Influence of Risk Perception during COVID-19 on Travel Behavior of German Tourists : An Opportunity for Domestic Tourism?
Spriestersbach, Luisa Laura (2024)
2024
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https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2024091125011
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2024091125011
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The travel and tourism industry of this century has been severely impacted by numerous external shocks. The COVID-19 pandemic in particular led to a global crisis in the tourism sector, as travel restrictions and lockdowns brought international travel to a virtual standstill. As a result, domestic tourism in Germany gained in importance, with an increase of such as a result of many Germans preferring to travel within their home country during uncertain times as part of their national culture.
This study aims to examine the impact of COVID-19 on travel behavior and destination choice of German tourists in 2020 to 2023. Its research was based on a quantitative method involving an online survey of 204 valid cases and used factor analyses to examine relations between items and measure constructs, for which internal consistency was demonstrated. Correlation analyses aimed to test hypotheses, which identified relationships between variables for five of seven hypotheses made. Independent samples t-tests were further conducted to reveal significant differences between the roles of gender and age on adaptive behavior as well as risk perception.
Researching the relationship between adaptive behavior and domestic travel, the study finds that German tourists choosing to travel domestically adapted their travel behavior as part of a protection motivation in order to reduce risk during the coronavirus pandemic. It further investigates how risk perception, vulnerability, and international travel experience influence domestic travel decision and reveals age and gender differences among the sample towards such. For gender differences, findings of this study indicate that females overall perceived higher travel risks. The role of age has shown to be a crucial element in domestic destination choice and adaptive behavior, indicating higher levels of such among older respondents. While risk perception boosted domestic destination decision especially in 2020, the study showed that such influence decreased as the pandemic progressed, vaccines became available and normalized conditions returned, resulting in German tourists to gradually prefer to return to international travel.
The various threats of recent years certainly have permanently changed the tourism sector as a whole and respective long-term consumer behavior, in which personal safety has shown to be a new basic requirement for all German travelers alike. Such need of safety is expected to drive the trend away from mass tourism towards more sustainable and nature-based tourism.
This study aims to examine the impact of COVID-19 on travel behavior and destination choice of German tourists in 2020 to 2023. Its research was based on a quantitative method involving an online survey of 204 valid cases and used factor analyses to examine relations between items and measure constructs, for which internal consistency was demonstrated. Correlation analyses aimed to test hypotheses, which identified relationships between variables for five of seven hypotheses made. Independent samples t-tests were further conducted to reveal significant differences between the roles of gender and age on adaptive behavior as well as risk perception.
Researching the relationship between adaptive behavior and domestic travel, the study finds that German tourists choosing to travel domestically adapted their travel behavior as part of a protection motivation in order to reduce risk during the coronavirus pandemic. It further investigates how risk perception, vulnerability, and international travel experience influence domestic travel decision and reveals age and gender differences among the sample towards such. For gender differences, findings of this study indicate that females overall perceived higher travel risks. The role of age has shown to be a crucial element in domestic destination choice and adaptive behavior, indicating higher levels of such among older respondents. While risk perception boosted domestic destination decision especially in 2020, the study showed that such influence decreased as the pandemic progressed, vaccines became available and normalized conditions returned, resulting in German tourists to gradually prefer to return to international travel.
The various threats of recent years certainly have permanently changed the tourism sector as a whole and respective long-term consumer behavior, in which personal safety has shown to be a new basic requirement for all German travelers alike. Such need of safety is expected to drive the trend away from mass tourism towards more sustainable and nature-based tourism.