Influence of tourists' perception of crisis response on city image and tourism intention
YIN Jiaojiao1,2,3， XIE Shuangyu1,3， HAN Lei4， CAO Chen1,3
(1.School of Urban and Environmental Science， Central China Normal University， Wuhan 430079， China；2.Colorado State University， Warner College of Natural Resources， Fort Collins 80521， USA； 3.Wuhan Branch of China Tourism Academy， Wuhan 430079， China；4. Southeast University， School of Humanities， Nanjing 211096 China)
Abstract：Since the outbreak of COVID-19 in spring of 2020， various kinds and thousands of anti-epidemic information was disseminated intensively all over the world. Under this circumstance， it's worth investigating the perception of potential tourists towards the response to tourism crises in Wuhan and its impact on city image and tourism intention. After discussing the theoretical paths and mechanisms that potential tourists' perception of tourism crisis response affects city image and tourism intention based on the theory of planned behavior， 3 129 online questionnaire survey data collected from Wuhan's potential tourists after the the city lifted travel restrictions were used to evaluate the level of tourists' perception of Wuhan's tourism crisis responses (TCR)， and the paths and mechanisms that tourists' perception influences city image and tourism intentions were analyzed by applying factor analysis and structural equation modeling. The results are shown as follows. 1) Potential tourists have a good perception of Wuhan's TCR including city dealing and handling， governments actions and people's performance during the crisis， with high evaluation of Wuhan's city image， while middle level of tourism intention. 2) Potential tourists' perception of TCR has significant direct effects on both the improvement of the city cognitive image and overall image as well as the enhance of tourism intention. It also indirectly increases tourism intention through the mediating effects of city image， forming a significant interaction chain of “perception of TCR-cognitive image-affective image-tourism intention”. Familiarity plays a moderating role between affective image and tourism intention in this chain. Based on these findings， strategies to strengthen TCR and enhance the city image are proposed to provide theoretical references for the improvement of tourism intention and the recovery of the city tourism market after the epidemic crisis.
2023, Vol. 57 
