tourism experience journal

Tourist Experience in Destinations: Rethinking a Conceptual Framework of Destination Experience

Journal of marketing research and case studies.

Walid BERNAKI and Saida MARSO

Encg, university of abdelmalek essaadi, tangier, morocco, academic editor: esther sleilati, cite this article as: walid bernaki and saida marso (2023), “tourist experience in destinations: rethinking a conceptual framework of destination experience ", journal of marketing research and case studies, vol. 2023 (2023), article id 340232, doi: 10.5171/2023.340232, copyright © 2023. walid bernaki and saida marso. distributed under creative commons attribution 4.0 international cc-by 4.0.

Tourism experience is a genuine source of destination attractiveness and long-lasting competitive advantage. Understanding the main drivers of the tourist experience in destinations is a critical step toward managing and delivering a satisfying destination experience to tourists. However, amidst a stream of research that explores experiences in different service settings, a framework of destination experience remains underexplored. To fill this gap in research, this article aims to draw an integrated conceptual framework of what makes a tourist experience in destinations along the travel journey and depicts the antecedents and consequences. By doing so, DMOs and other tourism stakeholders can fit their marketing strategies to cater to tourists’ needs and preferences. Also, this article discusses several measures and emerging research methods to capture the components of the destination experience.

Introduction

Recently, the concept of customer experience has received renewed attention in the tourism and leisure literature (Godovykh & Tasci, 2020a; Verhulst et al., 2020; Chen et al., 2021; Kim & Seo, 2022). Indeed, many businesses have adopted customer experience management, incorporating the concept of experience into their core objectives (Kundampully et al., 2018). Admittedly, a survey by Gartner (2014) reveals that 89% of companies consider experiences on the front line of their business competitiveness. It is now one of the leading marketing strategies embraced by hospitality firms (e.g., Disneyland, Abercrombie & Fitch, and Starbucks, to name only a few) and tourist destinations (e.g., Morocco, Thailand, Korea, Spain, etc.) (Ketter, 2018). To date, Hudson and Ritchie’s (2009) case study of branding destination experience illustrates this paradigm shift in the marketing and management of destinations. Furthermore, Berry, Carbone, and Haeckel (2002) suggest that organizations that continue to reduce their costs to support lower prices as an alternative to customer experience to gain a competitive advantage may affect the value of their product and service offerings, potentially jeopardizing their competitiveness (Vengesayi, 2003).

Nowadays, all that someone wants when one is on travel is to engage in memorable experiences to satisfy their emotional and psychological benefits, to be part of the destination experience, local culture and people, and country history (Morgan, Elbe, and de Esteban, 2009; Boswijk et al., 2007; Pine & Gilmore, 1999). This suggests that the choice of a particular tourist destination is enhanced by the significant mental image it portrays or the “pre-experience” the tourist expects to have upon arrival rather than the functional and utilitarian benefits that used to consider when making their choices (Oh et al., 2007; Kirillova et al., 2016; Ketter, 2018). Thus, destinations are now challenged to provide experiences that cater to postmodern tourists’ expectations, dazzle their senses, and go beyond alternatives in the marketplace. In this context, providing a conceptual framework of what makes an overall tourist experience in the destination is mandatory for destination marketing to design, manage and deliver a superior experience to tourists as a source of long-lasting competitive advantage (Karayilan & Cetin, 2016; Cetin et al., 2019; Crouch & Ritchie, 2005). In this framework, this study is an attempt to set an integrated conceptual framework of destination experience that depicts the factors of tourist experience during the tourist journey. Notwithstanding, despite the wide stream of research looking at tourist experience in various service settings in destination (Arnould & Thompson, 1993; Quan & Wang, 2004; Vitterso et al., 2004; Prentice et al., 1998), understanding the total experience in destinations is challenging.

This article raises several concerns. The first concern defines the theoretical knowledge of the concept of customer experience in tourism literature. The second concern comprises a conceptual framework of destination experience, including the antecedents, the formation, and the consequences of the tourist experience in destinations. The final concern concludes with marketing and management implications and avenues of future research.

 Literature Review

The Customer Experience in Tourism Literature

Since the late 1970s, the concept of experience has been an important research stream in consumer research (Jensen et al., 2015). By recognizing the experiential aspects of consumption, consumption has begun to be seen as an activity of production of meanings and a field of symbolic exchanges (Baudrillard, 1970), encompassed by what Holbrook and Hirschman (1982) call “the experiential view.” In their study, Holbrook and Hirschman (1982) refer to the experience concept as a personal and subjective occurrence with high emotional significance resulting from consuming goods and services. Fundamentally, this experiential perspective questions the limitations of conceptualizing consumption as a need-driven activity, wherein a customer is considered merely a cognitive agent, passive participant, and rational decision-maker that affords no emotions, symbolic, or spiritual relief (Angus, 1989) and focuses only on the quest for information and multi-attribute assessment (Addis & Holbrook, 2001). Against this background, it has replaced this functional and utilitarian view of consumption with an experiential view that emphasizes subjective responses and hedonism in the consumer’s way of thinking and acting (Holbrook & Hirschman, 1982). 

Particularly, since the emergence of the experience economy by Pine and Gilmore in 1999, the concept of customer experience has been increasingly cited at the forefront of researchers’ interest, particularly in tourism studies (e.g., Walls et al., 2011; Lugosi & Walls, 2013; Lemon & Verhoef, 2016; Andersson, 2007; Oh et al., 2007), in the same way, the management of customer/tourist experience has received growing attention in the general tourism literature (Schmitt, 2010; Verhoef et al., 2009; Tung & Ritchie, 2011; Brakus, Schmitt, & Zhang, 2008; Adhikari & Bhattacharya, 2016; Meyer & Schwager, 2007; Kundampully et al., 2018). Seemingly, tourism as a concept implies an experience. According to Holbrook and Hirschman (1982), this is explained by the fact that tourist and leisure activities, entertainment, and the arts are inherently defined by symbolic meanings and experiential aspects that make them intriguing research subjects. 

Following Kim and Seo (2022), the tourism experience is central to the tourism and hospitality industry and the main determinant of tourists’ behavioral intention and decision-making (Huseynov et al., 2020; Shafiee et al., 2021; Klaus & Maklan, 2013). To date, many studies in tourism literature have described the prevalence of tourists’ emotions and their strong influence on service performance and tourists’ behavioral intentions, such as willingness to recommend and spread positive word-of-mouth (Godovykh & Tasci, 2020b; Verhulst et al., 2020; Hosany et al., 2015).    

In the literature, more studies have exemplified an exhaustive and perplexing set of definitions and theoretical meanings of the experience construct (see table 1). Furthermore, numerous components emerge in the literature (e.g., affective, cognitive, conative, sensorial, and social), raising difficulties for academics and practitioners to fathom the concept of tourist experience (see table 2). These above components reflect a holistic structure of the destination’s positive and compelling tourism experiences (Godovykh & Tasci, 2020a).

Interestingly, the concept of customer experience has been approached primarily as a subjective, affective, and personal reaction to an event, market stimulus, or activity at different phases of the consumption process. For example, Otto and Ritchie (1996) define tourist experience as “the subjective mental state felt by participants during a service encounter” (p. 166). In their ground-breaking work, the authors claim that affective or emotion-based reports—i.e., the subjective, individual, and feelings experienced by tourists while traveling, are typically substantial in consumer behavior and marketing research. However, in conventional analysis, they are often neglected in explaining variances in tourists’ satisfaction evaluations, thereby limiting the understanding of consumer behavior. In addition, Schmitt (1999) considers customer experiences as “the private events that occur in response to stimulation (e.g., as provided by marketing efforts before and after purchase). They often result from direct observation and/or participation in events-whether they are real, dreamlike, or virtual” (p. 60). Also, Packer and Ballantyne (2016) refer to tourist experience as an individual’s immediate or ongoing, subjective, and personal reactions to an event, activity, or occurrence that usually happens outside one’s daily routine and familiar environment. 

In anthropological and ethnological studies, experience is an individual’s expression of their own living culture (Bruner, 1986). In conceptual terms, customer experience differs from an event. While an event happens to others, to society, and to the world, an experience is unique, personal, and differs from one person to another (Abrahams, 1986, as cited in Carù and Cova, 2003, p. 270). 

