Influence of tourists’ sociodemographic characteristics on their perception of destination personality and emotional experience of a city break destination

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of tourists’ sociodemographic characteristics on their perception of destination personality and emotional experience on the example of the city break tourism destination. Design/methodology/approach To examine this relationship, survey research was conducted on a sample of 203 national and international tourists who visited Novi Sad, the second-largest city in Serbia. Findings Research results confirmed the role of travelers’ sociodemographic variables in shaping their emotional experience and destination personality perception. The findings pointed out significant divergences in the perception of emotional experience in the case of respondents’ education level, previous visits to the city and travel companion. On the other hand, the analysis showed that repeat visitors significantly differed from first-time visitors regarding destination personality perception. In addition, differences in both destination personality and emotional experience assessment were found between national and international city break travelers. Originality/value The current study is first to focus on the role of travelers’ sociodemographic variables in simultaneous modeling of their perception of destination personality and emotional experience within the city break destination context. Besides, results revealed some new influencing factors of both destination personality and emotional experience perception, thus contributing to the existing tourism literature. In addition, this paper offers useful practical implications for city break marketers to adapt promotional activities, more effectively present the desired brand personality of the city to different sociodemographic categories of tourists and sustain repeat tourists’ perception of Positive surprise.

Cultural intelligence and heritage impact on choosing foreign tourist destination

“…The results also showed that the influence of these variables on the choice of foreign destinations is more pronounced in respondents belonging to Generation Z compared to the respondents belonging to Generation X, and similar results were obtained in previous research(Robinson & Schanzel, 2019;Yang & Lau, 2015), as well as by the authors who state that the influence of these variables is more pronounced in younger than in older respondents (Beerli-Palacio & Martin-Santana, 2018;Phau et al, 2014). At the same time, the obtained results are different in relation to studies that found that the impact of these variables is more pronounced in older people than in younger people(Šagovnoviš & Kovaţiš, 2020;Tešin et al…”

What Shapes Activity Preferences? The Role of Tourist Personality, Destination Personality and Destination Image: Evidence from Serbia

“…Previous research [16,29,30,51] indicates some differences in destination personality perception between respondents of different sociodemographic characteristics, especially of different nationality. The literature also highlights the importance of sociodemographic characteristics (such as gender and race) as a moderator of the relationship between brand personality and consumer satisfaction [52], while specifically, the study by Awad [53] emphasizes the impacts of age, income, and education.…”

“…Tourist personality is expected to influence activity preferences at destinations. Although the influence of individual characteristics has not been analyzed in the context of activity preferences, the expectation of a positive influence is based on the fact that many authors have demonstrated the influence of tourist personality on behavior [15,16,[90][91][92], with some authors clearly highlighting the influence of tourist personality on tourists' choice of activities [93][94][95]. It should also be noted that the Big Five model has not been widely used so far for tourists, but rather, simplified psychographic models have been applied [96].…”

“…Several studies also highlight the direct impact of sociodemographic characteristics on tourist behavior [16,97]. Lu and Pas [98] found a significant impact of sociodemographic variables (gender, age, occupation) on participation in destination activities and tourist behavior.…”

“…Destination personality and image, although well researched, remain popular topics in the tourism literature [11][12][13][14][15][16]. Previous research sheds light on how these constructs influence tourist behavior in general-particularly in explaining the influence of destination personality [17][18][19][20], destination image [21][22][23][24][25], and tourists' individual characteristics on destination image and destination personality [8,16,23,[26][27][28][29][30]. However, activity preferences have not been sufficiently explored in previous studies.…”