A qualitative study of antecedents of enduring involvement and its role in dining experiences of tourists

Purpose Considering the importance of involvement in experience, this paper aims to understand what factors lead to enduring involvement and how this type of involvement influences the food experience of tourists in the restaurant context. Design/methodology/approach Twenty tourists who had a dining experience in the restaurants of Queenstown, New Zealand were interviewed using the purposive sampling method. Findings Using manual coding, 11 factors were found to contribute to enduring involvement. The findings also showed that enduing involvement influenced the food experience of tourists in a positive way including four consequences. Research limitations/implications The research is limited to the restaurants of a specific destination and the findings should be generalised with caution. It, however, contributes to the existing research on involvement and experience in the hospitality and tourism literatures. Practical implications The findings provide guidelines on how restaurateurs understand the tourists’ perceptions and evaluations of their offerings to improve the dining experiences and manage their businesses effectively. Originality/value Previous research has not offered an understanding of what factors contribute to enduring involvement in the hospitality and tourism literatures and how this involvement impacts dining experiences of tourists.

Recreational scuba diving as a special form of tourism: lessons from Taiwan

Purpose Recreational scuba diving is one of the fastest growing tourism industries around the world and has become a popular activity in Taiwan. Few studies focus on enduring involvement with a high risk or difficult activity specialization, so this study aims to explore the causal relationship between enduring involvement and specialization and seeks to explain sustained involvement in scuba diving activity as a recreation specialization. Design/methodology/approach This research selects four diving sites in Taiwan as survey locations, specifically Yeliou, Longdong, Kenting and Green Island. The questionnaire consists of three sections, including demographic information, enduring involvement and specialization. By analyzing the data collected from 810 scuba divers in Taiwan, structural equation modeling is used to examine the causal relationships among the variables. Findings The primary findings of this study are as follows: attraction positively affects divers’ commitment and lifestyle through joy, relaxation and sharing diving experiences; the results indicate that self-expression is associated with past experience of participating in scuba diving activity; and centrality indicates that participants’ daily life and recreation are related to each other and become central to their life. Results show that most theoretical hypotheses are supported, but there is no significant evidence of attraction impacting past experience or self-expression influencing commitment and lifestyle. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to examine the causal influence of enduring involvement and specialization in the scuba diving context. The findings provide a solid theoretical basis for the study of sustained involvement motivation and behavior on specialization. Implications and recommendations for future research are discussed.

Enhancing Student Motivation in ESP by Increasing the Level of Engagement: A Proposed Model

The article considers the opportunity to enhance student motivation in the acquisition of English for specific purposes by increasing the level of learner engagement. The authors propose to use an interdisciplinary approach by applying tools that have been approved in marketing theory and practice for the management of consumer involvement in the purchasing process and adapting them to teaching ESP to increase course effectiveness. Marketing literature analysis reveals two important points. The first one is that in classical marketing, the concepts of enduring involvement and situational involvement are used and combined together to form a complex consumer response. In modern marketing, this complex response is called consumer engagement. The second point is that situational involvement plays a key role in shaping the complex consumer response. The authors' suggestion is to use situational involvement as the major tool for boosting student motivation taking into consideration factors such as the specific features of the new generations and the growing use of modern technologies in everyday communication and learning. A description of model tasks is given to exemplify their interdisciplinary nature as well as observations related to their use in class supplemented by student feedback.

Influence of the Olympic winter games PyeongChang 2018 on the Korean Wave: Comparison of perceptions between Koreans and Americans

This study was designed to investigate the effects of the Olympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 on South Koreans’ and Americans’ perceptions of the “Korean Wave,” or Hallyu. To achieve this purpose, a survey that included questions about the awareness of Hallyu among South Koreans and Americans was conducted before and after the Olympics. The results show that the Olympics positively influenced Hallyu and that the effect was greater for Koreans than for Americans. After watching the Olympics, Koreans had a greater sense of cultural soft power and their perception of Hallyu’s influence on the United States than before they watched the Olympics. However, for American participants, enduring involvement with Hallyu was the only factor that reflected a positive influence. This study demonstrates the relationship between international mega-sport events and a host country’s perceived cultural values.

