on particular empirical domains, mainly hotels, restaurants, and museums, and overlooking other contexts (e.g. airports, stations, within-city transportation, and events).

Robots in travel clinics: building on tourism’s use of technology and robots for infection control during a pandemic

“…AI-driven systems and robots, e.g., the world's first social robot PEPPER, or concierge CONNIE and many others, have long been employed in tourism and hospitality. Examples are too numerous to list but include travel information, booking, airline selfcheck-in, bag drop, automated border control, customer service, hotel check-in and check-out, welcoming guests and taking, storing and delivering luggage, room service, vacuuming, cleaning, security checks, entertainment, concierge services, and generally reducing waiting times [35][36][37].…”

“…Robots may mitigate discrimination by and of employers, employees, and tourists by serving without judgments but may indirectly discriminate by robots representing a particular race or gender or against people who are unfamiliar with the use of robots and need to ask for help [53,54]. Post-COVID-19, a combination of human, robotic and mixed service in tourism and hospitality was envisaged [55], but 'contactless service' still must focus on 'service' , not just 'contactless' [56]; a move from high-touch-low-tech to high-tech-low-touch may be detrimental to an industry that is built on human interaction [37].…”

Consumer Behavior in the Post-COVID-19 Era: The Impact of Perceived Interactivity on Behavioral Intention in the Context of Virtual Conferences

“…Recent studies have investigated the influence of virtual conferences, but there are still gaps in the literature that need further attention [2,18]. Specifically, the COVID-19 pandemic has significantly modified attendees' behaviors toward video-conferencing technologies [27,28], and their adoption and diffusion processes remain challenging [29][30][31]. To address this challenge, the current study aims to understand the antecedents of behavioral intention to participate in virtual conferences and propose strategies for engagement post-COVID-19 era.…”

Multi‐item unidimensional measurement scale construct: Perceived hygiene development (pHd)

“…Robots, automation, and contactless options are becoming more popular day by day (Pillai et al, 2021). Service establishments seek technology adoption for the post‐COVID era considering labor shortage (Iskender, Sirakaya‐Turk, Cardenas, & Harrill, 2022). These technology adoptions may need to be measured in terms of contribution to hygiene developments as perceived hygiene improvement may impact acceptance and use of technology adoption by customers.…”