JTHM 2014.3

Journal of Tourismand Hospitality Management

Volume 2, Number 3, March 2014 (Serial Number 6)

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Publication Information: Journal of Tourism and Hospitality Management is published monthly in hard copy (ISSN2328-2169) by David Publishing Company located at 240 Nagle Avenue #15C, New York, NY 10034, USA. Aims and Scope: Journal of Tourism and Hospitality Management, a monthly professional academic journal, covers all sorts of researches on all aspects of tourism and hospitality management from experts and scholars all over the world. Editorial Board Members: Andjelija Ivkov Dzigurski, Serbia. Bonface Odiara Kihima, Kenya. Burcu Selin Yilmaz, Turkey. Camatti Nicola, Italy. Charalampos Giousmpasoglou, Bahrain. Choen Krainara, Thailand. Dan Musinguzi, State of Qatar. Eka Bakhtadze, Georgia. Elisabetta Mafrolla, Italy. Elisa Rose Backer, Australia. Federica Palumbo, Italy. Heba Mahmoud Saad Abdel-Naby, Egypt.

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Journal of Tourism and Hospitality Management

Volume 2, Number 3, March 2014 (Serial Number 6)

Contents Tourism

The Role of Cooperative Strategies in Destinations’ Competitiveness in a Turbulent Environment 97

Ivett Sziva

Towards a Tolerance of Ambiguity Model in Greek Tourism Industry 106

Kleanthis K. Katsaros, Athanasios N. Tsirikas, Sofia-Maria N. Bani, Christos S. Nicolaidis

An Empirical Study on the Correlation Between Cruising Motivation and Cruising Intention 114

Guo Yingzhi, Hu Tian, Huang Jianfeng, Dong Kun

Tourist Expectation and Tourist Experience in Cultural Tourism 124

Orawan Boonpat, Noppamash Suvachart

Animator’s Roles in Enriching the Content of Tourist Stay 133

Zlatko Jakovlev, Cane Koteski, Snezana Bardarova, Aleksandra Zezova, Kristijan Dzambazoski, Gorancho Koteski

Journal of Tourism and Hospitality Management, ISSN 2328-2169 March 2014, Vol. 2, No. 3, 97-105

The Role of Cooperative Strategies in Destinations’

Competitiveness in a Turbulent Environment∗

Ivett Sziva Budapest College of Communication and Business, Budapest, Hungary

Destination management is a key issue of all overall models of destinations’ competitiveness and seems to be a

“panacea” in those countries, which introduces the tool-system in the near past, so as to support the destinations

(national/regional or local level) to keep up with keen competition, mainly in the Central-Eastern and Balkan

region. The culture of cooperation holds difficulties in this region. The lack of trust as well as cooperation in

bigger groups can be drawn back to the distrust business culture typical in these countries, and the so-called group

collectivism (a phenomenon of building trust in small groups based on personal contacts). The main focus of this

paper is to summarize the theoretical approaches to destinations’ competitiveness and destination management

and to summarize the results of two case studies concerning a destination facing keen competition or escaping

from a decline. The main research question is: “What kind of role can (could) destination management play in

destinations’ competitiveness in a turbulent environment?”. As a result of this research, the differentiated analysis

of management-oriented view of destinations’ competitiveness was carried out, as well as crystallizing the key

success/failure factors of destination management.

Keywords: destination management, destinations’ competitiveness, cooperation, management of change

Introduction

A destination can be defined as an area offering touristic services and activities, which has special attractions and can be chosen by a tourist for a trip. From a geographic point of view, the destination could be a continent, a country, a region, or any kind of place, and its border is determined by the distance of the home country of the tourists. In an optimal case, the destination operates as a management entity in spite of its numerous and heterogeneous players (Pechlaner, 2003). The destination should be seen as a concrete touristic service supplier, a “multi-product company” (Krippendorf, 1971). The definition of Flagestad (2002, p. 4) is the closest to the author’s interpretation, as he handled a destination as an entire entity of area: “A geographical, economic, and social unit consisting of all those firms, organizations, areas, and installations which when combined are intended to serve the specific needs of the visitors”.

The competitiveness of destinations came to the limelight of the academic research in the latest decade, mainly because of the growing competition between the must-see and alternative destinations. Although there

∗ This paper is based on the Ph.D. thesis of Sziva (2010) and further researches in the area, considering what, the author would like to express sincere appreciation for the support of the project KTIA_AIK_12-1-2013-004, from Research and Technology Innovation Fund (Kutatási és Technológiai Innovációs Alap).

Ivett Sziva, Ph.D., senior professor, School of Tourism, Leisure, and Hospitality, Budapest College of Communication and Business. Email: [email protected]; [email protected].

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THE ROLE OF COOPERATIVE STRATEGIES IN DESTINATIONS’ COMPETITIVENESS

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are a lot of approaches of the area from theoretical as well as researching viewpoints, there is a need to map the fitting of the theoretical approaches and the different methodological tools for the different types (e.g., level of development, unique selling points (USP)) of destinations. One of the key points of the overall model of the destinations’ competitiveness is destination management, which can be the driver of the so-called competitive advantage of the destinations: “(…) A destination endowed with a wealth of resources may not be as competitive as a destination lacking in resources but which is utilizing the little it has, much more effectively” (Crouch & Ritchie, 1999, p. 143). In this train of thoughts, the author found her own reasoning, particularly because during her researches in Central-European region, mainly Hungarian destinations, she met promising, small examples of initiations, which proved the importance of management questions in changing competitiveness. In this paper, the author gives an overview of the overall models of destinations’ competitiveness and the tasks of destination management, based on her Ph.D. thesis (Sziva, 2010) and further researches. The author analyzes Hungarian and Austrian cases from the viewpoint of the role of destination management and competitiveness, and focuses on how the changes of the turbulent environment can be handled and on crystallizing the most important differences, so as to provide starting and debate points for further researches.

Literature Review

Destination Management, Definition, and Tasks

From a demand-side perspective, a destination can be defined as a place, which possesses appropriate attractions, infrastructure, and touristic services, so as to be the place for touristic stay, and appears as an entire market player for the tourist (World Trade Organization [WTO], 1993). From the point of view of the market, the destinations are the sites of consumption and can be seen as the unit of touristic competition (Bieger & Laesser, 1998), and like this, it should operate as a strategic business unit, be independent from political limits, offer the guests the needed facilities for stay and experience, and have an obligation for brand and sales system building (Bieger, 1998). The main question is: “How should this strategic business unit, this multi-product company, be managed?”. The “meta-management” or the overall management of the destinations appeared only in the last decades (Sainaghi, 2006) and can be defined as follows:

(...) Destination management is the strategic, organizational, and operative decisions taken to manage the process of definition, promotion, and commercialisation of the tourism product [originating from within the destination], to generate manageable flows of incoming tourists that are balanced, sustainable, and sufficient to meet the economic needs of the local actors involved in the destination. (Franch & Martini, 2002; as cited in Presenza, Sheehan, & Ritchie, 2005, p. 3)

Beritelli, Bieger, and Laesser (2007) went further and made a clear distinction between the meaning of the destination management in the community model, highlighting the importance of networking, and in the corporate model, where the hierarchical relationships of interest determine the processes of destination management. Basically, Bieger (1997) determined the four most important functions of destination management: (1) planning (strategy, development model); (2) product development (e.g., operating information offices, creating marketable products, quality man, system); (3) marketing (e.g., market research, brand management, communication); and (4) pool (informing the industry, promoting awareness, support), kind of incubation functions, and supporting the community and the service suppliers.


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The Role of Destination Management in Destinations’ Competitiveness

According to one of the most influential definitions, “Competitiveness is the capacity of a destination to compete successfully against its main rivals in the world, to generate above average levels of wealth, and to sustain this over time at the lowest social and environmental cost” (WTO, 2000, p. 66). The most known overall models will be introduced as follows, highlighting the role of destination management.

The author highlights the model of Crouch and Ritchie (1999; 2000), because it is the most overall model of destinations’ competitiveness according to several writers (Enright & Newton, 2004; Buhalis, 2000; Faulkner, Oppermann, & Fredline, 1999). On the base of the model, the resources can be seen (supporting factors and resources; core resources and attractions), which are the sources of comparative advantage. The destination management guarantees to capture these resources at the operative level, which is done in the framework of the goals determined by strategic planning, and being in the centre of the model, enhancing its important, central role in destinations’ competitiveness. The success of all these factors is influenced by the so-called qualifying determinants.

Further on, the author focuses on the model of Dwyer and Kim (2003) because of two reasons: Firstly, it is as popular as the model of Crouch and Ritchie in the circle of touristic researchers; secondly, the model shows a more dynamic interpretation of destinations’ competitiveness than that of Crouch and Ritchie. Dwyer and Kim (2003) built up the model from the same ex ante factors as Crouch and Ritchie, but they added the demand factor as well and handled the situational factors as manageable. From their perspective, destination management plays an important, but not dominant role, which is influenced by several other factors, and this structure illustrates well the complexity of the destinations. Heath (2003) created his model for the under-developed, improving destination, based on his researches made in South Africa. The Heath model or the so-called Heath house contains five basic elements: (1) the basic (e.g., attractions, touristic infrastructure); (2) the cement (the relationships gluing together the different factors); (3) involving the participants in the development; (4) the building stones: sustainable product development and integrated communication; and (5) the roof: the factors of the adaptability. In the model of Bieger (1997), the competitiveness of the destination got a transparent overview, determined by two main factors: the resources and the strategic issues. Among the strategic factors, we can find important elements determining the competitiveness, e.g., cohesion and strategic orientation of the players, governmental role. There is a high enhancement on management quality, mainly on the professionalism and education of the players.

Data and Methodology

The main aim of this research is to map what kind of role does destination management play in the ex ante side of the destinations’ competitiveness in developing destinations facing fierce competition and what kind of factors has an impact on its role. To analyze the research topic, the case study methodology based on qualitative interviews was chosen, as among the explaining factors a lot of “soft” elements were proposed, and one Hungarian case and one Austrian case were analyzed in a structured way, based on structured interviews. The cases are characterized by the following objectives and methods.

Hungarian Case: Balatonfüred (Town, at Lake Balaton)

Balatonfüred is an emerging destination with high seasonality, getting out from the decline of touristic arrivals in the near past. Taking the tendencies of tourist traffic in the past 10 years, we can say that a fall in guest


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nights is seen in the tourism of the city until the nadir in 2006, which basically characterized the whole of tourism around Lake Balaton. After 2006, 13%-17% rise can be traced in the city’s tourist traffic, which can be explained by the development of the city carried out by the municipality and the touristic service providers (Hungarian Statistic Office [KSH], 2010). The management of the tourism in Balatonfüred was carried out by the Balatonfüred city local government’s tourism board and the board of the local government itself. City marketing (and touristic marketing) also belonged to the tasks of the local government until 2006, when these duties were transferred to the Balatonfüred Touristic Association by the local government, which is becoming the tender-financed destination management organization (DMO) of Balatonfüred. The main objective was to carry out the research as widely as possible, so as to get detailed answers to the research sub-questions. Serving this objective, 30 interviews were made in the scene.

Austrian Case: Carinthia (Province)

The objective of selecting the Austrian destinations was to see the Austrian system of the DMO, which has old traditions and a balanced structure. The specific aim was to analyze a medium developed region, with the problem of fierce competition and high seasonality but with different characteristics of the cooperation among the service suppliers. Because of the limited possibilities, the research was focused on those critical points highlighted in the Hungarian case, like context and success/failure factors of destination management. That is the reason why Carinthia, as a lake destination, was chosen out, as a medium developed destination with high seasonality (71% of tourist nights in the summer season), with an outstanding international attendance and stagnating turnover (Karnten Werbung [KW], 2010). Carinthia is managed by KW, a professional DMO with the objective of developing all-year, differentiated, and well-positioned wellness tourism. KW initiated the development of the “Seen Wellness” (Lake Wellness) product, and an association of the service providers called Seen Wellness Association, to carry out the development. In Carinthia, five interviews were made with the competent experts from destination management and the service suppliers.

Results

First of all, the context of destination management and competitiveness will be described so as to give an overview of the basic of the differences among the cases, which is followed by the results of the case study focusing on destination management.

The Context

The case studies showed some main differences regarding the context of the destination management, which should be highlighted firstly. In the Austrian case, the service suppliers were committed to the individual as well as the cooperative developments, with possessing the appropriate strategic view as well as the resources. In the Hungarian case, the marketable product development is hindered by the lack of resources (knowledge, human resources, and financial resources), cooperation among the players, and the paternalist view (“the town will solve it”). In the Hungarian case, difficulties could be realized regarding the cooperation, mainly because of the lack of trust towards the Touristic Association. The reason can be that the association is not a professional but a non-profit organization, with a leader who has tourism property. Further, distrust could be realized among the actors hindering the realization of proactive ideas. While in the Austrian case, the players showed trust for the associations as well as for the mutual initiations. This difference can be explained by the factors of different business cultures. It can be assumed that the lack of trust as well as cooperation in bigger groups can be drawn


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back to the distrust business culture typical in the countries of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (COMECOM) (Csepeli, Örkény, Székelyi, & Barna, 2004), and the so-called group collectivism (a phenomenon of building trust in small groups based on personal contacts1). Although in Austria, the sign of the so-called institutional collectivism can be realized, the players believe in organizations and social institutions instead of trusting only informal contacts, groups.

