Social media influence on tourists’ destination choice: importance of context

Challenging the mainstream assumption of social media influence on destination choice

“…From a theoretical perspective, we observed the absence of a guiding theory in the research of Tham et al (2020). Though the authors did provide a good review of relevant concepts, such as destination choice and social media, we opine that the theoretical foundation of their research would have been stronger if they had used a relevant theory.…”

“…We believe that credit must be given when credit is due, and in this instance, we acknowledge that the narrative put forth by Tham et al (2020) from their articulation of the problem statement to their review of the literature, the design of their study, and the discussion of their findingswas clear, coherent, concise, original, and insightful, thereby making it easy for readers to follow and identify the pertinent takeaways. We also congratulate the authors for stepping up to challenge the mainstream assumption or myth that many of us tend to take for granted and for (re)emphasizing the importance of contextual considerations in research (Lim, 2018b;.…”

“…social media is more popular but not yet as credible or trustworthy as existing sources of travel information) (Cox et al, 2009). More recently, we came across a rare but interesting take on social media in the field by Tham et al (2020) in Tourism Recreation Research, wherein the authors challenged the positive effect of social media on tourists' travel decisions in the digital age. We opine in our post-published review that the design of and insight from their qualitative study offer several important takeaways for future tourism and recreation research.…”

“…The research by Tham et al (2020) assessed the impact of social media influence on destination choice among tourists through the lens of context. The authors argued that the persistently rosy illustration of social media's inherent influence on destination choice is biased.…”

“…Thus, we highly encourage tourism and recreation scholars to use theories to guide their future research to avoid experiencing the opportunity costs of discoverable knowledge (i.e. the loss of opportunity to gain additional insights), as in the case of Tham et al (2020).…”