The Relative Importance of the Major Influences on a Tourist’s Purchasing Decision Essay

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The Impact of Terrorism on Tourism Demand by Jorge E. Arana and Carmelo J. Leon

Terrorism poses a threat to the security of a country and thus it has a negative impact to the tourism demand. The authors of this article major on the effects of September 11 terrorist attacks on the tourism sector. Due to the attacks, some destinations lost image and attractiveness while others upgraded their attractiveness.

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The tourism industry is very sensitive to the negative events of a country such as political violence and terrorist threats and attacks (Arana & Leon 2008). The absence of security threats facilitates the developments of world’s tourist destinations. Terrorism has a great effect on the tourism industry as it affects accommodation facilities, transport infrastructure, urban and environmental management, and international relations between nations.

The success of a country’s tourism industry depends on various factors, which determine the purchasing decision of a tourist. Some major factors contribute to the success of the tourism industry and they include leisure, job opportunities, education, exploration, and others. Hence, the purchasing decision of a tourist is dependent on many factors including availability of theme parks, quality of services at accommodation centres, and social centres, working environment, and personal security among others.

Tourists value peace and tranquillity for pleasure and other activities offered at the preferred destinations as the most important factor in the selection of a tourism destination. The study showed that the September 11 terror attacks affected the international tourism in major parts of the world. Tourists feared for their personal security in overseas nations and airline transports. They feared terrorists’ retaliations and thus there was tourists’ shock in the world tourism industries.

In addition, the study highlighted the fact that the September 11 terror attacks were main contributors to the decreased number of tourists in Mediterranean and Canary Islands. The study found a 25 per cent monetary decrease in tourists’ willingness to pay for average package for various tourist destinations (Gilbert & Terrata 2001).

On the other hand, the tourism industry has a quick ability to recover from negative economic effects. However, the recovery depends on the speed of correction of the negative economic events. The authors argue that in the event of unrepeated terrorist attacks, tourism industry takes a six to twelve months period to achieve full recovery. Hence, terrorism affects both the purchasing and travel decisions in the tourism industry.

The study also found that the magnitude of the effect of the September 11 attacks affected world nations differently. Three forms of dimension, viz. cultural aspect, individual experience, and cost of risk avoidance played a major role in determining the magnitude of effect on a destination.

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Beginning with the cultural aspect, countries with high Islamic population suffered the biggest blow. Tourists feared for their personal security due to prejudice that resulted from the attacks directed to the Muslims (Gilbert &Terrata 2001). Secondly, individual experience also played a major role in determining the effect of tourists’ purchasing choices.

Many people feared for their security due to high tension and anxiety that the world nations were experiencing. Tourists chose to go to the destinations that have less Islamic populations as opposed to those with high Islamic populations (Gilbert & Terrata 2001). Thirdly, the cost of avoiding the risk also played a major role in determining the effect of the September 11 terror attack to a country.

Due to the tourism shock, most of the tourist destinations were negatively affected, and thus it became a costly affair to make a choice of one’s destination. The choice of destination determines the degree of risk avoidance and hence prone to the negative effects of terrorism.

An Explanatory Study of Factors of Japanese Tourism Demand for the UK by: David Gilbert and Mikiko Terrata

The study shows the effects of cultural aspects in the Japanese tourism demand and purchasing decisions. According to the study, culture, language, and novelty among other UK features are the major pull factors of the Japanese tourism in the UK. The authors argue that individual’s motivation or in other words, the external and internal forces that guide a person play a greater role in the tourism industry.

The authors looked into tourism from the leisure perspective part of it rather than from the perspective of mere travelling to a unique destination. In tourism, there are positive internal and external forces, which drive an individual to travelling to specific world destinations.

On the other hand, other forces compel an individual to avoid travelling to some destinations as well. According to the Japanese culture, tourists are attracted to tangible products, but are unsatisfied with intangible aspects like spiritual and spare time space (Gilbert & Terrata 2001).

The authors argue that traditionally, Japanese tourists used to travel just for the sake of travelling, but the motivation has changed from that of tradition behaviour to travelling for specific objectives. The Japanese have the eagerness to learn new knowledge and enjoy the world’s adventures, which underscore the most common motivation of tourism, but motivations depend on the nature of demographics such as age, marital status, and gender.

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For instance, young tourists are more adventurous than old tourists are, and thus more likely to travel overseas for adventure. However, many factors hinder the Japanese tourism and they include security concern, foreign language, cost of travelling, fear of flying, and need to care for the home and family among other reasons. Language is one of the most common factors that hinder the Japanese tourism. Many tourists learn foreign languages before travelling to overseas countries because the Japanese is a universal language in Japan.