The Characteristics of Destination Management

In Balatonfüred, the visioning and the development function of the municipality must be highlighted, as earlier there was no special organization doing these tasks, the results achieved by the local government, mainly the mayor, in the aspect of visioning the town as the cultural capital of the Lake and realizing the needed steps (e.g., renewing the town, establishing museums, motivating the service suppliers to establish 4-star hotels and facilities) can be seen as the most important factor of demand-side destinations’ competitiveness. While regarding the “official destination management activity”, the members of DMO are very variedly informed of the point and purpose of the destination management. About one third of the interviewees have heard about the DMO, but they failed to say what exactly it is (“We’ve heard that we’ll have one, but we don’t know its exact purposes”). Another one third of the players have heard about DMO, but they do not understand why it is needed, and the rest connected it to exploiting the tender money (“I’m afraid the DMO has only been booming, because you could win a lot of money for it, but it’ll be over and it has to maintain itself later”). The most important and most perceived achievements of destination management are marketing communication and the increase of reputation. Typically, the communication function stands in the focus of destination management in the perception of the management of the association (DMO) and the city leadership (“It must be appreciated that the girls there do a good marketing”). It is important to emphasize that none of the players mentioned what functions would make DMO more than the current association, and understanding destination management caused difficulties to most of them. A quarter of the respondents highlighted that they would accept an independent management (“It must be communicated as the interest of the whole city. (…) We need a chairman who is independent, because anybody could be accused of being biased, after all this is Hungary”). Most service providers do not see clearly why DMO was born, what its purposes are, what destination management means, and what its duties are. Despite this, service providers expect the fulfillment of coordination and incubation functions from DMO, for the sake of improving their success (decreasing seasonality, product development, and increasing quality).

On the other side, the main area of resource stewardship, as well as carrying capacity issues is neglected by the local government and the new DMO as well, which factors, together with the lack of cooperation, and active non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the area can threaten the overall competitiveness of the area, the welfare and well-being of the locals as well as the guests.

Regarding the activities of the DMO (KW) in Carinthia, the following results could have been crystallized. The planning of the destination is characterized by a community-based planning, i.e., strategic actors are involved in the planning process (“Here in Carinthia, a large number of associations exist. (…) We have to ask them all, if we want to head for a new direction”): KW undertakes to promote the coordination of product and quality development in addition to setting strategic directions, provides continuous professional, technical guidance, and initiates the establishment of new coordinating organizations, like Seen Wellness (“The relation 1 For more details, please see Bakacsi (2006).


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with them (with the KW-Sz.I.) is continuous, should we have any question concerning the project they are there to help” (member of the Seen Wellness Association)). The organization carries out an active incubation activity along well-defined development policies: It initiates cooperation and development among service providers and provides technical assistance to implement the development and communication projects. Further on, the organization places an emphasis on environmental protection by providing incentives for service providers (“We pay great attention to the lakes, quality is constantly checked by environmentalists, who inform us of the results. (…) This is why we included environmental management systems in the criteria of Seen Wellness hotels”).

Structured details of the highlighted context of characteristics of development, management, players, and contacts can be seen in Table 1.

Table 1 Contextual Factors in the Analyzed Cases Dimension Balatonfüred (Developing destination) Carinthia (Medium developed destination)

Development characteristics

1. Top-down initiations 2. Aim: decreasing seasonality, demand-side success. Result: improvement of the townscape and communication 3. The sustainable development is questioned

1. Top-down initiations 2. Aim: decreasing seasonality, demand-side success.Result: product packages and communication 3. Enforcing sustainability

Players

1. Service providers with low activity and ability for cooperation; innovative and opened players are rare 2. Low trust for the DMO 3. The contact with the local suppliers is occasional 4. The driving force: local government and charismatic mayor

1. Cooperative service suppliers with the ability of developing individually or in community 2. The contact with the local suppliers is occasional 3. The local government is important at the local level, but at the regional level, it has shared tasks

Management

1. Local government, activity: planning, attractiondevelopment, with the central role of the charismatic mayor 2. Dependent civil marketing association (the leader is an important touristic player), not professionals. Activity: communication

Professional, independent management organization, activity: planning, coordination, professional support, and communication

Contacts

1. Strong social cohesion in the elite leading the town 2. Lack of occasional cohesion among the service suppliers 3. The factors of the destructive competition often, sophisticated competition only in “developer group”

1. Close cooperation among the players, associations, and civil organizations which have great roles in organizing tourism development and cooperation 2. Competition seems to be missing (yet)

Discussion and Conclusion

The driving engine behind the spectacular and demand-side success is the Hungarian town’s charismatic leader and the elite behind him who, on the basis of a determined and systematically designed urban development concept, were able to make use of calls for applications, and they relied on the historical relations and network of the city. The spectacular development of the town for the time being can be converted for income only by a relatively low number of entrepreneurs and locals. The reason is the seasonal nature of tourism, the short high season, which is a basic feature of Lake Balaton. Coordination would be of outstanding importance for the purpose of product development aiming to reduce seasonality. This could be implemented at the level of service providers, but several factors impede cooperation (for example, egoistic behavior, self-interest, the difficulties of running a small business), or at the level of destination management, but for the time being, this activity has not become much focused. The destructive impact of competition can be perceived


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nearly in all supply sectors: The development of service providers is made more difficult by the difficulties of running small businesses, which means the lack of resources and technical assistance. It has to be noted that the resources provided for service development so far primarily supported capacity building, and only very few supported the developments that aimed at unique services or the joint development of product packages.

Like in the case of Balatonfüred, the most important objective of development was to reduce seasonality and support demand-side success by product development in Carinthia as well. It has become obvious that essential preconditions for launching development activities are the existence of service providers who are willing to act, the traditions of the self-organization, and the primary role of associations in Carinthia, which supposedly is due to cultural circumstances and historical traditions (Austria is a special example with respect to bottom-up touristic associations, which are extremely large in number). A further important factor is the DMO, which organizes, encompasses, and supports them. It has a pronounced role in planning innovations, ideas come “from the top” (from the DMO), and service providers implement those ideas. Similarly, essential preconditions are the sources of funding (membership fee, project funding from the province and from calls for application for special product development purposes), and the critical mass of participants is also equally important.

Regarding the drivers of destinations’ competitiveness, the following factors were identified during the research:

(1) Innovation: Innovation seems to be the most spectacular driver in each case, with different results. In the developing (Balatonfüred) as well as in the medium developed (Carinthia) destinations, the main aim of the innovation was to decrease the seasonality and increase the demand-side success. In order to reach this, resounding attraction development was carried out, based on which new segments could be targeted because of the investment of the service suppliers. In Carinthia, concrete, marketable, and innovative product development was carried out in the cooperation of the service suppliers;

(2) Marketing communication: In the developing (Balatonfüred) and in the medium developed (Carinthia) destinations, the marketing communication is a highlighted factor as well as the result perceived mostly by the service suppliers;

(3) Financial resources: In both cases, the financial sources (membership fees, tender, and governmental or provincial sources) were highlighted. It is important to mention that in Austria, the development carried out in the framework of cooperation is financed partly by the province, meanwhile in Hungary, this kind of development is financed by central tenders for DMO and assures a limited framework for the innovative, individual ideas;

(4) The role of micro and small sized companies: In the Austrian case, the service suppliers were committed to the individual as well as the cooperative development, with possessing the appropriate strategic view as well as the resources. In the Hungarian case, the marketable product development is hindered by the lack of resources (knowledge, human resources, and financial resources) and cooperation among the players, but the paternalist view (“The town will solve it”) and the low taxing moral causing conflicts could also be seen as obstacles;

(5) Formal and informal contacts: The importance of the formal and informal contacts was emphasized in each case and could be identified as the base for the development of marketable products. In the Hungarian case, the cohesion of the elite seemed to be the catalyst because of which, the resounding attraction development could be started, while building marketable product packages is hindered by the lack of


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cooperation among the service suppliers. The main difference between the Hungarian and the Austrian cases could be seen in the social cohesion, which can be drawn back to cultural differences. In the Austrian destination, it was crystallized that the critical mass of the participants is needed in order to realize an effective cooperation and development. In the formal touristic cluster, the critical mass was needed to gather together valuable ideas, while in the medium developed destination, it was needed to realize a mutual communication reaching the economies of scale;

(6) Sophisticated competition: The negative correlation between the cooperation and the destructive competition could be seen in Balatonfüred, which could be drawn back to the lack of strategic view and marketing knowledge of the service suppliers in the concerned supply segments, facing with overcapacity. In the Hungarian case, the sophisticated competition could be seen among the players of the “developers” (the owners of the new tourism investments), who fulfilled an important role in repositioning the destination;

(7) Sustainable development: The question of sustainable tourism development was highlighted in the Austrian case. In Carinthia, the sustainable development was focused on improving quality management systems serving environment protection. In the case of the Hungarian destination, the questions of sustainability have not been realized enough yet;

(8) The role of destination management: It was identified that the destination management fulfills a catalytic role in starting and maintaining development serving the welfare of the destinations. In all the three cases, it was highlighted that a central coordination is needed. In the case of Carinthia, the professional, independent DMO played a catalytic role in development, by fulfilling the incubation and coordination functions. In the Hungarian case, the municipality fulfilled the planning and developing functions of the (missing) destination management, and the touristic association (initiated by the municipality) carried out the tasks of the marketing communication.

It seems that the need of the central coordination is independent from the development stage of the destination and can be explained by the dominant role of the micro and small size touristic enterprises in the supply, demanding the incubating and coordinating functions. Further explanation can be that characteristic, that all destinations in point can be named as rural, not as “must-see”, globally known destination, and need the mutual development as well as mutual marketing-communication activity. The results of this empirical study reinforced the importance of the destination/cluster management organizations, the municipality, and the touristic associations. This can be interpreted as the reasoning for the central importance of the destination management, which can be seen in the model of Crouch and Ritchie (2000), but it is important to highlight that several factors can influence the way of development and operation of DMOs (as was highlighted in Beritelli et al., 2007, regarding stronger and weaker community ties), or the assumption of the differences caused by cultural differences (Bakacsi, 2006) which should be further analyzed.

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Administration, Corvinus University of Budapest, Budapest). World Trade Organization [WTO]. (1993). Sustainable tourism development: Guide for local planers. Madrid, Spain: WTO. World Trade Organization [WTO]. (2000). Public-private sector cooperation: Enhancing tourism competitiveness (p. 289).

Madrid, Spain: WTO.


Towards a Tolerance of Ambiguity Model in Greek Tourism

Industry

Kleanthis K. Katsaros, Athanasios N. Tsirikas, Sofia-Maria N. Bani, Christos S. Nicolaidis

University of Macedonia, Thessaloniki, Greece

The present paper examines the influence of locus of control, involvement, job satisfaction, and organizational

commitment on hotel chief executive officers’ (CEOs) tolerance of ambiguity. The research sample consists of 82

Greek hotels’ CEOs. The first part of this paper analyses their level of locus of control, involvement, job

satisfaction, and organizational commitment, in front of the frequent, uncertain, and ambiguous changes in their

business environment. In the second part, results of principal component analysis indicate that two factors

characterize CEOs’ involvement, namely, importance and interest. Further, regression results reveal the significant

influence of interest, locus of control, and job satisfaction on CEOs’ tolerance of ambiguity. Finally, this paper

discusses the research findings and proposes certain practical implications for enhancing Greek hotel CEOs’ level

of tolerance of ambiguity and thus, their efficiency during change.

Keywords: ambiguity, chief executive officers (CEOs), change, emotional behavior

Introduction

Current constant political, economic, social, and technological changes have established a unique business

environment. Thus, nowadays, organizational members’ success highly depends on the extent to which they are

able to cope with change ambiguity/uncertainty in their business environment (Nicolaidis & Katsaros, 2011).

In this respect, the main aim of this paper is to examine the influence of certain significant perceptual and

attitudinal factors on chief executive officers’ (CEOs) tolerance of ambiguity. We chose CEOs due to their key

roles in an environment where the complexity and the pace of change increase (Johnson & Scholes, 2002) and

tourism industry, as a rapidly growing sector with extremely high change rates in terms of novelty, competition,

development, and growth in Greece (Armenakis, Harris, & Mossholder, 1993).

The first part of this paper makes a brief reference to the relevant literature as well as to the background of

the research. The second part of this paper, via a statistical analysis, examines CEOs’: (1) level of ambiguity

tolerance; (2) locus of control; (3) involvement during changes in their business environment; (4) degree of job

satisfaction; and (5) organizational commitment. Further, it investigates the relationship between CEOs’

tolerance of ambiguity and the above mentioned factors. The final part of this paper discusses the results and

proposes a number of certain policies that may effectively influence CEOs’ performance towards change.