From a broader perspective, Verhoef et al. (2009) suggest that customer experience is more than the result of a single encounter; it is affected by every episode of the customer’s interaction process with a firm. This is in line with Larsen (2007), who argues that the tourist experience cannot be conceived simply as the various events that arise during a tourist visitation but as an accumulation of ongoing travel stages (e.g., pre-trip expectations, events at the destination, and post-visitation consequences). This implies that the experience occurs before the event or any other service and may last long after the experience (Gretzel & Jamal, 2009; Arnould, Price, & Zinkha, 2002; Lugosi & Walls, 2013). Accordingly, these mutual influences continue to affect tourists’ future behavior and expectations for the next journey (Godovykh & Tasci, 2020a). In this regard, some scholars, like Walls (2014) and Carbone and Haeckel (1994), shed light on experience as the “takeaway” impression or outcome people generate during their encounters with organizations’ products or services. For instance, Park and Santos’s (2016) investigation of the memorable experience of Korean backpackers states that the remembered experience is critical when determining future behavior and decision-making. The latter falls within the experience economy, wherein Pine and Gilmore (1999) submit that experience memorability captures customers’ hearts. 

From a management and marketing standpoint, experience is seen as a novel and distinctive economic product that can be acquired as a separate good or service that satisfies postmodern consumer needs (Pine & Gilmore, 1999). As a result, the creation of an immersive backdrop for customers is now considered by the marketing discipline known as experiential marketing (Schmitt, 1999). According to Carù and Cova (2003), an experience is “mainly a type of offering to be added to merchandise (or commodities), products and services, to give the fourth type of offering which is particularly suited to the needs of the postmodern consumer” (p. 272). As an offering, experience has become closely related to a trip, journey, or even the attraction itself (Volo, 2009). Admittedly, an experience is created when “a company intentionally uses services as the stage and goods as props, to engage individual customers in a way that creates a memorable event” (Pine & Gilmore, 1999, p.11). That is, experiences are not self-generated but occur in response to staged modalities and the environment (Schmitt, 1999). Palmer (2010), in his conceptualization of customer experience in a retail setting, stated that it implies a variety of market stimuli that hold the potential to create value for customers. These stimuli are viewed as external factors that give birth to the experience.

Furthermore, Meyer and Schwager (2007) contend that contact with the service provider, whether direct or indirect, affects the customer’s experience. Direct contact occurs when a product or service is purchased, used, or provided. In contrast, indirect contact refers to unplanned encounters with service providers and touch-points that may entail reputation, a recommendation, advertising, after-sales support, and other factors (e.g., Payne et al., 2008). This shows that factors outside of an organization’s control, as well as those inside its control, have an impact on the customer experience (Verhoef et al., 2009).

In recent studies, in an attempt to define an all-comprehensive definition of the construct of experience, Lemon and Verhoef (2016) defined the concept of customer experience as “a customer’s cognitive, emotional, behavioral, sensorial, and social responses to a firm’s offerings during the customer’s entire purchase journey” (P.70). In this perspective, Bagdare and Jain (2013) refer to customer experience as all-inclusive and define it as “the sum total of cognitive, emotional, sensorial, and behavioral responses produced during the entire buying process, involving an integrated series of interaction with people, objects, processes, and environment in retailing” (p. 792). These definitions embrace the cognitive, emotional, sensory, and behavioral components of experience produced in the frame of different interactions with customers, stakeholders, and management processes. Generally speaking, managers and marketers have found it challenging to understand the relevance of the notion of the tourist experience and to identify the various interactions and relationships between customers/tourists and destination elements.

Table 1: An overview of definitions regarding the concept of customer/tourist experience

Table 2: Components of the concept of customer/tourist experience

The Value of Tourism Experience in Tourist Destinations:

Nowadays, with the increasing worldwide competition and the changing situation the world lives in due mainly to the post-pandemic period, the global economic crisis, and the emergence of a new form of technologies and behaviors, tourist destinations are not spared from these challenges. To adapt to these changes and maintain their position in the market, the tourism industry players need to develop and reinvent their tourism. Understanding their experiential offerings is therefore prominent to accomplish this. According to Pine and Gilmore (1999), the core value of destinations lies in the quality of the experience it offers. This experience can be strong that tourists might develop a deep emotional bond with their travel destination (Hidalgo & Hernandez, 2001) and influence their behavioral intentions (Prayag et al., 2017; del Bosque & San Martin, 2008). Nevertheless, limited studies address a comprehensive framework of what makes an overall tourist experience in the destination or implicitly depict the antecedents, formations, and consequences of the tourist experience in the destination (Cetin et al., 2019; Karayilan & Cetin, 2016). It is, therefore, within this context where this conceptual paper is located.

More specifically, within the context of tourist destinations, everything a “tourist goes through at a destination is an experience, be it behavioral or perceptual, cognitive or emotional, expressed or implied” (Oh et al., 2007, p. 120). Stated in another way, the destination elements, such as natural and cultural assets, spectacular scenery, and friendly local people, are no longer sufficient to satisfy the contemporary tourists’ needs and differentiate places in a highly competitive market (Hudson & Ritchie, 2009; Ketter, 2018). Instead, by providing a satisfying destination experience, destination managers and policy-makers can set their offering apart from their competitors (Schmitt, 2010), enhancing destination desirability to tourists and increasing, in return, destination profitability (Morgan, Elbe, and de Esteban, 2009; Lugosi and Walls, 2013).

To date, a great deal of research has explored experiences in specific settings, such as food experience (Quan & Wang, 2004), tourist attractions (Vitterso et al., 2000), backpackers (Park & Santos, 2016), heritage parks (Prentice et al., 1998), to name only a few. However, while these studies concentrate on a specific type of tourism experience, few studies have thoroughly approached the factors that holistically drive the tourism experience in destinations. The reality is, regarding the lack of a clear definition of the concept per se, the subjective nature of the construct, the timeframe of the experience, the dynamic nature of the destination itself, and the diverse approaches to the tourist experience are among the factors that make capturing the critical drivers of destination experience a difficult task (Godovykh & Tasci, 2020a).

Since the tourism experience extends a period of time and simultaneously involves synergistic interactions and consumption of products and services, destination managers cannot wholly orchestrate the drivers of the tourist experience in the destination (Lugosi & Walls, 2013; Walls et al., 2011). At best, they can only influence the psychological environment and the prerequisite that facilitate the conditions for the experience to take place (Mossberg, 2007). According to Lugosi and Walls (2013), experiences are a flow of emotions and thoughts that occur during destination encounters, including the influence of the physical environment (e.g., atmospherics, infrastructure, and superstructure), the social environment (e.g., the local community), and other customers (e.g., fellow tourists, friends and relatives). This is because a tourist’s experience entails a series of engagements and interactions with the tourism industry, meanings, and people’s surroundings (Moscardo, 2003). This interplay of interactions represents the core of the overall destination experience (Karayilan & Cetin, 2016). Within this analysis, the tourist experience can be regarded as a compound construct that originates from a set of interactions between tourists’ internal factors, such as cognition and senses; and an organization’s external factors, such as the physical environment, other tourists, employees, local communities, and tourism operators (Adhikari & Bhattacharya, 2016; Albayrak et al., 2018).

The Co-creation Perspective in Tourism Experience

In the last decade, consumer research has witnessed an ongoing period of changes in its theoretical and philosophical foundations. The framework within which the debates have been conducted is labelled “modernism versus postmodernism” (Featherstone, 1988; Firat, 1990; Firat & Venkatesh, 1993; Hirschman & Holbrook, 1992; Turner & Turner, 1990; Firat & Venkatesh, 1995; Fırat & Dholakia, 2006; Cova & Cova, 2009). The starting point of the first reflection is none other than the consumer who has changed status and even multiplied his functions and roles about the meanings he attributes to his consumption. Specifically, customers (e.g., tourists) have become less concerned about the material values of consumption and more interested in the experiential value they derive from activities and products (Firat & Dholakia, 2006). Arguably, Tarssanen and Kylänen (2006) put forward that the value in tourism activities is accumulated by means of more experiential elements and active participation, as opposed to simply visiting a particular tourist destination. Under this approach, Saraniemi and Kylänen (2011) consider the destination a dynamic entity where the tourist can “jump in.” Meaning that tourists are willing to co-create value with destination providers. For instance, Wu et al. (2015) argue that participatory experiences influence tourists’ perception of and satisfaction with their salt tourism experience.

