Global Tourist Behavior

Book excerpt: Global Tourist Behavior contains travel and marketing research that explores the integral global nature of tourism. The globalization of tourism has resulted in more culturally diverse travelers with different preferences, motivations, expectations, and needs, while at the same time worldwide movements toward democracy have made some locations more accessible than ever before. New diversity in global tourist behavior and the reciprocal interaction between travelers and destinations will pose new challenges and create new opportunities for tourism professionals. Global Tourist Behavior helps readers meet these challenges by providing unique and invaluable new research on global travel behavior as an integral component of travel and tourism marketing research. It features original, empirical research by tourism scholars representing a variety of locations worldwide, including North America, the Caribbean, Eastern Europe, Germany, Indonesia, Korea, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and Zambia. The geographically diverse chapters in Global Tourist Behavior present research on: marketing places to tourists tourists’knowledge of culture issues in cross-cultural tourism tourism channels and distribution systems international tourism and marketing expert systems in tourism marketing management the impact of mega events health tourism. Tourism promoters, decisionmakers, and students will find the information on international travelers’preferences, expectations, motivations, images, attitudes, and choices of tour packages extremely helpful. The book can also be used as a guide for attracting international tourist business and developing appropriate marketing and management strategies for specific destinations.