Kleanthis K. Katsaros, adjunct lecturer, Accounting & Finance, University of Macedonia. Email:

[email protected]. Athanasios N. Tsirikas, adjunct lecturer, Accounting & Finance, University of Macedonia. Sofia-Maria N. Bani, research associate, Accounting & Finance, University of Macedonia. Christos S. Nicolaidis, professor, Accounting & Finance, University of Macedonia.

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Tolerance of Ambiguity

Tolerance of ambiguity, among others, is defined as one’s acceptance of confusing situations and lack of

clear lines of differentiation (Ely, 1989). It refers to the way a particular individual perceives stimuli and

processes information. An individual with a low tolerance of ambiguity experiences stress, avoids ambiguity,

and seeks for certainty. On the contrary, an individual with a high tolerance of ambiguity perceives ambiguous

situations as desirable, interesting, attractive, and hence, approaches problems from innovative perspectives

(Kirton, 1981).

Numerous attempts have been made to examine the relationship between tolerance of ambiguity and

several personal, emotional, behavioral, and working attitudes. Generally, individuals with a high tolerance of

ambiguity can better cope with unstructured and dynamic situations characterized by uncertainty and ambiguity

(Budner, 1962). As a consequence, tolerance of ambiguity is correlated with: creativity (Tegano, 1990),

decision-making and critical thinking (Wilkinson, 2006), risk acceptance (Lauriola & Levin, 2001), and

effective performance in new situations (Jonassen & Grabowski, 1993).

Perceptions and Attitudes

On the whole, our workplace behavior is significantly influenced by our perceptions, personality traits,

attitudes, and experiences (Langton & Robbins, 2006).

Locus of control refers to an individual’s perception about whether the upcoming evolutions depend on

what he/she does (internal orientation) or on events outside his/her personal control (external orientation)

(Zimbardo, 1985). Begley and Boyd (1987) suggested that an internal locus of control may relate to higher

performance, but at excessive levels can result in a decline of performance. That is, excessive belief in the

personal efficacy produces careless behaviors, which may ignore emerging external dangers. On the other hand,

people with an external locus of control tend to be more stressed and anxious (Benassi, Sweeney, & Dufour,

1988) and unwilling to take risks and work on self-improvement (Rotter, 1975). On the whole, the international

literature suggests that generally managers appear to be more internals (Mamlin, Harris, & Case, 2001).

Involvement is mainly defined as an employee’s willingness to support the organization even if it requires

additional time and effort (Madsen, Miller, & Cameron, 2005). The literature suggests that employees’

involvement relates to their cognitive support during the change process and may promote personal and

organizational readiness for change (Armenakis et al., 1993). Scholars suggest that involvement can be

examined along a number of dipolar dimensions that can be viewed as independent of each other. Respectively,

McQuarrie and Munson (1991) supported that involvement can be examined by two bipolar dimensions,

namely, importance and interest. Importance refers to the perceived importance of an event and/or to the quality

of being important; and interest concerns the personal interest that a person has in an event.

Job satisfaction is mainly defined as the emotional and cognitive attitude held by an employee about

different aspects of his/her work (Wong, Hui, & Law, 1998). It may simultaneously influence and be influenced

by organizational changes and environmental ambiguity. For instance, Schweiger and DeNisi (1991) found that

employees involved in a merger exhibited decreased levels of job satisfaction, while Wanberg and Banas (2000)

found that low levels of change acceptance were associated with decreased job satisfaction. More to the point,

research has identified a positive relationship between job satisfaction and ambiguity tolerance and it suggests

that job satisfaction plays a critical role in employees’ acceptance of change (Judge, Thoreson, Pucik, &

Welbourne, 1999; Nicolaidis & Katsaros, 2011).


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Organizational commitment is defined as the relative strength of an individual’s identification with and

involvement in a particular organization (Mowday, Steers, & Porter, 1979). There is evidence in the change

management literature that organizational commitment plays an important role in employee’s acceptance of

change ambiguity/uncertainty. Relatively, Lau and Woodman (1995) argued that a highly committed employee

is more willing to accept an organizational change if it is perceived to be useful. That is, an individual

committed to an organization accepts its values, is willing to exert effort on its behalf, and wishes to remain in

the organization (Mowday et al., 1979). However, they noted that a highly committed employee may resist to

change if he/she perceives it as a threat for his/her own benefit or harmful to the organization.

On the whole, managers’ tolerance of ambiguity seems to be affected by their locus of control, involvement,

job satisfaction, and organizational commitment. Therefore, it emerges the main hypothesis of this paper:

H1: The interaction of managers’ locus of control, job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and

involvement affects their ambiguity tolerance.

Research Background

Greek tourism plays a vital role in the Greek economy. It is ranked worldwide 21st in absolute size and

37th in its relative contribution to national economies. In more detail, it accounts nationally for about 15.5% of

the gross domestic product (GDP) (EUR33.9 bn or US$50.2 bn), 18.8% of total employment (785,000 jobs or

1 in every 5.3), and 14.2% of total investment. Further, Greece is consistently ranked in the top 15 destinations

for global travelers with more than 15 million tourists per year.

Though, a climate of uncertainty and insecurity is prevailing in the Greek tourism industry as a result of

the severe national economic crisis. Greece is required to slash spending and restructure large parts of its

economy, in exchange for the 110 billion euro rescue plan funded by the International Monetary Fund, the

European Union, and the European Central Bank. As a consequence, there are continuous strikes, rallies, work

stoppages, protests, and social conflicts that may harm Greece’s image and have negative consequences to the

tourism development. Relevantly, the Association of Greek Tourism Enterprises along with the Hellenic

Chamber of Hotels forecasted that in 2010, tourist arrivals might fall more than 20% and thus, might provoke

massive lay-offs particularly in hotels (about 50,000 new unemployed). In any case, it should be noted that the

current and forthcoming changes may cause severe ambiguity/uncertainty and thus, affect negatively Greek

hotel CEOs’ overall performance.

Research

Taking into account the importance of the tourism industry to the Greek economy, the current

complexities that provoke intense changes, and the total absence of relevant researches in Greece, the purpose

of this research was, firstly, to examine CEOs’ locus of control, involvement, job satisfaction, and

organizational commitment, and secondly, to investigate the influence of the above mentioned factors on their

level of tolerance of change ambiguity.

This research was conducted during a 7-month period in 2010. Survey data were collected from hotels

established in Greece. In the first two months, a pilot test was conducted in order to examine the functionality

of this research. Subsequently, the structured questionnaires were personally delivered to the CEOs by

the research team. Overall, 82 Greek hotels’ CEOs participated in this research (a response rate of 38.8%).

Tables 1 and 2 summarize the demographic characteristics of the participants in our research.


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Table 1

Demographic Characteristics of the Sample by CEOs

Variable CEO

N Frequency (%)

Sex Male 64 78.05

Female 18 21.95

Age

25-34 years 5 6.10

35-44 years 26 31.71

45+ years 51 62.19

Marital status Married 66 80.49

Single 16 19.51

Education

Secondary 29 35.37

University 39 47.56

Master/Ph.D. 14 17.07

Working experience (pr. position)

1-5 35 42.68

6-10 41 50.00

11+ 6 7.32

Total working experience

6-10 21 25.61

11+ 61 74.39

Table 2

Demographic Characteristics of the Sample by Hotels

Variable Hotel

N Frequency (%)

Age

1-5 years 8 9.76

6-10 years 26 31.71

11-15 years 31 37.80

16+ years 17 20.73

Number of employees

1-10 9 10.98

11-50 39 47.56

51-250 26 31.70

251+ 8 9.76

Firm life circle

Initial 11 13.41

Growth 49 59.76

Mature 22 26.83

Annual turnover

< 1 million 8 9.76

1-10 million 45 54.87

11-100 million 21 25.61

101+ million 8 9.76

Regarding the tolerance of ambiguity measurement, we used the Tolerance-Intolerance of Ambiguity

questionnaire developed by Budner (1962). The questionnaire uses a 16-item scale and it follows a scale

ranging from 0 to 100. A score between 44 and 48 is considered relevantly neutral, while scores below 44

indicate a high tolerance to ambiguity and scores above 48 indicate a low one. Locus of control was examined

through the well-known questionnaire developed by Spector (1988). The questionnaire includes 16 semantic

different items scored on a 1-6 scale. Regarding the measurement of involvement towards change, we used the

McQuarrie and Munson’s (1991) revised version of their Revised Personal Involvement Inventory (RPII).


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The questionnaire captures two independent dimensions that evaluate involvement, namely, importance and

interest. For the measurement of job satisfaction, we used the 7-item scale Michigan Organizational

Assessment Questionnaire developed by Cammann, Fichman, Jenkins, and Klesh (1979), which contains a

3-item overall satisfaction subscale. Finally, for the measurement of organizational commitment, we used

Organizational Commitment Questionnaire developed by Mowday et al. (1979) which is composed of 15

semantic different items, scored on a 1-7 scale.

Results

The descriptive statistical results revealed that the tolerance of ambiguity index value is equal to 59.89.

Thus, they reveal CEOs’ hesitation towards uncertainty and/or a significant intolerance to the ambiguity that

every organizational change involves. Further, their locus of control degree is 3.89 (S.D.: 0.55) on a 1-6 scale.

Hence, they consider that the upcoming evolutions depend more on their own behaviors and actions, rather than

on luck or chance. Finally, CEOs exhibit significant job satisfaction (mean: 5.26 and S.D.: 1.05, on a 1-7 scale)

and also, organizational commitment (mean: 5.35 and S.D.: 1.15, on a 1-7 scale).

The principal component analysis results revealed two factors that constitute hotel CEOs’ involvement

towards change (see Table 3): (1) importance (variance 38.96%); and (2) interest (variance 20.12%). The two

factors had eigenvalues greater than 1 and accounted for 59.08% of the total variance. Further, high reliability

characterizes the two factors. The Cronbach coefficient alpha is 0.82 for the importance factor and 0.74 for the

interest factor. On the whole, CEOs’ involvement dimensions are relevantly positive. The factor of importance,

on a 1-6 scale, has a value equaling to 3.22 (S.D.: 1.09) and the factor of interest has a value equaling to

3.31 (S.D.: 1.02).

Table 3

Involvement Factor Analysis Results Question Importance Interest DQ1 0.798 DQ3 0.778 DQ6 0.761 DQ10 0.812 DQ9 0.754 DQ2 0.688 DQ5 0.672 Eigenvalue 3.759 2.022 Variance (%) 38.96 20.12 Cronbach α 0.82 0.74 Mean and S.D. 3.22 (±1.09) 3.31 (±1.02)

Finally, the correlation between the two factors that capture Greek CEOs’ involvement towards change

ambiguity and uncertainty is in general medium to low degree (0.430, p < 0.01; see Table 4).

Table 4

Factors’ Correlation Factor Importance Interest Importance 0.430*** Interest Note. ***: p < 0.01.


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Ordinary regression was run in order to examine the impact of managers’ perceptional, emotional, and

cognitive attitudes on their tolerance of ambiguity. Regarding the hypothesis of the paper, we can observe

(see Table 5):

H1: Only locus of control, interest, and job satisfaction emerged as significant predictors of CEOs’

tolerance of ambiguity.

Table 5

Regression Analysis Results Variable Dependent variable: tolerance of ambiguity (Constant) 30.73*** Locus of control -3.12*** Importance -0.812 Interest -1.49*** Job satisfaction -4.15** Organizational commitment 0.312 F 8.24*** N 82 R2 0.38 Notes. **: p < 0.05; ***: p < 0.01.

Discussion and Implications

The findings reveal relevant CEOs’ hesitation towards change and/or intolerance to the

ambiguity/uncertainty that every organizational change involves (tolerance of ambiguity = 59.89). However,

taking into account the dynamic nature of the Greek tourism industry, we may assume that the interpretation of

the results is worsening and ultimately may reveal that CEOs’ tolerance of ambiguity is unsatisfactory and

disconcerting. We may assume that a possible reason is the Greek national and business culture (norms and

values). Hofstede’s (2001) research findings suggest that within a sample of 56 nations, Greece has the highest

uncertainty avoidance value (Greece: 112; nations’ mean average: 66.4). Further, other researches also suggest

that low ambiguity tolerance (Nicolaidis & Katsaros, 2011) and high uncertainty intolerance (Nicolaidis, 1992)

characterize the culture of Greek firms in terms of risk evasion and change avoidance.

From the resource-based view of strategic management, this paper suggests three main strategic policies

that may influnce effectively CEOs’ tolerance of ambiguity. Most importantly, the proposed policies may

strengthen hotels’ strategy of growth (e.g., the provision of more and new services to the same and new markets,

to the diversification of their activities). The three strategic policies refer to: (1) the development of CEOs’

internal locus of control; (2) the enhancement of CEOs’ interest; and (3) the increase of CEOs’ job satisfaction. Greek hotels’ CEOs should try to cultivate their internal locus of control. We suggest that personal control

(one of the five core dimensions of empowerment; Whetten & Cameron, 1995) may facilitate CEOs to increase

the internal locus of control by applying a mix of the following three main practices: (1) fostering personal

mastery experiences, which helps managers to master experience over challenges, problems, or difficulties;

(2) providing resources, which refers to enhancing technical and administrative support to managers; and

(3) organizing teams, which refers to enhancing the capabilities of managers who participate in teams because

they want to do things beyond their personal abilities (e.g., share information, formulate and choose solutions

which they can either implement personally or in cooperation with others). The implementation of the above

practices may, in turn, raise CEOs’ tolerance of ambiguity.


