Tourist Consumption Behavior: An Unsolved Puzzle

Abstract

Tourists frequently pick the suitable product/service from the range of available goods, services, and tangible/intangible experiences. Modern marketers and consumers are highly demanding and innovative due to mounting competition and increasing disposable income. Generally, four elements are considered essential in consumers’ decision-making process: internal, external, situational, and marketing-mix (Dixit et al., 2019). The intensifying sophistication in hospitality and tourism services and experiences make it quite challenging for organizations to market them effortlessly. Several behavioral influences maneuver tourist consumption for travel, holiday, and leisure. Therefore, a precise understanding of tourist consumption behavior is essential for travel planners, service operators, and other stakeholders. Traveler consumption behavior is a highly complex and multifaceted phenomenon comprising varied cultural, social, psychological, personal, and attitudinal facades. Consumer behavior is broadly understood using three approaches, i.e., psychological, sociological, and economic (Valaskova et al., 2015; Veblen, 1899). The psychological approach establishes a linkage between the psyche and behavior of the consumer; the sociological approach highlights the responses of consumers during different circumstances or how various social instances persuade the consumers, and the economic approach is grounded on the micro-economy in which consumers express their preferred purchase intention and requirements explicitly. Therefore, consumer behavior is considered a vital baton to gauge the quality, effectiveness, and efficiency of products/services. Travelers’ consumption behavior is also manifested from two important factors: the quality, benefit, or pleasure that the product/ service offers and the signaling effect triggered by others’ consumption behavior (Bronner & de Hoog, 2021). The theory of consumption value (TCV), proposed by Sheth et al. (1991), offers valuable insights in explaining why (or not) a consumer buys a product, product category, and brand based on the value perspective. To understand the tourist consumption behavior more explicitly, Sørensen and Hjalager (2020) proposed a model that combines the dimensions of