Effects of perceived change of urban destination on destination attachment

Mei Huang; Xiaojie Yang; Danping Liu; Hedan Fang

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2022.1022421

Effects of perceived change of urban destination on destination attachment

Front Psychol. 2022 Nov 22:13:1022421. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.1022421. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Mei Huang^{1

2}, Xiaojie Yang^{2

3}, Danping Liu^{1

2}, Hedan Fang²

Affiliations

¹ School of Management, Xihua University, Chengdu, China.
² Research Institute of International of Economics and Management, Xihua University, Chengdu, China.
³ School of Emergency Management, Xihua University, Chengdu, China.

Abstract

The impact of urbanization on tourism is a widespread macroeconomic concern. However, few studies have explored the impact of destination urbanization on such individual tourist behavior as destination attachment. By developing an urbanization perception scale and analyzing tourists' destination attachment, this study provides empirical evidence for the micro-impact of urbanization. A sample of 825 repeat visitors of Chengdu, China, was included in the partial least squares-based structural modeling. The results of several tests show that the environmental changes caused by green urbanization positively impact tourists' destination attachment. This study also examines the explanatory role of tourist experience satisfaction and behavior control in this relationship. The findings suggest that tourists' experience of urban change is critical for the sticky marketing of tourist destinations.

Keywords: destination attachment; perceived behavioral control; perceived change; travel experience satisfaction; urbanization of tourist destination.