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Greek hotels should also consider the advantages that they may gain by investing in the increase of their

CEOs’ interest. This, we argue, could happen through the employment of education/communication

management practices (Johnson & Scholes, 2002) that may advance CEOs’ interpersonal relations through the

establishment of a favorable supportive organizational climate that may assist them in communicating their

ideas more clearly and trustfully (J. A. Fitzsimmons & M. J. Fitzsimmons, 2006). In addition, Greek hotels

should also consider: (1) facilitating CEOs to perceive all the exciting and interesting change aspects, through

the use of certain strategic tools (i.e., future search, real-time strategic change, open space processes); and

(2) utilizing job involvement practices in order to enhance CEOs’ interest towards change ambigutiy and hence,

ensuring their support even if it requires further time and effort.

Statistical results also indicate that CEOs’ tolerance of ambiguity can be further increased if they manage

to empower their job satisfaction in their working environment. Thus, CEOs should try to: (1) take

responsibility for the ambiguous aspects of their work; (2) influence their emotions in order to stress the

compatibility between important personal values and change variables; and (3) replace negative emotions, such

as fear or anxiety, with positive emotions, e.g., excitement, passion, or anticipation that can influence ambiguity

and make the work environment more attractive. The latter could happen by actions such as encouraging

approval, self-reassuring, requesting for feedback, and fostering informal social activities that build cohesion

and encourage friendship (Whetten & Cameron, 1995).

Conclusion

The research findings demonstrate a worrying level of tolerance of ambigutiy among Greek hotel CEOs.

It therefore suggests three strategic policies that may effectively influence their emotional and cognitive

behaviors in times of turbulence and uncertainty. Concluding, this paper reveals that deeper and broader

research on CEOs’ behaviors towards change ambiguity is needed in the tourism industry.

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An Empirical Study on the Correlation Between Cruising

Motivation and Cruising Intention*

Guo Yingzhi, Hu Tian, Huang Jianfeng, Dong Kun

Fudan University, Shanghai, China

The cruising market is booming in China, and both motivation and intention are the most important aspects in the

field of study on the cruising passengers’ behaviors. The research purpose of this paper is to identify the motivation

factors of the cruising passengers in China and their impact on the cruising intention. Based on the push-pull model,

this paper indentified the motivation factors, including intrinsic ones and extrinsic ones, and put forward the

research model. The intrinsic motivation factors include relaxation, socialization, family bonding, and social

recognition, whereas the extrinsic motivation factors include entertainment and ashore tour. Having collected data

through survey and analyzed them by the statistic methodology, this paper found that the motivation factors of

relaxation, family bonding, entertainment, and ashore tour have a positive impact on the cruising intention, and the

impact of relaxation is significant. By contrast, the motivation factors of socialization and social recognition are not

positively associated with the cruising intention.

Keywords: cruising passengers, motivation, cruising intention, correlation analysis

Introduction

The cruising industry in the globe, with an average growth of 7.6%, has been one of the fastest growing

tourism sectors since the 1980s. The statistics data indicated that, within the years from 1996 to 2010, the

number of the people taking the cruising vacation has increased from 6.26 million to 18.8 million, and the gross

expenditures by cruising passengers have reached up to $26.8 trillion. According to the predictions of the

reliable cruising organizations like the Passenger Shipping Association (PSA), the Cruise Lines International

Association (CLIA), and the European Cruise Council (ECC), the figure of the cruising passengers in the globe

will grow up to 25 million in 2015 and to 30 million in 2020, respectively. In addition, the growth in the

markets of Europe and Asia will be remarkable.

The center of the cruising industry worldwide has been moving eastward recently and especially, the

markets of China have undergone an extraordinarily strong growth. According to the China Cruise and Yacht

* Acknowledgements: This study was supported by Grand Key Project of China National Social Science Fund (12&ZD024), the Third Period of 985 to Whole Promotion of Social Science Research and Humane Fund at Fudan University (2012SHKXYB002), and China National Nature Science Funds (71073029&71373054).

Guo Yingzhi, Ph.D., professor, Department of Tourism, Fudan University. Hu Tian, Ph.D. candidate, Department of Tourism, Fudan University. Huang Jianfeng, Ph.D. candidate, Department of Tourism, Fudan University. Dong Kun, Ph.D. candidate, Department of Tourism, Fudan University. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Guo Yingzhi, Department of Tourism, Fudan University,

Shanghai 200433, China. Email: [email protected]; [email protected].

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Industry Association (CCYIA), the number of the international cruises received by the mainland of China was

223 in 2010, up 42.9% from the year before, of which 95 cruises depart from the coastal cities of China, up

18.75% and 128 international cruises call upon those cities, up 68.4%. Additionally, the number of voyage

departing from Hong Kong to Taiwan was about 20 in 2010, and the 30,000 passengers were mainly from the

mainland of China. The international cruises received by the Chinese mainland in 2011 were 262, up 17.5%

compared with 2010, carrying up to 504,582 passengers, of which 142 cruises depart from the coastal cities of

China, up 49.5% compared with 2010.

With the promise of the cruising industry in China, the industry focuses on one problem, that is, how to tap

the new market’s potential. Travel market is always bearing the prominent region attribute, for the travel

motivation and the travel intention will be remarkably different, if travelers from various nations have diverse

cultures, religious beliefs, and values (Baker & Crompton, 2000). Therefore, another major problem is

triggered: How to master the cruising motivation and the cruising intention, which are closely relevant to cruise

lines, so as to turn more potential cruise passengers to the actual product purchasers. In this sense, the research

question of this paper about the impact of the cruising motivation on the cruising intention is of high practical

significance.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the motivation factors influencing the intention of the cruise

passengers and to study the correlation between the cruising motivation and the cruising intention. It was

recently that the academic researches on the cruising industry started from scratch and the researches on the

consumer behavior of the industry are increasing. As a result, both the cruising motivation and cruising

intention have become one of the major research questions. However, all the researches on the questions

mentioned above merely focused on the markets except that in the mainland of China. In terms of theoretical

study, the research model and the independent variables indentified and put forward by the western researchers

are not appropriate for the Chinese cruising travelers. For instance, filial piety, one of the values in the eastern

cultures, has an impact on the cruising intention of the Chinese. It should be noted that there is neither the

research on the cruising motivation nor on the cruising intention conducted by domestic researchers. The

evidence is that none of the literature with the research keywords like cruise, motivation, intention, etc., was

searched out within the Chinese academic databases, such as China National Knowledge Internet (CNKI) and

Wan Fang Data, on June 15, 2012.

Literature Review

As far as the relevant literature is concerned, there is no enough research on the cruising motivation and

cruising intention. Qu and Ping (1999) studied the impact of cruising motivation on the intention, whereas the

measurement methodology on the motivation was in light of other disciplines, and the convergent validity and

discriminant validity of the instrument were not strictly tested. Hung and Petrick (2011) conducted a relevant

research with a case study on cruise travelers of Florida and the United States (US), but the measurement items

of motivation merely included the intrinsic factors and the extrinsic ones were not taken into account. In

addition, Hung and Petrick (2012) applied the research model of motivation-opportunity-ability (MOA) in the

analysis of the impacts of cruising motivation, constraints, and ability on the cruising intention. However, the

relevant research on the cruising motivation and intention has not been conducted by domestic researchers, for

there is evidence that none of the literature with the research keywords like cruise, motivation, intention, etc.,

was searched out within the Chinese academic databases, such as CNKI and Wan Fang Data, on June 15, 2012.


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Undoubtedly, motivation is the principal research topic within the fields of psychology, sociology,

discipline of consumer behavior, and tourism science. Quite a few theories and concepts on travelers’ motivation

have been put forward. For instance, MacCannell (1973; 1999) suggested that tourists travel to other destinations

to seek authentic opportunities when their usual environments lack such an experience. Plog (1974) allocated

tourists into an allocentric-psychocentric continuum in which tourists were categorized according to their

personalities towards novelty-seeking and implied that personality was one of the basic sources of travel

motivation. Pearce and Caltabiano (1983) applied Maslow’s hierarchy of needs to the study of tourist travel

motivations and suggested that experienced travelers are more likely to go on trips to fulfill a higher level of

needs (i.e., self-actualization) than novice travelers. These theories imply that people travel for fulfilling certain

needs and wants and that these needs and wants are the basic motivations for initiating a travel experience.

Crompton’s research on travelers’ motivation outstands in various relevant studies, for the push-pull

model put forward by him, which mainly suggests that travelers’ motivation should be deconstructed into two

dimensions including push factors and pull factors, has been widely recognized by tourism scholars (Kim &

Lee, 2002).

Push factors refer to the intrinsic needs motivating travelers, which include: escape from personal/social

pressures, social recognition/prestige, socialization/bonding, self-esteem, learning/discovery, regression,

novelty/thrill, and distancing from crowds (Crompton, 1979; 1992). This demand-side approach helps to

understand tourists’ decision-making processes. Unlike push factors, pull factors are generally viewed from a

supply-side perspective, mainly including the destination image, the attractions, the visible attributes related to

the destination attractiveness, natural and cultural environment, tour cost, tourism infrastructure, safety,

destination accessibility, etc. (Crompton, 1979; 1992).

In light of the push-pull model (Crompton, 1979), this paper presents its own research model, focusing on

the cruising market in China and the consuming behavior of the Chinese.

Research Model and Hypotheses

Based on the push-pull model (Crompton, 1979) and all the elements of motivation mentioned in the

literature, this paper suggests that the push factors of cruising motivation should be classified into four

constructs, comprising escape/relaxation, socialization, family bonding, and social recognition, while the pull

factors of cruising motivation should consist of two constructs, including entertainment and ashore tour. Family

bonding is identified as the construct which suits the cruise passengers with eastern cultures. In addition, it

should be mentioned that the construct of novelty, generally viewed as one construct of motivation (Hung &

Petrick, 2011), is absent in the paper, because the measurement items of family bonding and ashore tour will be

overlapped, and the reason for the absence of the constructs like luxury and food and beverage is that they are

not irreplaceable and unique to the cruise tourism.

For the purpose of study, this paper sets up the model and designs the following hypotheses (see Figure 1):

H1: Relaxation is positively associated with cruising intention.

H2: Socialization is positively associated with cruising intention.

H3: Family bonding is positively associated with cruising intention.

H4: Social recognition is positively associated with cruising intention.

H5: Entertainment is positively associated with cruising intention.

H6: Ashore tour is positively associated with cruising intention.


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Figure 1. The relation model of cruising motivation and intention.

Instrument Development and Data Collection

Based on the past literature and review by experts, the questionnaire was designed. The questionnaire

consists of seven constructs: relaxation, socialization, family bonding, social recognition, entertainment, ashore

tour, and cruising intention. Items for the constructs were designed with a 7-point Likert scale, ranging from

1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree).

To ensure that these items reflect the intended construct, content validity should be checked first.

Assuming that all the possible manifestations of a construct collectively form the population of questions,

content validity is the degree that the questions used in the survey for a construct provide a representative

coverage of the population. The questions we used were, to a large degree, based on the rephrasing of different

aspects of a construct as defined in the literature. This has provided the basis for content validity. In addition,

two Ph.D. students familiar with the research project were invited to discuss the phrasing of the questions to

ensure that the questions had at least face validity. Minor changes were made based on the feedback.

We carried out a random sampling survey to collect data in the Shanghai International Cruise Passenger

Center (North Bund) and Wusongkou International Cruise Terminal of Shanghai in May 2012. The respondents

of the survey were passengers of two cruise liners. One was the Victoria of Costa Cruise Lines, which called

upon Jeju, Busan of South Korea and Fukuoka, Kagoshima of Japan. The other was the Legend of the Sea,

which called upon Inchon, Jeju of South Korea and Kagoshima, Fukuoka of Japan.

The survey was carried out in two phases. Phase one was a pilot test involving 72 cruise passengers.

The purpose of the pilot test was to ensure the quality of the questionnaire. After that, the main study was

carried out.

Pilot Study

In the pilot test, 72 questionnaires were collected. In order to verify these questionnaires, exploratory

factor analysis (EFA) was conducted to test the convergent and discriminant validity of the instrument.

Convergent validity means that all the questions intended to measure a construct do reflect that construct.

Discriminant validity means that a question should not reflect an unintended construct and that constructs are

statistically different. EFA is an adequate tool, because it allows the underlying factors to emerge naturally from

the data without imposing any constraint. If the questions for a construct are well designed, they should

converge and form a major factor. If a question is problematic, it can be detected and removed from later study.