Exploring consumer–brand engagement: a holistic framework

Purpose This paper aims to investigate the causal relationships between constructs related to consumer–brand engagement (CBE), including consumers’ enduring involvement, ongoing information search behaviour, online engagement behaviour and brand attitude in Hong Kong. Design/methodology/approach The theoretical framework is tested using data from 302 customers of a durable technology product, a smartphone, in Hong Kong, collected using a self-administered online survey. Partial least squares-structural equation modelling was used to analyse the data. Findings The results reveal that consumers’ enduring involvement and ongoing information search behaviour are key drivers of CBE, ultimately enhancing customers’ brand attitude. The importance of enduring involvement in strengthening ongoing search behaviour, online engagement behaviour and CBE is confirmed, together with the importance of ongoing search behaviour in strengthening CBE. Further analysis demonstrated the full mediating role of ongoing search behaviour in the relationship between enduring involvement and online engagement behaviour, such that CBE fully mediates the impact of ongoing search behaviour on brand attitude. Research limitations/implications The research contributes to the extant literature by providing an understanding of how to strengthen CBE for durable technology products, such as smartphones. However, this study is cross-sectional in nature, focusing on smartphones in Hong Kong only. Thus, future research should consider comparisons between countries with diverse cultures as well as other industries, such as the service sector, to enhance the generalisability of the study’s findings. Practical implications Marketers should seek to heighten customers’ involvement levels by encouraging customer–brand interactions, which is not only useful in encouraging customers’ ongoing search and online engagement behaviour but also critical in strengthening CBE. Additionally, marketers are recommended to encourage customers’ ongoing search behaviour (at the category level), which is useful in encouraging consumers’ online engagement behaviour as well as strengthening CBE. Originality/value The role of ongoing search behaviour in brand building has received little attention in the branding literature. This paper makes a noteworthy contribution to CBE research by empirically testing a holistic framework, confirming that enduring involvement and ongoing search behaviour are critical drivers in the process of strengthening CBE. This paper also demonstrates the mediation roles of ongoing search behaviour and CBE in the holistic framework.

The application of enduring involvement theory in the development of a success model for a craft beer and food festival

PurposeThe purpose of this research paper is to examine whether enduring involvement theory plays a role in predicting craft beer and food festival visitors' experience of the festivalscape. Though craft beer and brewing is a growing area of research, there has been limited studies and theory application in this area. Around the world, craft breweries are increasing in number and producing more unique styles of beer as the demand for craft beer increases. Craft beer consumers visit many of these breweries and are attracted to craft beer festivals in which they can sample multiple local, regional, national and international craft beers.Design/methodology/approachA quantitative methodology was used based on data collected at the site of the festival. Researchers collected 204 useable surveys from visitors attending the North Miami Brewfest in North Miami, Florida, USA. Structural equation modeling was employed to examine the relationships among enduring involvement, festivalscape, satisfaction, revisit intention and word-of-mouth.FindingsThe results revealed that enduring involvement is significant in predicting all four factors of festivalscape (food/beverage quality, convenience, facility and festival staff). The festivalscape factors facility, food quality and festival staff predicted festival attendee satisfaction which in turn predicted both revisit intention and word-of-mouth. However, the festivalscape factor convenience did not influence satisfaction.Research limitations/implicationsThe authors surveyed only one festival in one region in South Florida. Further studies can survey multiple festivals in multiple regions to increase the generalizability of the research model. Enduring involvement theory could be applied to other niche areas in hospitality and tourism in the future (in addition to craft beer tourism).Practical implicationsCraft beer festival organizers should appeal to craft beer clubs, breweries and publications to attract those with a commitment to the craft beer industry to their event. People with an enduring, lasting commitment to craft beer are more likely to have a positive experience of the festivalscape at the event. Lastly, festival organizers should focus on the festivalscape factors facility, festival staff and food and beverage quality to influence satisfaction at the event.Originality/valueThis project applies enduring involvement theory in a festival setting. The research is further unique by adding enduring involvement as a predictor of festivalscape experience.

Drivers of soccer fan loyalty: Australian evidence on the influence of team brand image, fan engagement, satisfaction and enduring involvement

PurposeThe purpose of the paper is to contribute to the extant sport marketing literature by positing fan engagement, team brand image and cumulative fan satisfaction with the team as factors influencing attitudinal and behavioural soccer (football) fan loyalty, with enduring involvement with the team as a moderator.Design/methodology/approachA convenience sample of Australian A-League soccer fans completed a paper-and-pencil, self-administered survey to evaluate their team on the focal constructs. A total of 207 participants were recruited from a major Australian east-coast university.FindingsUsing partial least squares-structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM), the study found that fan engagement influences both team brand image and cumulative fan satisfaction, while team brand image also influences cumulative fan satisfaction, and both of these constructs influence attitudinal loyalty and behavioural loyalty. The moderating role of enduring involvement was also found for two relationships: team brand image → attitudinal loyalty and team brand image → behavioural loyalty, along with a mediating role of attitudinal loyalty.Originality/valueThis study increases our understanding of the reasons why soccer fans are committed to and exhibit fan-related behaviours for a team, thus contributing to the sports-marketing literature on the relationships amongst fan engagement, team brand image, cumulative fan satisfaction, attitudinal loyalty and behavioural loyalty, along with the moderating role of enduring involvement. The findings also assist sports-marketing practitioners to formulate more effective, fan-centric marketing-communication strategies leading to a larger loyal fan base.