Building on this theoretical analysis, the idea that the tourist experience is only determined by the industry and carried out by passive customers is contested in light of this theoretical approach. For example, Walls et al. (2011) proceed to argue that an experience is “self-generated and that the customer can control or choose whether he will have an experience or not (including negative experiences)” (p. 18). This is consistent with extant research, implying that tourists recall what they perform rather than what they see (Park & Santos, 2016). In fact, tourists form their own experiential space that fits their vision for what it should be, depending on their motivation and reasoning (Suvantola, 2002). This is why King (2002) explicitly notes that “customers interested in travel and tourism have an enormous range of experiences and destination options open to them, but they are increasingly in the driving seat when it comes to how they uptake their planning information, what they receive and the process they choose to go through in marketing their purchase” (p. 106). For this reason, many studies have emerged to recognize the modifying role of tourists in the creation and design process because the value of service and product offerings rely on tourists’ active participation in the consumption process.

Indeed, with the democratization of the Internet and the growing use of information and communication technologies (ICTs), Neuhofer et al. (2012) posit that tourists have become active participants in creating the experience they want to live in. Following these developments, Prahalad and Ramaswamy (2004) assign tourists as co-creators of their own experiences. They presume that the value creation of destinations depends on the ability of destination management processes to facilitate tourists’ interactions within the tourism system, which allows tourists to personalize their own experiences. Thus, by leaving space for tourists, Richards and Wilson (2006) imply that such an approach can lead tourists to construct their trip narrative of their surroundings and form their personal perspective.

In this context, Ritchie and Hudson (2009) exhort marketers to concentrate their marketing actions and advertising on tourism experiences to evoke tourists’ senses and inspire them to co-create their experiences while co-constructing the meanings they are looking for (Cova, 1996). Similar to this, Scott et al. (2009) propose, for future research, a shift from experience as something inherent for the visitor to a management approach in which experience is co-created by the visitor and supplier. In summary, it can be concluded that a tourist experience is highly personal, subjective, and co-created by tourists and providers through a series of interactions with the physical environment and activities, tourism businesses, and other fellow tourists.

Measurement of Experience and the Emergence of New Research Method

One of the most difficult and crucial problems for any destination or organization looking to establish a sustainable competitive edge is understanding the components of tourist experiences in the destination and managing all clues during tourists’ interactions with destination service providers (Lemon & Verhoef, 2016; Becker & Jaakkola, 2020). Indeed, by understanding the key factors of the tourist experience, managers and marketers can respond to the needs of potential tourists and influence their behavior. 

However, academics and practitioners suffer from measurement myopia because the tourist/customer experience is individualized, vague, and multifaceted. Our analysis of prior research generally brings forth the core tenants of measurement complexities and challenges as follows: these complexities include a lack of an accepted definition of the concept, the multiple elements that underpin the construct in itself, the dynamic nature of the context-specific variables, the intangible nature of tourism products and services, the highly subjective, unique, and personal reactions of tourists, and the number of tourism players and stakeholders that exist within the tourism system (Godovykh & Tasci, 2020b; Hwang & Seo, 2016; Gentile et al., 2007; Meyer & Schwager, 2007; Palmer, 2010; Bagdare & Jain, 2013; Gnoth & Matteucci, 2014).

One degree of complexity arises from the fact that tourists differ in their motivations, attitudes, travel behavior, and preferences (Kundampully et al., 2018). For example, Andersson (2007) and Morgan et al. (2009) affirm that the expected value of a particular experience may differ from that of others. Similarly, Hwang and Seo (2016) suggest that the consumption experience might easily change the affective attitude generated by a customer experience over time. Furthermore, Csikszentmihalyi and Csikszentmihalyi (1988) argue that some personal characteristics may influence customers to engage in “flow” experiences more frequently, more intensely, and longer than others. Similarly, Ritchie and Hudson (2009) argue that tourists bring different social and cultural backgrounds; that is, each tourist holds a specific personal value that filters through their lives and affects their decision to select a particular destination and tourism experience (Madrigal & Kahle, 1994). Furthermore, Milman et al. (2017) report that visitor experience dimensions might not be concrete or objective when visiting a mountain attraction. This may induce different attributes and yield different interpretations, which vary from one customer to another.

Other scholars refer to the broad spectrum of research methodologies that have emerged in the business field and might be adjusted to investigate the concept of customer experience in the tourism and hospitality industry. These research methodologies are heterogeneous to the extent that customer experience is measured either quantitatively or qualitatively using a wide range of measurement tools, such as structured surveys, direct observation, structured or unstructured interviews, and measurement scales. Nevertheless, most researchers fail to consider the drivers of customer experience in its totality, for example, in pre-, during-, and post-experience (Godovykh & Tasci, 2020a). For example, many scholars (Verhulst et al., 2020; Godovykh & Tasci, 2020b; Kuppelwieser & Klaus, 2019; Palmer, 2010) have questioned the substantial reliance on conventional and retrospective self-report metrics to capture the dynamic aspects of tourists’ emotional responses from past experiences and current customers’ feelings, ignoring the dynamic nature of affective dimensions of experience. Accordingly, this may not predict consumer behavior or service performance outcomes. In this context, the online experiment by Godovykh and Tasci (2020b) supports the significant impact of post-visit emotional stimulation on several aspects of customer loyalty, demonstrating that the dynamic nature of the customer experience can be altered even long after the customer journey.  

On the other hand, many scholars note a shortage of innovation-related methods to identify the key elements of the tourist experience and the inability of many researchers to convey theory to research methods. For example, Palmer (2010) deems the inadequacy of survey design to assess the changing nature of affective and experiential dimensions of experience and, adding to the above, the concern that respondents’ answers might be misrepresented by their mood when answering questions (Skard et al., 2011); alternatively, it can be biased to the fact that they may not recall experienced emotions accurately. 

In this regard, Fick and Ritchie (1991) advocate using additional qualitative measures to abstract critical dimensions and highlight that a strictly quantitative scale fails to consider those affective and hedonic factors “which contribute to the overall quality of the service experience” (p. 9). From this point of view, Ritchie and Hudson (2009) argue that qualitative methods are convenient for researchers. For example, Holbrook (2006) surmises that due to the context-specific and non-linear nature of experiences, qualitative methods are well-suited to assess customer experience. Godovykh and Tasci (2020b) draw attention to more psychophysiological measures of emotions, such as electrodermal activity and electromyography, electrocardiography, pupillometry, etc., to overcome the limitations of conventional self-report measures. Correspondingly, Verhulst et al. (2020) adopt neurophysiological metrics to measure emotions and their dynamic nature along with customer experience. Their experimental results show that neurophysiological measures may better delineate arousal levels throughout different customer experience phases, although not self-reported by participants. Thus, Verhulst et al. (2020) emphasize the critical stake of such measures to managers and service designers, as they depict how emotions vary across different touch-points and channels throughout the customer experience. Hence, such a measurement approach might underpin which moments better predict customer behavioral intentions and service performance outcomes. However, using neurophysiological methods for data analysis is more difficult and costly for analyzing; therefore, managers and academics may reject it (Verhulst et al., 2019).

Hwang and Seo (2016) propose innovative methodologies to approach customer experience and recommend using experience sampling, grid techniques, netnography, structured content analysis, and emphasizing a cultural perspective. According to Lugosi and Walls (2013), a wide range of approaches and methods have been provided to studies regarding destination experiences, such as autoethnographic, ethnographic, visual methods, netnographics, and other forms of Internet research approaches, along with more traditional survey-based and quantitative approaches (see also, Hosany & Gilbert, 2010; Oh et al., 2007; Raikkonen & Honkanen, 2013). In accordance with Godovykh and Tasci (2020a), capturing the fundamental nature of tourist experiences must call upon a mixture of different research approaches, including self-report methods, interview techniques, experience sampling methods, and psychophysiological metrics, to allow researchers to instantly measure components of the total experience and respondents’ reactions as they unfold before, during, and after the experience, as opposed to looking only at transactional touch-points. Kim and Seo (2022) confirm that a combination of such methodologies reflects the true nature of customer experience. Similarly, Klaus and Maklan (2013) assert that quality of service experience (EXQ) should be considered alongside more traditional metrics for measuring customer experience. For example, customer satisfaction and net promoter score are commonly known as better and direct predictors of customer behavior, and their applicability is relatively practical and cost-effective. In general terms, Verhulst et al. (2020) and Verhulst et al. (2019) posit combining neurophysiological measures with conventional metrics (e.g., self-report and behavioral measures), which may help to strengthen validity and reliability.