Relaxation

Socialization

Family Bonding

Social Recognition

Cruise Intention

Entertainment

Ashore Tour

H1

H2

H3

H4

H5

H6


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EFA with principal component analysis was used to extract factors in our study. Following the

recommended procedures, major principal components were extracted as constructs; minor principal

components with eigenvalue less than 1 were ignored; an item and the unintended construct correlation should

be less than 0.4 for discriminant validity. We extracted seven factors corresponding to the seven constructs

using Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) 21.0, and the eigenvalue of the 6th and the 7th factors

were 0.931 and 0.908, respectively, approaching 1. The items showed appropriate validity and were kept for the

main study. Table 1 reports the principal component analysis results with varimax rotation using SPSS 21.0.

Table 1

Factor Loading for EFA of Pilot Data

Construct Item Component

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Family bonding

I cruise for it suits family travel very much (Bond2).

0.871

I cruise to increase affections among my family (Bond3).

0.809

I cruise to accompany my parents(Bond1).

0.697

Cruising intention

I shall cruise in a short period (Intent1). 0.900 I shall encourage my family and friends to cruise (Intent2).

0.849

I shall recommend cruise to others(Intent3).

0.784

Socialization

I cruise to enjoy various parties on cruise (Social1).

0.899

I cruise for there are passengers from various nations (Social2).

0.886

I cruise to get chances to know new friends (Social3).

0.809

Entertainment

I cruise for there is casino on board(Enter1).

0.881

I cruise to enjoy wonderful performance in the theatre (Enter2).

0.832

I cruise to enjoy the wonderful games(Enter3).

0.796

Ashore tour

I cruise for the ship calls upon a few harbor cities (Atour1).

0.861

I cruise for the ashore tour is wonderful too (Atour2).

0.781

I shall take itinerary into more account if cruising (Atour3).

0.765

Social recognition

I cruise to have a high-status vacation(Prest1).

0.820

I cruise to get praises from my friends(Prest2).

0.811

I cruise to photograph an exotic place to show friends (Prest3).

0.719

Relaxation

I cruise to escape from the crowd (Relax1).

0.647

I cruise to relax myself (Relax2). 0.685

I cruise not to relax myself (Relax3). -0.839

Eigenvalue 6.509 3.833 1.958 1.437 1.145 0.931 0.908

Variance (%) 30.99 18.25 9.326 6.843 5.452 4.435 4.276

Cumulative variance (%) 30.99 49.25 58.57 65.42 70.87 75.30 79.58


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Main Study and Data Analysis

The main study involved 300 cruise passengers, yielding a total of 300 questionnaires, and 296

questionnaires were returned. However, 21 questionnaires were incomplete or invalid, and they had to be

discarded, resulting in 275 questionnaires for use.

As for the demographics of the population, the male respondents accounted for 52%, and the female ones

accounted for 48%. The age above 45 accounted for 46%, between 35 and 45 accounted for 33%, and between

20 and 35 accounted for 21%.

Table 2 shows the descriptive statistics. Most of the constructs had a mean between 4.0 and 5.0,

indicating an upward bias in the sample, comparing with a mid-point of 4. Since regression analysis requires

the data to be normally distributed, to ensure that the upward bias would not jeopardize normality,

we did a univariate normality test for all items on skewness and kurtosis. A 95% confidence level was

imposed. All items fell within the corresponding confidence intervals, rendering our data suitable for further

analysis.

Table 2

Descriptive Statistics and Factor Correlation Mean S.D. Min. Max. Intent. Relax Social F.B. S.R. Enter. A.T.

Intent. 5.507 0.984 2 7 0.879

Relax 5.101 1.022 2 7 0.57 0.849

Social 4.232 1.252 1 7 0.31 0.29 0.834

F.B. 5.041 1.051 1 7 0.51 0.63 0.32 0.797

S.R. 5.501 1.013 2 7 -0.08 -0.11 -0.15 -0.14 0.834

Enter. 4.194 0.818 2 7 0.57 0.56 0.41 0.43 -0.14 0.786

A.T. 5.491 0.996 2 7 0.15 0.03 0.00 0.03 0.68 -0.05 0.814

Notes. Intent. is the abbreviation of intention. Relax is relaxation. Social is socialization. F.B. is family bonding. S.R. is social recognition. Enter. is entertainment. A.T. is ashore tour. The correlation of the same factor is the square root of the average variance extracted (AVE).

Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) is the conventional statistics method to specify and test such a

relationship for measurement model. With this method, items are expected to be highly correlated only with

the intended construct. If an item is not substantially related to the intended construct or significantly related

to an unintended construct, the pre-specified relationship is invalidated and adjustment of the instrument is

required. Therefore, the first requirement of CFA is that the construct-item correlation should be significant.

Among the standard factor loadings, the loading of item “atour3” and its intended construct is 0.23, which is

very insignificant, and then the item “atour3” was dropped.

In addition to the significant construct-item correlation, for an item, the AVE by the latent factor

should be greater than 0.5, which means that a construct should explain more than 50% of the item variance.

Moreover, items of the same construct should be highly correlated. To measure such correlations,

two measures, composite factor reliability (CFR) and Cronbach’s alphas (α), are required to be greater than

0.7. If all these criteria are satisfied, the convergent validity of the items is said to be confirmed. Table 3

reports the result of convergent validity for the sample using statistical package LISREL1. All criteria were

satisfied. 1 An acronym for linear structural relations.


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Table 3

The Convergent Validity of the Measurement Model Construct Item Std. loading AVE Cronbach’s alpha CFR

Intent.

Intent2 0.99 0.774 0.907 0.911

Intent1 0.82

Intent3 0.82

Relax

Relax3 0.95 0.722 0.882 0.885

Relax1 0.81

Relax2 0.78

Social

Social1 0.93 0.696 0.870 0.871

Social2 0.83

Social3 0.73

F.B.

Bond2 0.88 0.636 0.831 0.839

Bond1 0.82

Bond3 0.68

S.R.

Prest1 0.89 0.696 0.865 0.873

Prest2 0.82

Prest3 0.79

Enter.

Enter1 0.96 0.619 0.950 0.752

Enter2 0.94

Enter3 0.90

A.T.

Atour1 0.69 0.663 0.851 0.854

Atour2 0.86

Atour3 0.88

Notes. Intent. is the abbreviation of intention. Relax is relaxation. Social is socialization. F.B. is family bonding. S.R. is social recognition. Enter. is entertainment. A.T. is ashore tour.

One way to confirm the discriminant validity is to check that the inter-construct correlation is less than the

square root of AVE. The underlying rationale is that an item should be better explained by its intended

constructs than by some other constructs. The correlation among constructs is reported in Table 2. Discriminant

validity was confirmed in our sample.

Testing of Hypotheses

Since the measurement model was satisfactory, we proceeded to test hypotheses. Before any conclusions

can be drawn for testing the hypotheses, the model must fit the data well. A few model-fitting indices can be

employed here: standard chi-square = 1.304 < 3, root mean square error approximation (RMSEA) = 0.044 < 0.1,

comparative fit index (CFI) = 0.98 > 0.9, incremental fit index (IFI) = 0.98 > 0.9, and adjusted goodness-of-fit

index (AGFI) = 0.89. Our results indicated satisfactory model fit.

In our measurement model, the dependent variable was cruising intention, while the independent variables

were relaxation, socialization, family bonding, social recognition, entertainment, and ashore tour. Based on the

hypotheses, the regression equation was presented:

0 1 2 3 4 5 6. . . . . .Intent Relax Social F B S R Enter Atourβ β β β β β β ζ= + + + + + + +

After the scatter-plot analysis, we found that there is a linear correlation. And then, we proceeded with

both the regression analysis and the hypotheses testing. Table 4 shows the results.


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As Table 4 shows, such independent variables as relaxation (β1 = 0.316, p = 0.000), family bonding

(β3 = 0.170, p = 0.036), entertainment (β5 = 0.234, p = 0.002), and ashore tour (β6 = 0.176, p = 0.031) are

positively associated with cruising intention. Thus, H1, H3, and H5 were supported. Moreover, the correlation

between relaxation and cruising intention is highly positive. The rest of the independent variables, social

recognition (β2 = 0.040, p = 0.573) and socialization (β4 = 0.075, p = 0.361), are not positively associated with

cruising intention. Thus, H2 and H4 were not supported.

Table 4

Regression Analysis and Hypotheses Testing

Hypothesis Independent variable

Dependent variable Standard β T-test Sig. R2 F-test Result

1 Relax Intent. β1 = 0.316 3.759 0.000 0.393 15.970 Supported

2 Social Intent. β2 = 0.040 0.565 0.573 Not supported

3 F.B. Intent. β3 = 0.170 2.120 0.036 Supported

4 S.R. Intent. β4 = 0.075 0.916 0.361 Not supported

5 Enter. Intent. β5 = 0.234 3.121 0.002 Supported

6 A.T. Intent. β6 = 0.176 2.172 0.031 Not supported

Conclusions

The results of the data analysis indicated that the motivation of relaxation is positively associated with

cruising intention. Their highly positive correlation was consistent with the attribute of cruise, the type of

vacation tour. The emergence and rise of cruise marked the transformation of tourists’ values, from fast

sightseeing to slow tour experience (Pearce & Caltabiano, 1983). Tourists have attached more importance to

their own sustainable development, to the harmony with nature, to the value of experience, and to their own

health, which resulted in the changes in their tour types (MacCannell, 1999). Cruise, a tourism product of

vacation type, known as a floating resort or a floating tiny town, seems wonderfully suitable for tourists’

motivation of relaxation and their value of experience (Lois, Wang, Wall, & Ruxton, 2004). So, the function of

relaxation should be highlighted when the cruise line promotes its products.

The positive correlation of family bonding and cruising intention demonstrated that a cruise is appropriate

to the family tour. Tourists with an eastern culture background considered family as one of their core values. A

few unique traditions of eastern culture turned out to be the motivation factors influencing cruise travelers’

intention. Our survey indicated that a large proportion of aged passengers took the cruise vacation which was

purchased by their children. It was filial piety that was the major motivation factor triggering cruising intention.

The vacation type, relatively settled space, and slow experience resulted in cruise being viewed as a major

alternative of family tour (Yarnal & Kerstetter, 2005). Therefore, the product design and promotion by a cruise

line ought to meet demands for affection bonding of the family within each phase of the life cycle.

The relatively significant correlation of entertainment and cruising intention accounted for entertainment’s

importance in influencing cruising passengers’ consuming decisions. Diverse performances, games, and casino

on ship are unique to the cruise and should be the advantages of cruise promotion (Petrick, Li, & Park, 2007).

For example, it was for its philosophy of fun ship that the sensation was created by the Carnival Cruise Lines in

the 1960s. Another thing which needs to be noted is that there is a gap of recognition among passengers from

various nations because of the difference in their consuming psychology and cultures. As an example, Italian

opera is presented by Carnival’s cruise when its voyage is on the Mediterranean, while the Broadway opera


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would be the alternative when the cruise floats on the Caribbean. The cruise line has to consider how to localize

entertainment products.

The itinerary of cruise was another major factor impacting the potential passengers’ decisions. Apart from

the home port, a few call-upon ports were the major knots on the cruise’s route (MacCannell, 1973), and the

ashore tour, with the center of a call-upon port, had the limited space of a cruise expanded largely (Jaakson,

2004). When a potential passenger made a purchase decision, the call-upon ports and the ashore tours on them

would be weighed too much besides the destination. However, the call-upon ports selected by the cruise line

were mainly the coastal cities with the developed tourism, and the ashore tours were generally sightseeing and

shopping, which resulted in an unobvious advantage of tour by cruise to that by air. The design of itinerary and

ashore tour should be innovative and meet the demand of passengers for novelty.

Theoretically, it seemed to a cruise that socialization should be one of the motivation factors impacting the

intention for a ship, as a carrier has the settled space. However, the data analysis indicated that the motivation

of relaxation was highly positively correlated with intention. One major reason is that the respondents of our

survey were passengers with an eastern culture background. The eastern culture thinks highly of a reserved

person and the Chinese passengers stamped by the culture had a weak motivation for sociable parties. That

gave a hint to the cruise line that simply copying the products for the Europeans and Americans was definitely

wise. There is a large difference in the motivation and consuming behavior of passengers from various nations

for their diverse cultures, values, and religious beliefs.

Although the tour by cruise can be classified into the tourism product of high scale, the motivation of

social recognition was definitely not the major factor influencing the potential passengers’ intention. One

reason was that with the travelers getting more experienced, the motivation of prestige through travelling had

been weakened. The other reason was that a few price-sensitive travelers had become cruise passengers as a

result of the various promotion ways employed by cruise lines (Petrick, 2005), in order to expand their market

shares. Under the circumstances mentioned above, the motivation of social recognition had an ineffective

impact on cruising intention.