Economic recession also determines the purchasing decisions of the Japanese tourists. The Japanese currency, Yen, is very vulnerable to economic recessions. In the recent recession, the Japanese Yen lost value to other foreign currencies. Consequently, Japanese tourists had a problem for cost of tourism was higher than normal and thus difficult for most of them to travel outside Japan (Lang, O’Leary & Morrison 1993).

Another factor that affects Japanese tourists’ purchasing decision is time and expense. Naturally, the Japanese are hardworking people and in most cases referred to as workaholics by other cultures. There is a cultural misconception that they feel guilty whenever they leave their colleagues at work.

Therefore, it is extremely difficult for a Japanese to leave his or her work for the sake of leisure. In most cases, they like travelling for economic reasons rather than for leisure as they consider such a move as a waste of timer (Montgomery 1992). Security concern is another crucial factor that affects the Japanese tourism.

Japan rates as one of the safest countries in the world according to their vow of not participating in international conflict and military involving activities after the World War II. As a result, the Japanese feel more insecure while in the other world countries than at their home country. The international threats of terrorist attacks in the world countries over the recent past have contributed to a great reduction of the Japanese tourists (Lang, O’Leary & Morrison 1993).

Comparing the two papers, both are persuasive, but the paper by David Gilbert and Mikiko Terrata is more reliable. Tourists’ purchasing decisions are dependent on various factors, which the second paper has elaborated extensively. Terrorism is an international threat and affects the tourism demand just like any other economic elements. Hence, the first paper, The Impact of Terrorism on Tourism Demand, is persuasive, but less reliable as compared to the second paper.

Culture is a major factor that determines the tourists’ purchasing decision. Every individual across the world is associated with a particular culture, which dictates the acceptable behaviours and activities of that person. Therefore, tourists determine their tourism destinations and purchasing decisions according to their cultures and beliefs. The second paper has provided evidence for this point whereby Japanese culture dictates time management and work as a person’s moral obligation (Gilbert & Terrata 2001).

Language concern is a major factor that affects international tourism. Tourists from countries that do not use universal languages as national languages experience problems when leaning other languages. Japan is a good example of such nations where the Japanese language is the national language, and thus the citizens are required to learn other foreign languages such as English in order to travel to other parts of the world.

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There are other important journals of tourism. I looked into the article “Tourism management: purchasing decisions” in the International Journal of Tourism Management by John Fletcher and “Professing tourism: Tourism academics as educators, researchers and change leaders” in the Journal of Tourism Studies by Philip L. Pearce. The authors of the two journals have broadly discussed the issues of tourism.

From the above literature review, the authors have discussed the factors that influence the purchasing decisions of tourists. On the other hand, these two journals have discussed the management of tourism in a broader perspective. Government and locals have the sole responsibility of tourism management in a country. The government sets the policies meant to encourage foreign and local tourism as well as putting infrastructure in place to see to it that the tourism sector is running smoothly (Pearce 2005).

In addition to setting up policies, the government is also responsible for ensuring the security of tourists’ attraction sites against any threats. Tourists also need protection from any threats and it is the responsibility of the government to enforce laws as a measure of ensuring security in a country. Security of tourists and tourism sites is a priority of the tourism regulation boards, and thus the government should oversee the same (Fletcher 2013).

References List

Arana, J & Leon, C 2008, ‘The impact of terrorism on tourist demand’, Annals of Tourism Research, vol.35 no. 2, pp. 299-315.

Fletcher, J 2013, ‘Tourism management: purchasing decisions’, International Journal of Tourism Research, vol. 15 no. 2, pp.105-108.

Gilbert, D & Terrata, M 2001, ‘An exploratory study of factors of Japanese tourism demand for the UK’, International Journal of Contemporary Hospitality Management, vol.13 no. 2, pp. 70-78.

Lang, C, O’Leary, J & Morrison, A 1993, ‘Activity segmentation of Japanese female overseas travellers’, Journal of Travel and Tourism Marketing, vol. 2 no. 4, pp. 1-22.

Montgomery, M 1992, ‘The Japanese Market: a profile’, Tourism Intelligence Quarterly, vol.14, no. 2, pp.57-64.

Pearce, L 2005, ‘Professing tourism: Tourism academics as educators, researchers and change leaders’, The Journal of Tourism Studies, vol. 16 no. 2, pp.98-102.

Ryan, C & Gu, H 2009, ‘Tourism in China: Destination, Cultures and Communities, Routledge, New York.

Woodside, A & Martin, D 2008, Tourism Management; Analysis, Behaviors, and Strategy, CABI, London.

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