Last but not least, in light of the development of ICTs, Lugosi and Walls (2013) claim that hardwired technologies, such as mobile phones, GPS, and geographic information systems, have lately gained more ground in the investigation of daily tourist movements and activities in a location. 

For example, Lee et al. (1994) employed a self-initiated tape-recording model (SITRM) to gather data. This technique requires participants to wear electronic pagers and carry self-report booklets in addition to a quantitative survey form, making researchers more willing to collect immediate participant experiences. In doing so, it minimizes memory decay and mood bias. Volo (2009) sheds light on the benefits of unobtrusive methods (e.g., sensory devices, use of GPS, travel diaries, and videos) as an alternative to access tourists’ emotions and feelings. Chen (2008) examined travelers’ mental representations of their family holiday experiences and actions using the Zaltman metaphor elicitation technique (ZMET). Supplementing this approach, Lugosi and Walls (2013) recommend adopting the actor-network theory (ANT) technique to examine travel destinations and visitor experiences through various players, actions, processes, and relationships as a complement to this strategy. Kim and Seo (2022) provide insight into new big data sources for gathering information on consumer experience.

An Integrated Conceptual Framework of Destination Experience

Tourist Experience is a complex and wide-ranging construct arising from a broader set of interactions with actors, stakeholders, and other tourists (Jaakola et al., 2015; Verhoef et al., 2009; Packer & Ballantyne, 2016; Kandampully et al., 2018; Meyer & Schwager, 2007). In light of the above discussion, many studies refer to the tourism experience as cumulative of each moment experienced by tourists during their journey, i.e., before the experience occurs, during the travel destination, and long after the tourist returns to their home environment. This ongoing process influences tourists’ future behavior and expectations of the next trip. To illustrate, Tung and Ritchie (2011) define an experience as “an individual’s subjective evaluation and undergoing (i.e., affective, cognitive, and behavioral) of events related to their tourist activities that begin before (i.e., planning and preparation), during (i.e., at the destination), and after the trip (i.e., recollection)” (p. 1369). Thus, different factors influencing tourist behavior can be illuminated during each stage of the experience process (Chen et al., 2014). Still, no prior holistic conceptual model exists in the literature that has examined all the elements that form the tourist experience in the destination.

Our approach to the present study is to build on the initial work of Godovykh and Tasci (2020a), Lugosi and Walls (2013), and Walls et al. (2011), an integrated conceptual framework of destination experience (see Figure 1). This conceptual framework portrays a process that covers components, processes, and stakeholders and depicts how they combine to form what is fundamentally the destination experience. It takes the tourist experience antecedents from a diverse body of literature and deals with tourist experience as a construct created due to tourist interactions with the physical and social environment of the destination along their journey (i.e., pre, during, and post-destination experience), creating, in consequence, opportunities for positive outcomes to tourists and destinations as well.

From a marketing perspective, this framework is suggested as a tool for decision-making to help DMOs and other tourism stakeholders to capture the holistic nature of the tourist experience in the destination setting. This may have practical implications for DMOs and other tourism stakeholders operating at the destination to fit their marketing practices to design a superior destination experience in response to the tourists’ needs and preferences. Practically, future research on tourist experience in destinations may pinpoint the specific roles of each stakeholder and the destination elements when considering the construction of the experience the tourists receive.

In doing so, we consider the definition proposed by Godovykh and Tasci (2020a), which is holistic from its perspective, to explain the concept of the destination experience. We include the social interaction dimension as a crucial element of the tourist experience in the definition mentioned above in order to widen the scope of experiential appeal and dwell on the implications of developing an integrated destination experience (see the works of Murphy, 2001; Milman, Zehrer, & Tasci, 2017; Bharwani & Jauhari, 2013). 

In this perspective, a destination experience can be described as the total of tourists’ internal reactions (i.e., affective, cognitive, sensory, conative, and social) enhanced by external destination-related elements (e.g., destination stakeholders and managers, physical environment, tourism activities, local community, and other tourists) that occur within a series of dynamic interactions encountered directly or indirectly along the travel journey; during pre- destination experience, during the core of the experience and post-destination experience. As a result, it might be interpreted differently according to tourists’ characteristics, resulting in distinct consequences related to tourists and the visited destination. This proposed definition may be particularly constructive in explaining and measuring destination experience. It describes the holistic structure of experience components (e.g., cognitive, affective, sensorial, conative, and social) as tourist responses during their journey. Accordingly, this proposed definition is highly consistent with previous conceptualizations of other tourism and hospitality scholars (e.g., Packer and Ballantyne, 2016; Adhikari & Bhattacharya, 2016; Palmer, 2010; Verhoef et al., 2009).

Antecedents

In the tourism and hospitality industry, a number of antecedents have been offered as reliable predictors of customer experience, some of which have been argued to affect the quality, formation somewhat, and/or purchasing of experiences. This is due to the fact that each tourist’s experiences are unique based on their perceptions, consumption, and interpretation.

One set of antecedents is related to tourists’ characteristics in terms of socio-demographics (gender, age, nationality, occupation, salary), psychographic profile (personality and lifestyle), and culture (Godovykh & Tasci, 2020a; Adhikari & Bhattacharya 2016; Kim et al., 2012; Andersson, 2007; Hwang & Seo, 2016; Park & Santos, 2016; Morgan, Elbe, & de Esteban. 2009), level of familiarity, knowledge and previous experience background (Holbrook & Hirschman, 1982; Finsterwalder & Kuppelwieser, 2011; Adhikari & Bhattacharya, 2016; Hwang & Seo, 2016), group characteristics and ethnic background (Holbrook & Hirschman, 1982;  Adhikari & Bhattacharya, 2016; Hwang & Seo, 2016; Heywood, 1987), tourists’ expectations (Arnould and Price, 1993; Ofir & Simonson, 2007), their preferences and purposes of trips (Adhikari et al., 2013; Hu & Ritchie, 1993; Wijaya et al., 2013), skills, abilities, and attitudes (Andersson, 2007), and tourist motivation and level of involvement (Prebensen et al., 2013). Such factors are critical drivers of one’s experience at the destination and post-purchase experience evaluation.

The other set of antecedents is concerned with destination-related features and situational characteristics. On the one hand, most researchers claim that destination attractions represent the core elements of tourism (Gunn, 1972). Furthermore, Buhalis (2000) reports that tourists’ selection of a particular destination is motivated by existing tourism attractions, accessibility, available packages, activities, and ancillary services. Similarly, Lin and Kuo (2016) suggest that the destination’s culture, history, religion, nature, events, architecture, hospitality, and other related variables likely influence the tourist experience. Also, Mossberg (2007) suggests many factors influencing the tourist experience, i.e., service personnel, physical environment, products/souvenirs, other tourists, and themes/stories. More broadly, Kim (2014) proposes ten factors to form memorable tourism experiences, including local culture, various activities, hospitality, infrastructure, environment, management, accessibility, quality of service, physiography, place attachment, and superstructure. From another perspective, marketing literature considers that tourist behavior depends heavily on the nature and quality of the tourism experience. For example, Gronroos (2001) highlights the significant determinants of service quality on customer satisfaction, behavioral intentions, and customer experience. On the other hand, situational characteristics include situational factors, such as the nature of the consumption context (Hwang & Seo, 2016) and macroeconomic and environmental factors (Grewal, Levy & Kumar, 2009; Hwang & Seo, 2016; Hudson & Ritchie, 2009) that likely influence the tourist experience in various contexts. The tourist and hospitality business as a whole has undoubtedly been impacted by several uncontrolled factors, such as natural disasters and climate change, financial crises, unfavorable exchange rates, and sanitary concerns.

Consequences

The concept of experience is central to customer behavior (Klaus & Maklan, 2013; Addis & Holbrook, 2001). Many studies have discussed the positive relationship between positive tourist experiences and behavioral intentions and attitudes to make inferences about the destination.