References Baker, D. A., & Crompton, J. L. (2000). Quality, satisfaction, and behavioral intentions. Annals of Tourism Research, 27(3),

785-804. Crompton, J. L. (1979). Motivations for pleasure vacation. Annals of Tourism Research, 6(4), 408-424. Crompton, J. L. (1992). Structure of destination choice sets. Annals of Tourism Research, 19(3), 420-434. Hung, K., & Petrick, J. F. (2011). Why do you cruise? Exploring the motivations for taking cruise holidays, and the construction

of a cruising motivation scale. Tourism Management, 32(2), 386-393. Hung, K., & Petrick, J. F. (2012). Testing the effects of congruity, travel constraints, and self-efficacy on travel intentions: An

alternative decision-making model. Tourism Management, 33(4), 855-867. Jaakson, R. (2004). Beyond the tourist bubble? Cruiseship passengers in port. Annals of Tourism Research, 31(1), 44-60. Kim, S. S., & Lee, C. K. (2002). Push and pull relationships. Annals of Tourism Research, 29(1), 257-260. Lois, P., Wang, J., Wall, A., & Ruxton, T. (2004). Formal safety assessment of cruise ships. Tourism Management, 25(1), 93-109. MacCannell, D. (1973). Staged authenticity: Arrangements of social space in tourist settings. American Journal of Sociology,

79(3), 589-603. MacCannell, D. (1999). Staged authenticity. In The tourist: A new theory of the leisure class (3rd ed.; pp. 91-107). Berkeley:

University of California Press. Pearce, P. L., & Caltabiano, M. L. (1983). Inferring travel motivation from travelers’ experiences. Journal of Travel Research,

22(2), 16-20.


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Petrick, J. F. (2005). Segmenting cruise passengers with price sensitivity. Tourism Management, 26(5), 753-762. Petrick, J. F., Li, X., & Park, S. Y. (2007). Cruise passengers’ decision-making processes. Journal of Travel and Tourism

Marketing, 23(1), 1-14. Plog, S. C. (1974). Why destination areas rise and fall in popularity? Cornell Hotel and Restaurant Quarterly, 14(4), 55-58. Qu, H., & Ping, E. W. Y. (1999). A service performance model of Hong Kong cruise travelers’ motivation factors and satisfaction.

Tourism Management, 20(2), 237-244. Yarnal, C. M., & Kerstetter, D. (2005). Casting off: An exploration of cruise ship space, group tour behavior, and social interaction.

Journal of Travel Research, 43(4), 368-379.


Tourist Expectation and Tourist Experience in Cultural Tourism

Orawan Boonpat

Khon Kaen University, Khon Kaen, Thailand

Chiang Rai Rajabhat University, Chiang Rai, Thailand

Noppamash Suvachart

Khon Kaen University, Khon Kaen, Thailand

Chiang Rai is one of the most famous destinations in Thailand due to its rich tourism resources especially with

many cultural resources and well-organized and developed tourism infrastructure. As a consequence, Chiang Rai

has targeted to promote and develop cultural tourism in order to attract more foreign tourists to visit and satisfy

their needs and expectations, which is seen as one of the most important aspects in the current tourism development

strategies in Chiang Rai. Therefore, the main purpose of this study is to compare the gap between pre- and

post-experience of foreign tourists who visited Chiang Rai towards their expectation and experience on: (1) arts and

crafts; (2) life style of local people; (3) local food; (4) festivals and local traditions; (5) ethnic/indigenous life style

and culture; and (6) cultural heritage. The quantitative approach has been chosen to conduct the study by using a

questionnaire with 400 foreign tourists and One-way ANOVA was the statistic used for gap analysis between

tourist expectation and experience. The data collection included the analysis of government documents and the

relevant literature. The finding of the study illustrated that cultural tourism plays an important role in tourism

development in Chiang Rai and the gap between pre- and post-experience of tourists. However, in order to

minimize the gap between pre- and post-experience of tourists and maximize their expectation and satisfaction,

both government and private sectors should have an in-depth understanding towards the management of cultural

tourism. The tourist needs more quality cultural products and foreign language skills from staff and local people.

Keywords: tourist expectation, tourist experience, cultural tourism

Introduction

Recently, cultural tourism has been targeted as the main approach for tourism development in most regions

worldwide, particularly the old cities or towns. This is due to its rich cultural resources and heritage such as the

unique ways of life, food, events and festivals, culture and tradition, language, costume, ethnic or indigenous

culture, and so forth. According to Figini and Vici (2012), cultural tourism is considered as the approach that is

able to minimize the impact of tourism but will generate a local awareness to protect and conserve their local

heritage. However, nowadays, it seems that conventional or mass tourism is still the main form of tourism

which mostly focuses on the number of tourists rather than on quality. It might be argued that this form of tour

is still popular due to business reason of travel companies and the size of tourist demand. Most of conventional

Orawan Boonpat, Ph.D. candidate in Tourism and Hospitality Innovation Management, Faculty of Management Science,

Khon Kaen University; lecturer, School of Tourism, Chiang Rai Rajabhat University. Email: [email protected]. Noppamash Suvachart, DBA, associate professor, Faculty of Management Science, Khon Kaen University.

DAVID PUBLISHING

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TOURIST EXPECTATION AND TOURIST EXPERIENCE IN CULTURAL TOURISM

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tours are in the form of ready-made tour which packed together food services, accommodation, guide services,

and transport services in designed time period such as city tour, sightseeing tour, and the like. This form of tour

has resulted in less opportunity for tourists to earn in-depth experience and understand the story and unique

aspect of the destination (and tourism products such as cultural uniqueness). One of the best examples of this is

that when tourists visit the show of cultural dance of ethnic people in the northern part of Thailand which is

organized especially for tourists, the show will last only about 10 minutes, while the original one lasts for two

hours, meaning that only some parts of the dance have been performed for tourists due to the time limit, and

this kind of dance is known as “artificial culture” (the culture that is just for show, which is not authenticity

culture). Eureka Consulting Company (2012) argued that the process of adapting local culture as artificial

culture makes tourist intresting as “tourist trap”. Similar to Eureka, Hunter (2011) also argued that artificial

culture is not considered as a part of cultural tourism, as tourists did not learn and experience the true story and

original knowledge about those cultures. Lynch, Duinker, Sheehan, and Chute (2011) also insisted that cultural

tourism must be in a form that provides tourists with enough opportunities to learn and experience the

uniqueness of local culture where they visit, which will be significantly different from place to place.

According to Figini and Vici (2012), Eureka Consulting Company (2012), Hunter (2011), and Lynch et al.

(2011), it can be argued that cultural tourism is the form of tourism that provides wider opportunity and real-life

experience for tourists. In the same vein, cultural tourism is also considered as the form of tourism that is able

to generate a social awareness of conserving and protecting cultural resources. Therefore, not only tourism

sector and other private sectors, but also local communities have been required to have the responsibility and

coordination in order to strengthen cultural tourism itself and maximize its value for all stakeholders.

In relation to the above mentioned, the researchers are interested in investigating cultural tourism

development in Chiang Rai, one of the most famous tourist destinations in Thailand, aiming to promote

Chiang Rai as the destination for cultural tourism and examine tourist expectation and experience of cultural

tourism in Chiang Rai. The finding will be developed as the means to maximize tourist satisfaction and

minimize the gap between pre- and post-experience in cultural tourism of tourists in Chiang Rai.

Literature Review

Tourist Expectation

Vroom (1994) has described the element of expectation in the expectancy theory. According to the author,

expectation consists of three elements called VIE (valence, instrumentality, and expectancy). V or valence

illustrates that each person is satisfied with the outcome, and if the people feel good, it means that they will get

positive experience. I or instrumentality is defined as a way that will lead to satisfaction. E or expectancy

means expectations of people, and they need different expectations. They will be satisfied when their needs are

met. Upon receiving the response, then a person will get the satisfaction and expectations will increase. The

main factors affecting the expectations of the service offered are: (1) has been told through travel

recommendations from others who have experienced the past; (2) the travel needs of an individual; (3) travel

experiences in the past; (4) messages from the media and the provider; and (5) prices during peak periods.

The nature of the expectations of tourists, which helps in the decision of the individual to choose an

action, may depend on the nature of the different backgrounds of the individual. Expectations of the parties

may be different, because they have their own ideas and their needs are different. In tourism, expectations of

tourists are expected in the tourism services on travelers’ visits. The expectation is the basic service that meets


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the needs. When visitors’ higher expectations of the service are met, they will be satisfied with that service.

In contrast, if tourists do not get the service that they expect or if the service quality is lower than expected,

they will feel offended and may not come again. According to Li, Lai, Harrill, Kline, and Wang (2011),

tourists are expected towards travel due to six reasons, which consisted of patience of the staff, privacy need

services, clear marketing communications, reasonable price, word of mouth, and previous experience of

tourist. Expectations show the needs of people from the present to the future. The personal experience is a

measure of what is happening. In a service business, especially the tourism industry, it is important to study

the expectations of tourists, as this will lead us to understand more of what travelers want to make use of their

experience to meet their expectations and generate high satisfaction towards all products and services

provided.

Tourist Experience

Tourism experience can be in the form of direct experience from tourists’ own travel and indirect

experience (listening to the stories from friends, family, or relatives). In terms of tourism business as well as

other related businesses, the services provided, such as tourism information, relaxation and enjoyment

environment, friendly staff, and good advice, are considered as elements to satisfy tourists’ needs and

expectations. According to Beeho and Prentice (1997), tourists who feel that their expectations were met will

advise their friends, families, and relatives to visit those places and they will also return to those places again.

On the contrary, Blackwell, Minard, and Engel (2001) argued that if tourists are unhappy with the services

provided or if they experienced bad things, they will not go back to those places again and they will tell those to

their friends, families, and relatives. Wang, Chen, Fan, and Lu (2012) pointed out that the story or experience

of tourism from friends, family members, or relatives has played a vital part in the decision-making process of

people who planned to travel and insisted that most people will change their decisions after receiving or

listening to the unhappy story or bad experience of friends, family members, or relatives (not to go). Quan and

Wang (2004) described tourism experience as a relationship of activities and environment and mentioned that

the best experience depends on the best support of related services, such as food services, accommodation,

transport, and travel services. Tourists’ experience might typically be different, depending on their previous

experience and information they have as well as the responses to their expectations. Similarly, Chaudhary

(2000) argued that tourists would be satisfied if they got what they expected and would be dissatisfied if they

did not get what they expected. In relation to Quan and Wang (2004), it can be argued that the quality of

tourism products and services is considered as the key element for generating satisfaction and good experience

for tourists as well as meeting their expectations.

Tourist Perception

Bernstein, Penner, Clarke-Stewart, and Roy (2012) have described perception as the process that occurs

after the stimulus has been interpreted as a feeling and what is meant by knowledge, experience, and

understanding of a person. It is perceived as something that must be learned without learning or experience and

will not cause the recognition performance. According to perception theory, it is important to learn the basic

elements of the perception process of a person, because any behavioral response is based on the perception of

their environment and the ability to interpret it. It can be said that learning and performance of people depend

on several factors such as recognition, efficient stimulation factors which include sensory perception, and

psychosocial factors (knowledge and attitude).


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There are three steps of perception. These include stimuli (products and services), perception of need, and

response to the need. The factors that influence perception consist of characteristics of recipients (users) which

are divided into two aspects including physical and psychological. Physical means having complete sensory

perceptions, such as hearing and visioning. This quality of these factors will result in the correctness of

perception. Psychological characteristics include memory, intelligence, emotion, interest, intention, value, and

previous experience.

It can be considered that the perception process is a process that relates to cognitive thinking, feeling,

learning, memory, and decision-making.

In terms of tourism, tourist perception can be divided into three stages including: (1) the exposure stage,

when tourists receive related information; (2) the attention stage, when tourists consider and reconsider the

information they received; and (3) the comprehension stage, when tourists try to interpret the information they

received.

The characteristics of tourism stimuli include: (1) stimuli to generate perception which are tourist

attraction, tourism season, and tourism situation; (2) visitors’ senses (sense organ) that make them feel like

traveling, seeing, and hearing ads or various forms of tourism promotion; (3) experience or prior knowledge of

the tourist; and (4) interpretation of tourism attractions or from previous experience or knowledge of the travel

experience of tourists. Tourism stimuli can promote the possibility of getting what we need and know much

more in line with the experience.

Cultural Tourism

Smith (2003) has described that cultural tourism is the form of journey of a person or a group of people

who are seeking for the place where they can admire the unique beauty of the culture of other people with a

high respect of those cultures of each other in order to form friendship and tolerance to the culture of the

community. Cultural tourists will be offered an opportunity to learn and seek for new experiences. In the areas

with rich historic and cultural heritage, tourists will be told the stories of the culture which reflect and show the

lifestyles of the local people in each period, festivals and traditions, as well as the stories of social or economic

development in the community. The widely known cultural tourism values include conservation and

preservation of cultural resources and minimization of the impact of tourism by generating the social awareness

of protecting and conserving cultural resources. Cultural tourism resources mainly consist of the forms of arts

and crafts, lifestyles or ways of life, language, costume, food, religions, traditions, and other cultural heritage.

According to Jittangwattana (2005), cultural tourism has played a vital part in generating social awareness of

cultural resources in Thailand. Goeldner and Ritchie (2009) have argued that the emphasis of cultural tourism is

on educating its visitors in a different way to travel which focuses on learning and participation in the life of the

community, while the mass tourism primarily focuses on the enjoyment of tourists. According to Goeldner and

Ritchie (2009), it can be argued that cultural tourism allows visitors to learn in depth the differences of culture

and language, costume, and ways of life which enable them to get novel experience that they expected before

their travel.

