Exploring crowding in tourist settings: The importance of physical characteristics in visitor satisfaction

How perceived crowding changes the interrelationships between perceived value, tourist satisfaction and destination loyalty: the empirical study at Hoi An

“…While perceived crowding has been validated to affect both tourist satisfaction and destination loyalty negatively (García-Buades et al, 2022; Papadopoulou et al, 2023; Ruiz et al, 2021), its moderating role in the triangle relationship between these two and perceived value is still unexplored. Statistical results suggest that high levels of perceived crowding as WHS can suppress the positive influence of perceived value on either tourist satisfaction ( H4 ) or destination loyalty ( H5 ).…”

“…Overcrowding has been regarded as the negative outcome of a quantity-led tourism development strategy (Schuckert & Wu, 2021) and the consequence of poor destination management and tourism planning (Ruiz et al, 2021). The findings of this paper suggest that even when tourists, either international or domestic, could perceive the site’s value, overcrowding prevents tourists’ full access to those values.…”

“…The concentration of tourists at certain times gave rise to the problem of over-crowdedness at the destination (Gössling, McCabe, & Chen, 2020; Mihalic, 2020; Yu & Egger, 2021). The adverse effects caused by a high volume of tourist arrivals on the level of tourist density can produce unsatisfactory psychological outcomes among visitors to the destination (García-Buades, García-Sastre, & Alemany-Hormaeche, 2022; Papadopoulou et al, 2023; Ruiz, Delgado, García-Bello, & Hernández-Fernaud, 2021).…”

“…Meanwhile, the stimulus-overload theory (SOT) asserts that crowding may cause an unfavourable assessment of an area’s population density, and hence, lead to high anxiety among site visitors (Milgram, 1970). Perceived crowding has been widely proven to produce direct influences, either positive or negative, on tourists’ perceived value at the destination (Hou & Zhang, 2021; Yin, Ji, Huang, & Ni, 2023), the level of their satisfaction (Ruiz et al, 2021; Zehrer & Raich, 2016), the intention to revisit (Kim & Yoon, 2020; Yin, Cheng, Bi, & Ni, 2020) or the intention to recommend the destination (Papadopoulou et al, 2023; Nian, Chen, Zhang, Li, & Ren, 2023). However, to our best knowledge, very few papers have examined tourist psychological elements such as perceived crowding (Albayrak et al, 2021; Papadopoulou et al, 2023) as the moderator of the interrelationship among perceived value, tourist satisfaction and destination loyalty.…”

Understanding crowding perceptions and their impact on place experience: Insights from a mixed‐methods study

“…Moreover, the study empirically assesses the influence of crowding on visitors' satisfaction and post‐visit behavioral intentions, including intention to share information online about destinations. In addition, unlike previous studies that assessed crowding perceptions based on visitors' memories (e.g., Ruiz et al, 2021) or through online simulations (e.g., Park et al, 2021), this research combines the findings of both exploratory inductive data obtained from focus groups and from in situ travelers' perceptions of crowding (gathered over 2 months), which enhances the quality and validity of the findings. Last, the study is original in crystallizing the findings of an exploratory and a descriptive study, which contrasts with previous single‐method, cross‐sectional and context‐specific research into destination crowding.…”