From a tourist perspective, as mentioned before, experiential responses have broadly been expressed as a combination of cognitive, emotional, behavioral, sensorial, and social reactions by a tourist as a result of active interactions and engagement with the destination’s physical environment, people, and tourism stakeholders. In this regard, the tourism experience is proposed to result in emotional responses such as fun, feelings, fantasies, entertainment, and refreshment (Holbrook & Hirschman, 1982; Hirschman & Holbrook, 1982; Holbrook, 2000; Tynan & McKechnie, 2009; Hwang & Seo, 2016; Babin et al., 1994); cognitive responses such as knowledge, skills, learning, and memories (Oh et al. 2007; Holbrook & Hirschman, 1982; Pine & Gilmore, 1999; Lin & Kuo, 2016); conative responses such as practices, involvement, and engagement (Palmer, 2010; Schmitt, 1999; Unger & Kernan, 1983; Kim et al., 2012; Prahalad & Ramaswamy, 2004); sensorial responses such as taste, sound, smell, sight, and touch (Berry, Carbone, and Haeckel, 2002; Hudson & Ritchie, 2009); and perceived motivation (Pearce & Caltabiano, 1983; Oh et al., 2007). In a nutshell, when tourists value the experience, they begin valuing everything they feel, hear, see, and smell during their encounters with the destination. 

From a destination perspective, DMOs can meet tourists’ expectations and sway their behavioral intentions in terms of satisfaction and behavioral loyalty intentions by having an understanding of how tourists evaluate and benefit from their experiences at the destination (Klaus & Maklan, 2013; Hosany & Gilbert, 2010). According to Oppermann (2000), travelers’ positive experiences at a destination may affect their desire to return and strengthen their ability to recommend the destination to friends and family. Hidalgo and Hernandez (2001) argue that experiences might be so powerful that tourists might become attached to the destination. These marketing outcomes are based on the importance of literature and research, emphasizing their weight as a consequence (Godovykh & Tasci, 2020b).  

Figure 1: A conceptual framework of total destination experience

Conclusions, Implications, and Future Research Perspectives

This study aims to develop an integrated conceptual framework of tourist experiences in the destination based on the theoretical and conceptual understanding of tourism experience as an emerging topic in tourism research and consumer behavior. This framework will assist DMOs and policy-makers in broadening their understanding of the various factors and processes when considering the formation of the tourism experience. In doing so, DMOs and other tourism stakeholders can manage the prerequisite of enjoyable experiences for tourists, which will likely inspire tourists to return to the destination and recommend it to others.

The relevance of this research lies in the topicality of experience themes in tourism studies; the different insight that stems from this conceptual paper might have theoretical and managerial implications. From a theoretical perspective, this study aims to extend the conceptual and theoretical investigations of the experiential paradigm for destination management and marketing (Lugosi and Walls, 2013; King, 2002; Morgan, Elbe, and de Esteban, 2009). Therefore, the conceptual framework supplements the traditional framework of management through an experiential approach that considers the neglected experiential reactions of tourists (i.e., affective, conative, sensorial, and social responses) evoked as a result of dynamic interactions and active engagement with destination elements and stakeholders, alongside their destination visitation. From a management and marketing perspective, we believe that the conceptual framework of destination experience management may function as a guideline framework for destination managers and marketers to empirically study tourist experiences during the tourist journey in a destination. Hence, a clearer understanding of the relationship between specific tourist experiences, as they relate to the destination, can signal destination managers and marketers to establish a well-conceived marketing strategy to stage and deliver the desired tourism experience as part of a tourist value proposition.

Recently, intensive work has shed light on the co-creation experience process as critical to marketing strategies and differentiation in the general business literature. From this perspective, tourists are no longer considered passive recipients of a pre-conceived tourism product or experience but rather active partners in the co-creation experience design and management process (Lusch & Vargo, 2006; Lugosi and Walls, 2013; Prahalad & Ramaswamy, 2003; Mossberg, 2007; Binkhorst & Den Dekker, 2009). Morgan, Elbe, and de Esteban (2009) imply that the delivery of co-creation tourist experiences can only be achieved through an effective combined effort between the private and public sectors. This is in line with previous research that considers tourist experiences derived from broader networks of actors, stakeholders, tourists, suppliers, host guests, brands, fellow tourists, and the local community (Jaakola et al., 2015; Verleye, 2015). Therefore, destination managers and marketers must focus on an eco-tourism system that includes destination managers and stakeholders in managing the co-creation destination experience. Therefore, further investigations are required to design co-creating experiential marketing strategies to assist tourists in co-constructing their desired tourism experience that provides the emotional state or pre-image they are looking to live in.

Last but not least, we propose empirical studies investigating causal linkages between different variables with related interactions, antecedents and consequences to fully leverage the relevance of the proposed conceptual framework.

Statements and Declarations

The author(s) reported no potential conflicts of interest.

The author(s) received no financial support for this article.

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Transformational tourism – a systematic literature review and research agenda

Journal of Tourism Futures

ISSN : 2055-5911

Article publication date: 22 June 2022

Issue publication date: 22 September 2022

This paper aims to examine critically the literature on transformational tourism and explore a research agenda for a post-COVID future.

Design/methodology/approach

A systematic review of the transformational tourism literature is performed over a 42-year period from 1978 to 2020.

Further research is required in terms of how transformative experiences should be calibrated and measured both in qualitative and quantitative terms, particularly from the perspective of how tourists are transformed by their experiences. Similarly, the nature and depth of these transformative processes remain poorly understood, particularly given the many different types of tourism associated with transformative experiences, which range from religious pilgrimages to backpacking and include several forms of ecotourism.

Practical implications

Future research directions for transformational tourism are discussed with regard to how COVID-19 will transform the dynamics of tourism and travel, including the role of new smart technologies in the creation of enhanced transformational experiences, and the changing expectations and perceptions of transformative travel in the post-COVID era. In addition, the researchers call for future studies on transformational tourism to explore the role of host communities in the delivery of meaningful visitor experiences.

Originality/value

Transformational tourism is an emerging body of research, which has attracted a growing level of interest among tourism scholars in recent years. However, to this date, a systematic review of published literature in this field has not been conducted yet in a holistic sense. This paper offers a framework for future research in this field.

• Transformational tourism

Literature review

• Research agenda

Nandasena, R. , Morrison, A.M. and Coca-Stefaniak, J.A. (2022), "Transformational tourism – a systematic literature review and research agenda", Journal of Tourism Futures , Vol. 8 No. 3, pp. 282-297. https://doi.org/10.1108/JTF-02-2022-0038

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2022, Roshini Nandasena, Alastair M. Morrison and J. Andres Coca-Stefaniak

Published in Journal of Tourism Futures . Published by Emerald Publishing Limited. This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this licence may be seen at http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode .

Introduction

Although transformational tourism would seem to be a novel emerging field of research ( Reisinger, 2013 ), the roots of this concept can be arguably traced back to Victorian England (e.g. the Grand Tour), when leisure-related travel was often linked to self-change and self-exploration. Indeed, authors in the 17th and 18th century, including James Boswell, Samuel Johnson and Mariano Vasi, among others, provided reflective accounts of their travels in continental Europe ( Knowles, 2013 ). From a more scholarly perspective, Mezirow's (1978) transformational theory set the foundations of what later evolved into transformational tourism with Bruner (1991) and Kotler (1998) as its pioneers. Today, scholarly research guided by transformational learning theory (see, for instance, Mezirow, 1991 , 2000 ; or Hobson and Welbourn, 1998 ) is well established and early tourism scholars built on these foundations to explore the therapeutic and experiential elements of travel ( Kotler, 1998 ). More recently, Ross (2010) defined transformative travel and tourism in terms of their aim to “honour the delicate interplay between the self and anyone who is different or the ‘other’ during the travel” (p. 55), with Lean (2012) arguing the key role of physical travel in this process.

Different aspects of transformational tourism have been explored adopting perspectives that have included existential-humanistic approaches ( Kirillova, 2017 ), co-creation ( Wengel et al. , 2019 ), volunteer tourism ( Knowlenberg et al. , 2014 ), pilgrimage tourism ( Nikjoo et al. , 2020 ), ecotourism ( Pookhao,2014 ), the sharing economy ( Guttentag, 2019 ), experience development ( Wolf et al. , 2017 ) and host–tourist relationships ( Lean, 2012 ; Soulard et al ., 2019 ; Robledo and Batle, 2017 ).