From all concepts, the researchers created a questionnaire about the expectations of the tourism experience

and the experience gained in the field of tourism travelers. They are arts and crafts, Lanna Lifestyle (Northern

Thailand style), lifestyles, food, festivals, indigenous people, and cultural heritage.


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Methodology

Sample and Mean for Data Collection

Questionnaires were used as the means of data collection in this study. The questionnaire was in the

form of a 5-point Likert scale (ranging from 1 to 5) and was created based on theoretical concepts and

the aim of the study. The questionnaire has been divided into three parts. The first part consists of

general questions about tourists. The second part consists of the questions towards tourists’ expectations

and their experience of traveling in Chiang Rai towards six key aspects which include: (1) arts and crafts;

(2) ways of life of local people; (3) food; (4) events and festivals; (5) ethnic/indigenous people; and

(6) cultural heritage. These items were created and modified from previous studies of G. Lee and C. Lee

(2009), Wang et al. (2012), Beeho and Prentice (1997), Li et al. (2011), and Figini and Vici (2012). There are

five levels of each factor: expectation and experience. For the expectation, 5 is for highly expected, 4 is for

expected, 3 is for somehow expected, 2 is for less expected, and 1 is for unexpected. For the experience, 5 is

for highly experienced, 4 is for experienced, 3 is for somehow experienced, 2 is for less experienced, and 1 is

for inexperienced.

The last part consists of open-ended questions asking towards what tourists considered as the strength and

weakness of cultural tourism management in Chiang Rai and how to improve and develop a better quality.

The questionnaire has been tried out with 40 foreign tourists in order to ensure the reliability. The edited

and completed version of questionnaire has been completed, using accidental sampling, by 400 foreign

tourists who visited Chiang Rai and were waiting for the departure flight at the Mae Fah Luang Chiang Rai

International Airport.

Data Analysis

In the stage of data analysis, the One-way ANOVA has been used as the tool for gap analysis between the

expectation and the experience of tourists. A general profile of tourists has been illustrated by descriptive

statistics.

Results

Tourists’ Demographic Profile of Respondents

As illustrated in Table 1, it is found that the majority of foreign tourists are female. In terms of gender, 244

of the tourists are female (61%) and 156 are male (39%), and more than 42% are married. In terms of age, more

than one third of the respondents are at the age of 20-29. In terms of marital status, the highest percentage is

41.8% (married). In terms of purpose of visit, leisure is the main purpose as the number shows more than

88.6%. In terms of source of information, internet is the biggest source of information about Chiang Rai while

friends and relatives is the second powerful source. In terms of country of origin, France, Australia, and

Germany were among the major groups of tourists, whose percentages are 22.8%, 11.5%, and 10.6%

respectively.

Table 1

General Profile of Tourists

Factor No. Percentage (%)

Gender Male 156 39.0

Female 244 61.0


129

(Table 1 continued)

Factor No. Percentage (%)

Age

Lower than 20 26 6.5

20-29 125 31.2

30-39 100 25.0

40-49 80 20.0

50-59 34 8.5

Above 60 35 8.8

Marital status

Single 156 39.0

Married 167 41.8

Divorce/widowed 25 6.2

Not married but live together 52 13.0

Purpose of visit

Leisure travel 354 88.6

Business travel 21 5.2

Visit friends and relatives 25 6.2

Sources of infomation about Chiang Rai

Newspapers 5 1.2

Travel agents/tour operators 71 17.8

Travel offices abroad 10 2.5

Friends and relatives 125 31.2

Books 46 11.5

Internet/websites 127 31.8

TV/radio 0 0

Guides 16 4.0

Country of origin

France 91 22.8

Australia 46 11.5

Germany 42 10.6

Austria 26 6.5

China 26 6.5

United States of Amercia (USA) 21 5.2

Italy 21 5.2

Canada 20 5.0

Japan 20 5.0

England 11 2.8

The Netherlands 11 2.8

Singapore 10 2.5

United Kingdom (UK) 10 2.5

Belgium 10 2.5

Malaysia 10 2.5

Korea 10 2.5

Indonesia 5 1.2

Spain 5 1.2

Switzerland 5 1.2

Importance-Performance Analysis in Tourist Expectation and Tourist Experience in Cultural Tourism

The research results explain that arts and crafts was the cultural aspect with a high expectation of tourists but tourists experienced lower than they expected (moderate/somehow experienced or do not meet the expectation).

Ways of life is the only cultural aspect with a high expectation and tourists are highly experienced (meet the expectation) and tourist experience as well.

130

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Arts and crafts

Lanna Lifestyle (Northern Thailand style)

Local food

Festivals

Indigenous people

Cultural heritage

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3.17

3.36

3.35

3.30

3.47 3.45 3.61

3.69

3.58

3.39

3.52

3.61

2.91

2.73

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3.60

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0.87

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131

Discussion and Conclusions

According to the finding, the strengths of Chiang Rai as a cultural tourism destination include the rich

variety of cultural resources, especially ways of life of local people and ethnic/indigenous culture. The

weakness of Chiang Rai tourism is the foreign language ability of local people and tourism also needs to

improve by good management of, e.g., tourist services and tourist supports, for instance, printed documents,

brochures, maps, and signs particular in the place, which must be precise, clear, and in proper quantity and

quality.

In terms of management of cultural tourism in Chiang Rai, cultural route, calendar of cultural activities,

and continuity of promotion are needed. Also important is that good coordination, participation, and

involvement of all stakeholders should also be considered as the key elements of cultural tourism management

to meet tourist expectations.

As addressed in previous parts, the primary aim of cultural tourism is to generate the awareness of

conserving and preserving the value of cultural resources and minimizing the impact of tourism. This is

because cultural tourism is considered as the form of tourism that consumes fewer resources compared with

mass tourism. This might sound strange for some tourists or even community members and travel companies as

in terms of tourists, cultural tourism is the form of tourism that will create and offer them an opportunity to

experience and study the very unique aspect of culture within the community where they visit, for instance, it

could be considered as a potential harm to cultural resources. However, it can be argued that, according to the

findings of this study, generating and proposing the appropriate approach for cultural tourism management and

development in order to apply for maximizing the greatest value for community and providing benefit through

the expectation of tourists can be seen as a way to promote cultural tourism in Chiang Rai.

Limitation and Recommendation for Future Study

In terms of future study, the study of the appropriate approach for cultural tourism development in

Chiang Rai is one of the most interesting issues. In relation to research method, the use of only the quantitative

research method is a limitation for obtaining in-depth information and details. As a result, for future study, the

qualitative research method, such as an in-depth interview with key informants, should be applied, as this

method will help the researchers to access more in-depth details.

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heritage village. Tourism Management, 18(2), 75-87. Bernstein, D. A., Penner, L. A., Clarke-Stewart, A., & Roy, E. J. (2012). Phychology (9th ed.). Belmont: Wadsworth Cengage

Learning. Blackwell, D., Minard, W., & Engel, F. (2001). Customer behavior. Orlando: The Dryden Press. Chaudhary, M. (2000). India’s image as a tourist destination: A perspective of foreign tourists. Tourism Management, 21(3),

293-297. Eureka Consulting Company. (2012). Projects studies in tourism: An image of the country from foreigners. Bangkok: Tourism

Authority of Thailand. Figini, P., & Vici, L. (2012). Off-season tourists and the cultural offer of a mass-tourism destination: The case of Rimini. Tourism

Management, 32(4), 825-839. Goeldner, C., & Ritchie, B. (2009). Tourism: Principles, practices, and philosophies. New York, N.Y.: John Wiley & Sons.


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Hunter, W. (2011). Rukai indigenous tourism: Representations, cultural identity, and Q method. Tourism Management, 32(2), 335-348.

Jittangwattana, B. (2005). Sustainable tourism development. Bangkok: Press & Design. Lee, G., & Lee, C. (2009). Cross-cultural comparison of the image of Guam perceived by Korean and Japanese leisure travelers:

Importance-performance analysis. Tourism Management, 30(6), 922-931. Li, X., Lai, C., Harrill, R., Kline, R., & Wang, L. (2011). When east meets west: An exploratory on study on Chinese outbound

tourists’ travel expectations. Tourism Management, 32(4), 741-749. Lynch, M., Duinker, N. P., Sheehan, R. L., & Chute, E. J. (2011). The demand for Mi’kmaw cultural tourism: Tourism

perspectives. Tourism Management, 32(5), 977-986. Quan, S., & Wang, N. (2004). Towards a structural model of the tourist experience: An illustration from food experiences in

tourism. Tourism Management, 25(3), 297-305. Smith, M. K. (2003). Issue in cultural tourism studies. London: Routledge. Vroom, H. V. (1994). Work and motivation. San Francisco: Jossey Bass. Wang, W., Chen, S. J., Fan, L., & Lu, J. (2012). Tourist experience and wetland parks: A case of Zhejiang, China. Annals of

Tourism Research, 39(4), 1763-1778.


Animator’s Roles in Enriching the Content of Tourist Stay

Zlatko Jakovlev, Cane Koteski, Snezana Bardarova, Aleksandra Zezova University Goce Delcev, Stip, Republic of Macedonia

Kristijan Dzambazoski Agency for Tourism Promotion of Republic of Macedonia, Skopje, Republic of Macedonia

Gorancho Koteski Army of Republic of Macedonia, Skopje, Republic of Macedonia

For successful animation of visitors, animators must perform very complex, demanding, and dynamic tasks.

Professional performance of tasks implies the need for an animator to be a complete person. This means that he/she

not only must have a sound education, but also have to be specialized for certain activities. There are different types

of animators so that their diversity mirrors the success of the hotel. Animators must have certain basic physical and

psychological characteristics. So, despite the knowledge and experience, animators must have inherent

characteristics such as talent, humour, to be friendliness, and so on. Sense of humour and ability to work with

people are two important characteristics of a successful animator. Many hotels need animators who can entertain

tourists and make their stay memorable resort experience, which will be a reason for return of tourists. One of the

key factors for tourism success is animator. Today, the whole tourism sector is based on animation of the tourists.

The purpose of this paper is to show the role of the animator in enriching the content of tourist stay. To successfully

execute the animation to the tourists, animators must meet certain characteristics which will be analysed in this

paper. In this research will be used methods of analysis of scientific literature on the impact of animation on

enrichment of tourist stay. The research stems from the fact that animation is one of the most important

animation-motivational factors for the development of tourism.

Keywords: animator, tourism, recreation, characteristics, tourists, hotels

Introduction

Animator is a tourist worker, who with his/her general characteristics must meet all required criteria and roles. His/her activity begins with the first contact with visitors, lasts throughout the tourist stay until their departure, which includes sending and promise that the next meeting will strive to meet all of their interests, preferences, and desires. Because of that, he/she is required to have a specific character trait and physical endurance. So, animators have to fulfil certain roles which might render them to be complete people and to have everything that is in the function of enriching the content of tourist stay.

Zlatko Jakovlev, Ph.D., associate professor, Faculty of Tourism and Business Logistics, University Goce Delcev. Email: [email protected].

Cane Koteski, Ph.D., assistant professor, Faculty of Tourism and Business Logistics, University Goce Delcev. Snezana Bardarova, MSc., teaching assistant, Faculty of Tourism and Business Logistics, University Goce Delcev. Aleksandra Zezova, Ph.D., assistant professor, Faculty of Tourism and Business Logistics, University Goce Delcev. Kristijan Dzambazoski, MSc., director, Agency for Tourism Promotion of Republic of Macedonia. Gorancho Koteski, Lieutenent-General, Chief of the General Staff, Army of Republic of Macedonia.

DAVID PUBLISHING

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ANIMATOR’S ROLES IN ENRICHING THE CONTENT OF TOURIST STAY

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Psychophysical Characteristics of the Animator

Animators must be psychologically and physically healthy, which means that there must be a person without any mental and physical disabilities. By their external physical appearance, it must be at a higher level, i.e., they must meet stringent criteria. His/her appearance may be one of the important criteria in terms of its final choice. He/she performs highly complex, diverse, and subtle tasks. For this purpose, the psychological and physical characteristics should be taken into account for selection of animators. In that connotation, according to Butler (1968), the most significant psychological and physical features of the animator include:

(1) Personal and professional honesty; (2) Sense of humour; (3) Sense of providing services; (4) Understanding of animating as art; (5) Intelligence and common sense; (6) Good psychophysical health; (7) Energy and enthusiasm; (8) The ability for the organization. Cerovic (1999) also highlighted a number of such features: (1) Pleasing appearance: Because an animator’s activity is related to the subjective judgment of the

members of the group, his/her outward appearance should be adapted to the group; (2) Optimal age of life: Age of animators is specifically determined and should be in accordance with the

requirements of the group. They are supposed to be relatively young and experienced; (3) A stand: Given that animating is a dynamic profession, permanent change will not affect the proper

situations and quick decision-making when there is a conflict in communication with the group; (4) Interest and engagement: Animators should be flexible, because they are changed according to the mood

and attitude of the group, and they should be interested to be involved in adapting to the group; (5) Honesty: With their interpersonal communication with the group, they should possess a high degree of

honesty and never have to compromise the trust that has earned the group their verbal or non-verbal actions; (6) Professionalism: In relation to members of the group, an animator should manifest a high level of

expertise and knowledge. This is the only way for an animator to gain great authority; (7) Natural talent: Given the fact that animation is a complex and specific activity, here creativity comes to

the fore. Primarily through interpersonal communication, animators have to spread a feeling of serenity, mood, and balanced humour;

(8) Attention: Because animators work with a group that is heterogeneous, they should leave tourists with the impression that they may not be highly prestigious and have personal ambitions, but for each member of the group, they should be especially careful, ready to help the tourists to solve their dilemma and fear at any time, and satisfy tourists’ desires;

(9) Inclination towards art: Animators should have a developed aesthetic sense of beauty and the appropriate and adequate way to convey it to the visitors;

(10) Confidentiality: Animators must have faith in people and start from the assumption that all people have the goodwill and positive intentions. In no case should animators show that they question the human values;

(11) A positive direction: He/she should be a person who is oriented for the good of the group members and cares to achieve their personal positive experiences;


135

(12) Intelligence: It will help to make it easier and faster for animators to communicate with the group. With this characteristic, animators can be worn successfully in all conflict situations, be rational in decision-making, realistic, and always cheerful;

(13) Good psychophysical health: Animators should be psychologically and physically healthy, because animation is a laborious and responsible activity;

(14) Vigour and enthusiasm: In the environment, by their actions, verbal and non-verbal contacts must act forcefully, confidently, and with a high degree of enthusiasm and desire to achieve success.