Reisinger (2013) defined transformational tourism as tourism that delivers “very rich and very deep sensual and emotional transformational experiences that enable people to achieve their full potential as unique and authentic human being” (p. 31). In spite of this tentative attempt to define the concept, the connection between lasting personal transformations and visitor experiences in the context of tourism remains poorly understood. This article seeks to contribute to existing knowledge through a bibliographic analysis of the literature in this field and a research agenda for future scholarly work beyond the on-going COVID-19 pandemic and building on similar systematic literature reviews (SLRs) on this topic published recently ( Teoh et al. , 2021 ), though adopting a more comprehensive approach to the literature beyond the merely experiential elements of this field of research. The research agenda suggested is deliberately thought-provoking in its stance, particularly at a stage when the world is beginning to emerge from one of the most traumatic global health crises in living memory. Travel and tourism have been one of the worst-hit sectors of the economy ( Škare et al. , 2021 ). However, the sector is uniquely positioned to capitalise on the use of much sought transformational experiences to drive strategies for recovery ( Abbas et al. , 2021 ; Pasquinelli et al. , 2022 ) and re-think the strategic positioning of tourism destinations adopting innovative future-based approaches ( Korstanje and George, 2022 ; Assaf et al. , 2022 ). First, the methodology of the systematic literature search is explained, with its main findings outlined. This is then followed by a review of the literature on transformational tourism and a proposed research agenda.

Systematic literature search methodology

Building on earlier literature reviews by Stone and Duffy's (2015) and, more recently, Teoh et al. (2021) , an SLR of transformational tourism (TT) was conducted as part of this study with the aim of eliciting key publications in this field as well as different theoretical perspectives and conceptual frameworks in this context. This SLR combined Davis et al .’s (2014 ) standard five-step Evidence-Based practice in Medicine (EBM) approach with the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis) approach proposed by Moher et al. (2009) , as shown in Figure 1 . In line with this, Scopus and WoS (Web of Science) were chosen as the sources for the literature search over a 42-year period from January 1978 to July 2020.

First, a set of keywords linked to transformational tourism was selected for the systematic literature search. In order to do this, a selection of seminal scholarly works in this field was made first. These seminal works included Reisinger's (2013 and 2015) edited books on “Transformational Tourism (Tourist and Host perspectives)”, where various typologies of tourism are explored from a transformational perspective. In addition to these two books, two articles were selected ( Sterchele, 2020 ; Pung et al. , 2020 ), as they included the most up-to-date literature reviews at the time. Similarly, the first article to coin the concept of transformational tourism ( Bruner, 1991 ) was also selected. A content analysis of these publications was then conducted to elicit search keywords relevant to transformational tourism. Additionally, the five most-cited journal articles on transformational tourism were used as part of this content analysis to develop a set of keywords, which were then used for the systematic literature search process. The terms “transformative” and “transformational” were selected as some of the most often used keywords in these scholarly works. However, given that transformative experiences often involve a process of defining or re-defining an individual's self-identity, the following keywords were also deemed relevant to this study, based on the analysis of the publications cited above: “self-changing”; “self-development”; “self-improvement”; “self-responsibility”; “self-fulfilment”; “self-realisation”; “self-reflexive”; “self-monitoring”; “self-transformation”; “personal transformation”; “personal development”; “personal identity”; “transformational self”; “change in oneself”; “reflection on oneself”; “being true to oneself”; “immersing oneself”; “finding oneself”; and “life-changing”. Similarly, and given the different types of tourism often linked to transformational processes, the following search keywords were also adopted as part of this content analysis: “volunteer”; “ecotourism”; “adventure”; “backpacker”; “backpacking”; “yoga”; “religious”; “pilgrim”; “pilgrimage”; “wellness”; “wellbeing”; “well-being”; “spiritual”; “culture”; and “cultural heritage”.

The article search was performed by title, abstract and keywords, using Boolean operators “OR” and “AND” with an asterisk (“*”-proximity operator) to ensure that all alternative terms were captured. In addition to this, and given the limited amount of “hits” achieved initially, a number of search keyword combinations were implemented as part of the search query. For instance, “religious* Tourism” OR “religious* travel” AND “transform*” OR “life-changing” OR “self-change” OR “self-reflect” OR “personal transformation” OR “identify the life” were used as part of this exercise.

Figure 2 outlines the process followed in this systematic search of the literature on transformational tourism. For each search criteria, the number of scholarly sources found is indicated (e.g. n  = 51). Only books and articles in peer-reviewed journals were considered in this systematic literature search. Editorial articles published in academic journals were not included in the analysis.

Overall, 194 scholarly sources related to transformational tourism were found to have been published between January 1978 and June 2020, following on from a preliminary screening process for validity and applicability to this study. Overall, it was found that scholarly interest in transformational tourism was rather embryonic among tourism scholars until 2007, with a significant growth in research activity between 2018 and 2020, which accounted for more than half of the total available documents, as shown in Figure 3 .

Research topics in transformational tourism

Further analysis of the data ( Figure 4 ) showed that 34 of these scholarly works were in pilgrimage/religious/spiritual tourism, with others related to cultural and heritage tourism (31), ecotourism (27), volunteer tourism (25), wellness/wellbeing/yoga tourism (14), backpacking tourism (9), adventure tourism (7) and dark tourism (5).

A qualitative analysis of keywords used was also performed. This is illustrated in the form of a network visualisation in Figure 5 . The analysis rendered 102 scholarly outputs with the highest level of connection with transformational tourism. This rendered 11 clusters and 364 links, with a total link strength value of 372. Higher weights rendered larger circle labels for “transformation”, “transformative travel”, “tourism development”and “sustainability”. For example, 13 items, including “memorable experience” and “transformational learning”, represented one cluster. On the other hand, 6 items, including “tourist behaviour” and “spiritual tourism”, represented 11 clusters, as shown in Table 1 .

Sources of scholarly works in transformational tourism

The highest proportion of journal articles on transformational tourism was published in Annals of Tourism Research ( Table 2 ). Other journals contributing to this field included, in descending order, Tourism Recreation Research , Journal of Sustainable Tourism , International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage , Current Issues in Tourism and International Journal of Tourism Research . A further 62 scholarly sources were published in a variety of other journals, excluding books and book chapters.

Research focus on transformational tourism

Qualitative research tended to dominate (47%) scholarly works on transformational tourism. This was followed by conceptual approaches (26%). It is noteworthy that only 12% of published journal articles on this topic involved quantitative research, though the lack of appropriate measurement scales and indexes may have influenced this.

A substantial proportion of research related to transformational tourism has tended to focus on aspects related to tourism demand (47%), including tourist behaviour, visitor experiences and transformational processes (e.g. personal and emotional changes, self-transformation). From a supply perspective, research on transformational tourism centred on tourism destinations accounted for 26% of scholarly output, with research focusing on host communities, local stakeholders, entrepreneurs, culture, economic development and environmental impacts accounting for 50 articles. In turn, conceptual research accounted for only 12% of scholarly output, with other categories seemingly rather unexplored, particularly, as regard sustainability (1%).

The 194 scholarly outputs identified by this systematic literature search could be broadly grouped into four themes, namely: tourism experiences; leadership; responsible tourism and the United Nations' sustainable development goals framework.

Tourism experiences

Visitor experiences contribute to the thought processes that result in transformational outcomes for individuals. These experiences may revolve around the socio-cultural exchange, escapism, risk-taking activities, facing challenges, gaining confidence, personal development in new roles and controlling negative emotions such as fear, anger and anxiety. Coghlan and Gooch (2011) have shown that Mezirow's (2000) transformation steps effectively link with these types of experiences well beyond volunteer tourism. Similarly, interaction with local communities at tourism destinations, the development of new relationships and reflecting on a new understanding of social realities around the world have been shown to contribute to these processes in a variety of contexts, including ecotourism ( Walter, 2016 ; Jernsand, 2017 ), voluntourism ( Lee and Woosnam, 2010 ; Coghlan and Gooch, 2011 ; Zavitz and Butz, 2011 ; Alexander, 2012 ; Adams, 2013 or Muller et al. , 2020 ), pilgrimage and spiritual tourism ( Bond et al. , 2015 ; Kurmanilyeva et al. , 2014 ), backpacker tourism ( Bosangit et al ., 2015 ; Yang et al. , 2018 ), wellness, wellbeing and yoga tourism ( Thal and Hudson, 2019 ; Dillette et al. , 2019 ; Voigt et al. , 2011 ; Kim et al. , 2019 ), adventure tourism ( Allman et al. , 2009 ; Gilbert and Gillett, 2014 ), cultural and heritage tourism ( Yamamura et al. , 2006 ; Marschall, 2008 ) and dark tourism ( Sharma and Rickly, 2019 ; Zheng et al. , 2020 ).

Similarly, transformative processes at the individual level have been linked by research studies to visitor experiences where escapism was a key motivation ( Chen et al. , 2014 ; Lochrie et al. , 2019 ), breaking away from daily routines and responsibilities ( Adams, 2013 ), where feelings of personal freedom induced by travel remained at the core of visitors' enjoyment ( O'Reilly, 2006 ). For instance, research by Deville and Wearing (2013) examined ecotourism's transformational potential in the context of organic farms, where budget travellers interacted with local communities over lengthy periods of time, resulting in strong bonds forged with those host communities. Moreover, research by Jernsand (2017) found that there are three aspects affecting the delivery of transformational experiences in tourism. These include embodied and situated learning, relationship building and acknowledging and sharing power that is derived from engaging in development projects. Similarly, Massingham et al. (2019) found that engagement in environmental conservation projects and its experiential elements (e.g. education, encounters with wildlife) were generally associated with participants' emotions, learning, connections and reflective processes.

In a completely different context, dark tourism has often contributed to transformational processes through the delivery of experiences that often generate negative feelings among visitors, even when these negative emotions do not necessarily equate to negative experiences ( Linayage et al. , 2015 ). Dark tourism may in some cases result in visitors being exposed to poverty, hunger or dramatic levels of deprivation, which can have profound emotional impacts on people witnessing these circumstances.

Using generally more positive emotions, scholars have argued that adventure tourism ( Gilbert and Gillet, 2014 ) can also lead to transformative experiences through risk-taking, overcoming personal fears, self-affirmation, teamwork and tourists realising their true potential, even if some scholars would posit that for adventure tourism to deliver truly transformative experiences, it needs to involve extreme situations that take people to the very limits of their emotions ( Allman et al. , 2009 ).

Overall, considering the overall trends that appear to emerge from the transformational tourism literature over the past four decades, scholarly research in this field appears to have shifted from individual transformations among tourists to a different level of understanding of these processes through different types of experiences where interactions with other individuals are beginning to be investigated in more depth, even if the research that takes into account host–visitor relationships remains still nascent. Similarly, from a more theoretical perspective, memorable experiences linked to tourism remain another fertile path for research – see, for instance, Pung et al .'s (2020) conceptual model, particularly, in terms of their measurement (note the transformational tourism experience scale developed by Soulard et al. , 2020 ) and links to various aspects of experience design, including the “disorienting dilemma” first outlined by Mezirow's (1978 , 2000) as a factor that significantly influences the development of transformational experiences. Research by Soulard et al. (2020) , for instance, discovered that this “disorienting dilemma” tends to occur once tourists have returned home, so it is not possible to research it while they are still at their destination of choice.

Leadership is increasingly developing into an emerging research theme in transformational tourism. Scholarly research in this field ( Spicer-Escalante, 2011 ; Robledo and Batle, 2017 ) posits that tourism experiences focusing on personal development, including improved communication, bonding with others, development of self-understanding and self-awareness are elements that tend to contribute to personality traits associated with leadership.

For instance, using Hanson's (2013) leadership development interface model, Cruz (2017) showed that pilgrimage tourism experiences often contain important metaphorical aspects that influence the development of leaders. In fact, Cruz (2017) described pilgrimage as a “foundational symbol for leadership development” (p. 50) as it delivers self-awareness, self-growth and self-understanding as a result of self-reflection.

Similarly, Ross (2019) and Robledo and Batle (2017) used the metaphor of Campbell's archetypal journey adopting transformational tourism as a “hero's journey”. Research by Gilbert and Gillett (2014) echoes this metaphor in their analysis of Mary Shaffer and Barbara Kingscote as horseback adventurers and their achievements in the “frontier stage of adventure” (p. 314), which often involved overcoming fear in order to achieve their goals. The study found that through embodied experiences in adventure tourism such as excitement and thrill based on risk, they were able to de-territorialize themselves.

Responsible tourism

Responsible tourism guides a destination's development and respects its overall tourism system through a balanced focus on its culture, environment, local economy and host community ( United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), 2018 ). In line with this philosophy, responsible tourists tend to be particularly predisposed to protecting the environment and its biodiversity. In turn, for local communities, it is the conservation and development of destinations that are often the priority ( Sin, 2010 ; Woo et al. , 2015 ), particularly with the aim of improving the quality of life of residents ( Lehto et al. , 2020 ), creating an increasingly resilient local economy and capitalising on the advantages of sustainable tourism ( Uysal et al. , 2016 ). However, the longer-term sustainability of a destination relies largely on a combination of responsible visitors and entrepreneurial residents with a good sense of environmental stewardship.

On this front, Ulusoy (2016) argued that “responsible [tourism and consumption] becomes an act of hybrid, of moral, rational, social, and ludic agencies” (p. 284) where tourists partaking in alternative break trips can undergo deep transformational experiences as a result of the acquisition of a sense of empowerment and a broader sense of responsibility. The same study found that participants in transformational experiences tend to develop responsible identities through their development of an organic community, unpretentious fun, embracing the other, developing and using capabilities, overcoming challenges and self-reflection. Ulusoy’s (2015) findings underline that the development of responsible behaviours and identities leads to self-interest and the creation of deep connections with “others”. Walker and Moscardo (2016) took this further within an indigenous tourism context by arguing that responsible tourism should also involve the development of a “sense of place” and a “care of place”. Moreover, they posit that these two spheres have the potential to deliver deeply transformational processes in tourists as well as their host communities, often influenced by periods of critical self-reflection.

Sustainable development (United Nations' sustainable development goals framework)

Transformational tourism has been interpreted by some scholars as a sustainable ambassador ( Lean, 2012 ) by encouraging the empowerment of local communities as well as helping host communities and tourists to reflect on their responsibilities. In line with this, it could be argued that transformational tourism has a role to play in sustainable development.

The tourism sector has been linked to the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals framework and the tourism development report in 2018 ( United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), 2018 ) illustrated five pillars in this respect, namely, sustainable economic growth; social inclusiveness, employment, and poverty reduction; resource efficiency, environmental protection, and climate change; cultural values, diversity and heritage; and mutual understanding, peace and security. Kim et al. (2019) , for instance, illustrate the link between community-based ecotourism and sustainable transformative economies. Similarly, Butcher (2011) highlights that ecotourism has the capability to tackle poverty and address the Millennium Development Goals. Massingham et al. (2019) feature aspects of experiences such as positive and negative emotions, connections, reflections and elements of experiences (animal encounters and educational shows) associated with ecotourism that support different types of conservational engagements. Higgins and Mundine (2008) allude implicitly to aspects of social inclusiveness, poverty reduction and resource efficiency in their analysis of transformative experiences in voluntourism. However, much of this research remains embryonic in terms of its contribution to clear links between transformational tourism and the UN's framework of Sustainable Development Goals.

Discussion and research agenda

As scholarly enquiry related to transformational tourism and, indeed, transformational experiences in this industry ( Teoh et al. , 2021 ) continues to develop, it would appear that an impending sense of Quo Vadis is emerging among researchers in this field. Far from being a sign of philosophical indecisiveness, creative dithering or even – far from it – lack of thought leadership, this may be more a product of the trans-modernity phenomenon first coined by Ghisi (2001) within the context of sustainability and discussed holistically with mesmerising profoundness by Ateljevic (2009 , 2020) . Indeed, in line with Ateljevic's argument, should transformational tourism focus solely on the neurological and psychological changes taking place at the level of the individual, the search for meaning by new generations in a hyperconnected world where, paradoxically, loneliness is on the rise, or the existentialist dilemmas emerging among communities around the world as the fallout of the largest global pandemic in living memory? This section attempts to discuss these issues and potential avenues for new research in transformational tourism adopting a futures-based approach. Inevitably, perhaps, questions are raised with no easy answers, at least not within the current business and management paradigm that dominates much of tourism research today.

Firstly, the concept of what should be classed as “transformative” or “transformational” merits further investigation, particularly, given that transformational thought processes arising from self-reflection are complex and tend to take time ( Coghlan and Weiler, 2018 ), as illustrated in Figure 6 . Similarly, in order for transformation of any given magnitude to take place, is a trigger in the form of, for instance, a memorable experience a pre-requisite? Would this mean that a more ordinary, and arguably less memorable tourism experience, would be unlikely to result in transformative thought processes? Furthermore, if a tourism experience is designed to be “transformational”, how would we evaluate its success given that the time scales associated with self-reflection processes may last several years? Similarly, the output of this transformation may differ among individuals. For some, the transformation may be purely cognitive, whereas, for others, the transformation may result in physical changes and even life-changing actions such as a major career epiphany, a move to a different part of the world (or simply from an urban environment to a more rural location), dietary changes (e.g. embracing vegetarianism) or a radical lifestyle change involving some or all of the above.