These characteristics lead to the conclusion that the animator is required to have a wider ange of psychological and psychophysical features and a developed sense of hearing, sight, and smell. Here should be added psychomotor properties, i.e., art movement (coordination and grace), rapid response, running, which must be high, coming to the conclusion that his/her health must not be violated. All these psychophysical characteristics should be targeted to meet the needs of visitors, because the animator must create a warm atmosphere filled with “serenity and mood” (Moisset, 1996).

Due to the abovementioned, the following important aspects of the scope of communicability are required of animators:

(1) Clear verbal expression, which means that animator should have a solid excuse with a clear and correct emphasis. Those who have certain disadvantages in terms of speech expression or some hearing damage have no way to deal with this profession;

(2) Emotional resilience, which involves a high degree of self-control that animators should manifest in a number of different conflict situations;

(3) Tact, a feature that animators are supposed to possess, especially to those visitors in the group requiring a special attention, and they should be more careful to them;

(4) Ability to remember the means of observing not only the major events, but also the small details which will be of great benefit for the animation process;

(5) Ability to communicate skillfully, which is believed by many to be the primary means of animators. The success of the animation depends on the communicability which reflects certain skills, habits, knowledge, personality traits, and other psychological and physical characteristics. In this context, the animator must constantly be improved, because communication is the result of all the knowledge, skills, and capabilities which he/she owns and which are manifested through the clear speech ability, appearance, and other forms of communication (Cerovic, 1999).

In fact, it comes to verbal communication, which is very important, because an animator is in constant and direct contact with visitors. That is verbal communication which is very important for the animator, because he/she is in constant and direct contact with the visitors. The purpose of verbal communication is to act, assure, and recruit, which is especially important in animation, because as previously pointed out, interpersonal communication is the essence of animation. Animators must pay great attention to the verbal expression, which is achieved by constant practices. Except for the way of excuse, he/she should raise his/her skill for speaking. Animators need to recognize and respect different cultures and areas from which visitors come, meaning that this form of communication should be improved to the highest level of professionalism. In this context, it may be pointed out that Cicero as a result of perseverance and plenty of exercise, by a man with a speech impediment, became a backbone.


136

Animator is necessary to perfect and non-verbal communication. For successful realization of the animation programs, animators use non-verbal cues such as body movement, tone, mimics, gestures, and facial expressions that include smile. In this connotation, a prominent hotelier said, “For good operation of the hotel, it is important to determine the location, but for the warm atmosphere in the hotel, it is important to smile” (Štimac, 1975). The animator’s style of dressing and his/her outward appearance play important roles in non-verbal communication, i.e., face, hair, hands, and more.

Roles That an Animator Should Meet in Relation With the Visitors

Besides the psychological and physical characteristics for a successful implementation of animation programs, animators must possess expert knowledge and everything for successful accession of the individual and the group as a whole. Namely, in a new and unfamiliar environment, some visitors are often badly adaptable. In order to address these situations in tourism, the animator has the most important role. To meet the complex requirements that are required of the animator, he/she should have emotionally and socially constructed personality, positive character traits, and be professionally trained to deliver programs of animation. In this context, Kripendorf (1986) considered that animation should be run by educated animators with special personal characteristics and with the best pedagogical education. Such animation today is still rare, but is often misinterpreted and commercialized. An animator, to successfully organize and realize the animation programs, must meet certain roles in terms of visitors, because he/she knows the various aspects of the tourism offer.

Figure 1. Schematic representation of the roles of animators. Source: Finger and Benoit (1988).

The basic features of the roles set out in the scheme under Cerovic (1999) are: (1) Colleague: Animator to visitors should be set as a colleague, but not in the professional sense, because

they will be participating in the same activities during the tourist stay. We can say that success is the animator who to the guests will be set as a colleague and assist in animation programs;

(2) Driver: Group, animators, and spiritual adviser of their activities. This role is particularly significant for those visitors who are more difficult to adapt to the new environment. Animators perform with all their knowledge, skills, dexterity, and creativity and motivate guests to stay active;

(3) Organizer: In order to successfully realize animation programs, animators need to be successful organizers, because visitors see it as colleague, counsellor, and above all personality which they can rely;

(4) Universal: Animators not only need to know all the contents of the animation, but should also have a wider education and general culture. It actually means that he/she will be able to handle in any situation including even extreme cases;

Animator

Driver

Organizer

Universal

(Specialist)

Active guest on holiday

Host

Representative

Informator

Partner in conversation

Friend


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(5) Specialist: Despite its universality, he/she should be a narrow specialist for a specific animation activity; (6) Active guest on holiday: First of all, an animator is a tourist worker who encourages and organizes

animation activities. He/she should be an active member of the group. If an animator behaves as an active guest on holiday, each member of the group will perceive him/her as their colleague;

(7) Host: Animator is a representative of the hotel, the place, and the country as a whole. In every situation, he/she should make it clear that he/she was proud to belong to the community that he/she represents;

(8) Representative: This role of the animator does not give him/her any special power, but means that it protects the interests of the hotel, resort, and even the country as a whole;

(9) Informator: Animator is the carrier of information to visitors. Guests as a group or individual are usually interested about their stay in the country, population, its culture, and customs. For this reason, animators need to have a wide range of knowledge and information and should timely inform the subjects who show an interest in some information about the foreign country;

(10) Partner in conversation: It is known that interpersonal communication is the essence of animation. It is actually a conversation between two or more persons. Through dialogue, visitors get various information in their domain of interest and ask a number of questions in the process of animation. Through conversation, animators will instruct guests in the direction that better exploits the benefits which allow tourist destination;

(11) Friend: If you establish a professional, but at the same time, friendly relationship between animators and members of the group, the success of the animation is inevitable. But here, it should be noted that friendship should in no case exceed the normal limits that would distort their roles and place in animating.

Professional Profile of Animator

Starting from the fact that the animation is a very complex activity, it logically raises the question of the need for a sound general and specialized education for all segments of the animation. Unfortunately, in these current conditions, a structured education of staff in this profile still lacks in our country. The entities that are interested in this issue, i.e., who want to deal with this phenomenon, should have a broad knowledge of all aspects of animation. Namely, from our point of view, animators should have a university degree in the field of tourism or related areas. In addition, they need to pass an exam for animators, which would consist of a theoretical and a practical part and it would be realized: Faculty of Tourism and Hospitality in Ohrid at University “St. Kliment Ohridski”, Bitola; Faculty of Tourism and Business Logistics in Gevgelija at University “Goce Delcev”, Stip; Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics in Skopje at University “St. Kiril i Metodij”; and the Private University of Tourism and Management in Skopje. We believe that their scientific and professional staff, through a specially designed curriculum, will satisfy the requirements imposed by modern trends in tourism for education of the professional animators. For successful monitoring of the modern tourist flows, animators should permanently improve themselves through participation in various courses, seminars, and through their personal involvement by using additional literature, such as various textbooks, encyclopaedias, manuals, and more.

In this context, according to Rеlac and Bartoluci (1987), the following are considered as appropriate experts for sport-recreational animation:

(1) Technicians’ sports recreation; (2) Coaches’ separate activity; (3) Senior organizers for recreation; (4) Professors of physical education, recreation trained.


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As most appropriate experts for cultural-entertaining animation, Buntasheski (2001) proposed: university art historians, ethnologist graduates, musicologist graduates or music teachers, and graduates in tourism and hospitality. According to Buntasheski (2001), animation outings and visits could engage the following profiles: graduate in tourism and hospitality managers, graduate art historians, ethnologist graduates, professors of geography, and the like.

For successful programming and implementation of the contents of the animation, an animator has to be a complete person. It specifically means that he/she should have a broad general and tourist culture. Animators must have an extensive knowledge of the socio-economic system of the Republic of Macedonia and the history of the Macedonian people, given the fact that visitors will be interested in our country, its social, political, and economic regulation, as well as our national history. Shouldn’t there be improvisation on this field? Given the fact that the animation in tourism activity is concerned with animators whose aim is to enrich the tourist guests, it can be noted that there is a direct communication between animators and visitors. For this purpose, it requires knowledge of tourism as a socio-economic phenomenon. In this context, it should be equipped with knowledge and information on the changes of tourist facilities in our country and elsewhere. An animator should also possess a great knowledge of the cultural and historical monuments and cultural institutions in our country. Information that are given to the visitors are part of the own tourist culture of the animator. The process of giving the information is a complex socio-psychological interpersonal relation between animators and visitors. For that reason, animators need to have a basic knowledge of communicative activities. Animators should have a basic knowledge in the field of psychology, especially the psychology of tourism and hospitality. This is necessary, because animators met different types of visitors who have different properties and exhibit different reactions. Professional profile of animators would not be complete without the knowledge of foreign languages. Namely, every tourist-catering worker should have knowledge of foreign languages, and in particular, it relates with animator (minimum two worlds). It stems from the fact that animator communicates with heterogeneous tourist table which has a variety of linguistic, cultural, religious, and national characteristics. Besides, animators should have specific specialist knowledge. In this connotation, he/she should have knowledge of his/her expert and psychological profile, know all aspects of animation in tourism, and possess great knowledge about visual communication at animation in tourism. Besides the above theoretical findings, according to Cerovic (1999), an animator has to be someone who has some experience, i.e., practical need to have knowledge of the following:

(1) Work with microphone; (2) Practical exercises in visual communication workshops; (3) Specialized workshops for creating objects in the domain of animation; (4) Conducting games; (5) Practically carrying hobbies and the like.

Concluding Remarks

It can be concluded that the animation should be a necessary part of the Macedonian tourist offer, because it is the only way their goals may be reached. In this way, visitors will know the culture of our country in the widest sense. Given that this notion is incorrectly realized, animation sometimes comes down to pure fun which can lead anyone who has little talent. This way will degrade the function of animation as a cultural activity as well as the function as a tourist animator worker. In order to address such adverse conditions, it is necessary to properly understand the concept of animation, especially animators. Therefore, the animation must be run by professional animators.


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To successfully animate visitors, animators have to perform very complex, demanding, and dynamic tasks. Professional performance of tasks implies the need for an animator to be a complete person. This means that he/she not only must have a sound basic education, but also have to be specialized for certain activities. Also, he/she should have a sense of identifying the needs and preferences of visitors as well as organizing the group. Animators need to have such a relationship with the members of the group in which they would perceive an animator as an active member of the group. Thus, a psychological atmosphere needs to be created. In this way, their mental, general, and special abilities are especially prominent. Also, an animator should be a dynamic, initiative, and emotionally and socially mature person with a highly developed sense of humanity and responsibility. For animation to be successful, it should be carried out by all members of the hotel, i.e., teamwork is necessary, and the animator is an equal member of the business team. Also, it is necessary to emphasize that the animation cannot and should not serve to cover up the shortcomings in terms of quality of service, because then it ceases to be animation.

References Buntasheski, B. (2001). Animation in tourism offer. Ohrid: Research Institute of Tourism. Butler, G. D. (1968). Introduction to community recreation. New York, N.Y.: McGraw Hill Inc.. Cerovic, Z. (1999). Characteristics of animators in tourism animation in hotel tourism offer. Opatija: Croatian Association of

Hoteliers and Restaurateurs. Finger, C., & Benoit. (1988). Lectures on training animators. Rabac. Kripendorf, J. (1986). Traveling humanity. Zagreb: SNL and the Institute for Tourism Research. Moisset, P. (1996). Accueil et animation. AFIT Agence Francaise de I`ingenierie touristique, Oktobar, Tournai, Belgique. Relac, M., & Bartoluci, M. (1987). Tourism and sport recreation. Zagreb: Informator. Štimac, K. (1975). The influence of the successful reception room guest in the hotel. Bulletin 3, Zagreb.

JTHM 2014.3

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