Secondly, what type of tourism would be more likely to deliver the type of transformational tourism experiences sought by future generations? So far, scholarly enquiry in this field has tended to favour pilgrimage tourism, backpacker tourism, voluntourism and other forms of tourism often clustered under the general umbrella term of “special interest tourism” (see Weiler and Firth, 2021 for a research agenda for this field). Increasingly, however, slow tourism (see, among others, Caffyn, 2012 ) is likely to develop as a channel for transformational tourism experiences as the world emerges from the current global COVID-19 pandemic. However, although this type of tourism has often been associated with nature-based tourism, urban tourism destinations are likely to become strong competitors for slow tourism over time. Urban tourism destinations will not only develop their nature-based offer in the future, including mega parks (e.g. Buckley et al. , 2021 ), geology-related attractions (e.g. Richards et al. , 2021 ) and urban wildlife (e.g. Simpson et al. , 2021 ), all of which have a positive impact on the mental health of residents and visitors alike. They will increasingly seek to evolve their smart tourism offer towards a different paradigm, coined by Coca-Stefaniak (2020) as “wise tourism cities”, which focusses more on a hybrid approach combining smart technologies and digital detox to trigger neurological processes leading to elusive (and often ephemeral) states of inner peace. Although these events need not result in transformational experiences at all in the short term, the effect of these experiences on visitors and residents alike will become an avenue of scholarly enquiry at various levels, particularly given that the impending Internet of the Senses revolution is poised to widen the array of options available to tourism professionals on this front ( Agapito, 2020 ; Pasolini et al. , 2020 ).

Thirdly, the majority of articles found in this systematic literature review focused on the tourists' perspective, with only a limited number of studies investigating the host and destination perspective ( Isaac, 2017 ; Wanitchakorn and Muangasame, 2021 ). However, transformational experiences embedded in any degree of – albeit contested – authenticity tend to rely on a social context where local host communities play a pivotal role in the delivery of immersive experiences for visitors ( Lehto et al. , 2020 ; Seeler et al. , 2021 ). Meaningful tourism experiences ( McIntosh and Mansfeld, 2006 ; Mason and O'Mahony, 2007 ) sought by new generations of tourists (e.g. Chirakranont and Sakdiyakorn, 2022 ; Wilson and Harris, 2006 ) will increasingly rely on this aspect of transformational tourism, which currently remains under-researched. This search for more meaningful travel may well be one of the trigger points arising from the fallout of the global COVID-19 pandemic, as some scholars have postulated, particularly in the context of sustainable tourism ( Lew et al. , 2020 ; Galvani et al. , 2020 ).

Conclusions

Transformational tourism remains an emerging field in tourism research. This study has provided a systematic analysis of the literature on this topic in terms of its predominant research approaches, focus and perspectives, including the contribution of scholarly works from related fields such as ecotourism, voluntourism, adventure tourism and pilgrimage tourism, among others. Overall, 194 articles have been reviewed spanning a 42-year period from 1978 until 2020. Most research in transformational tourism appears to adopt a demand-led focus, with scholarly enquiry adopting a host community perspective in need of further development. Similarly, in spite of the growing links between leadership development and transformational experiences or the parallels between transformational tourism and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals framework, these two aspects of scholarly enquiry remain under-researched. Moreover, the need for a tourism system-based approach to the analysis of transformational tourism processes is argued in this study with a framework suggested for further research in this field that considers the role of time in the development of transformational tourism experiences as well as a potential continuum in this process that also involves more “standard” or “ordinary” tourism experiences as well as memorable ones. Accordingly, recommendations for further research in transformational tourism are offered adopting a tourism futures approach to elicit not only the shorter-term impacts that the on-going global COVID-19 pandemic will have on the dynamics of tourism and travel but also longer-term trends, including the growing search among new generations of tourists for meaningful experiences, where local communities play an active role.

Systematic literature search process

Systematic literature review process with selection criteria

Growth in transformational tourism publications between 1978 and 2020

Articles in transformational tourism by topic (absolute numbers for 1978–2020 period)

VOS viewer network visualisation of themes related to transformational tourism research

Conceptual framework for future research in transformational tourism

Keyword co-occurrence

Sources (peer-reviewed journals) of transformational tourism articles

Abbas , J. , Mubeen , R. , Iorember , P.T. , Raza , S. and Mamirkulova , G. ( 2021 ), “ Exploring the impact of COVID-19 on tourism: transformational potential and implications for a sustainable recovery of the travel and leisure industry ”, Current Research in Behavioral Sciences , Vol.  2 , 100033 .

Adams , A.E. ( 2013 ), “ The pilgrimage transformed: how to decompartmentalize US volunteer tourism in central America ”, in Borland , K. and Adams , A.E. (Eds), International Volunteer Tourism , Palgrave Macmillan , New York , pp.  157 - 169 .

Agapito , D. ( 2020 ), “ The senses in tourism design: a bibliometric review ”, Annals of Tourism Research , Vol.  83 , 102934 .

Alexander , Z. ( 2012 ), “ International volunteer tourism experience in South Africa: an investigation into the impact on the tourist ”, Journal of Hospitality Marketing and Management , Vol.  21 No.  7 , pp.  779 - 799 .

Allman , T.L. , Mittelstaedt , R.D. , Martin , B. and Goldenberg , M. ( 2009 ), “ Exploring the motivations of BASE jumpers: extreme sport enthusiasts ”, Journal of Sport and Tourism , Vol.  14 No.  4 , pp.  229 - 247 .

Assaf , A.G. , Kock , F. and Tsionas , M. ( 2022 ), “ Tourism during and after COVID-19: an expert-informed agenda for future research ”, Journal of Travel Research , Vol.  61 No.  2 , pp.  454 - 457 .

Ateljevic , I. ( 2009 ), “ Transmodernity: remaking our (tourism) world? ”, Philosophical Issues in Tourism , Channel View Publications , London , pp.  278 - 302 .

Ateljevic , I. ( 2020 ), “ Transforming the (tourism) world for good and (re) generating the potential ‘new normal ”, Tourism Geographies , Vol.  22 No.  3 , pp.  467 - 475 .

Bond , N. , Packer , J. and Ballantyne , R. ( 2015 ), “ Exploring visitor experiences, activities and benefits at three religious tourism sites ”, International Journal of Tourism Research , Vol.  17 , pp.  471 - 481 .

Bosangit , C. , Hibbert , S. and McCabe , S. ( 2015 ), “ ‘If I was going to die I should at least be having fun’: travel blogs, meaning and tourist experience ”, Annals of Tourism Research , Vol.  55 , pp.  1 - 14 .

Bruner , M.E. ( 1991 ), “ Transformation self in tourism ”, Annals of Tourism Research , Vol.  18 , pp.  238 - 250 .

Buckley , R. , Zhong , L. and Martin , S. ( 2021 ), “ Mental health key to tourism infrastructure in China's new megapark ”, Tourism Management , Vol.  82 , 104169 .

Butcher , J. ( 2011 ), “ Can ecotourism contribute to tackling poverty? The importance of ‘symbiosis’ ”, Current Issues in Tourism , Vol.  14 No.  3 , pp.  295 - 307 .

Caffyn , A. ( 2012 ), “ Advocating and implementing slow tourism ”, Tourism Recreation Research , Vol.  37 No.  1 , pp.  77 - 80 .

Chen , G. , Bao , J. and Huang , S. ( 2014 ), “ Segmenting Chinese backpackers by travel motivations ”, International Journal of Tourism Research , Vol.  16 , pp.  355 - 367 .

Chirakranont , R. and Sakdiyakorn , M. ( 2022 ), “ Conceptualizing meaningful tourism experiences: case study of a small craft beer brewery in Thailand ”, Journal of Destination Marketing and Management , Vol.  23 , 100691 .

Coca-Stefaniak , J.A. ( 2020 ), “ Beyond smart tourism cities–towards a new generation of ‘wise’ tourism destinations ”, Journal of Tourism Futures , Vol.  7 No.  2 , pp. 251 - 258 , doi: 10.1108/JTF-11-2019-0130 .

Coghlan , A. and Gooch , M. ( 2011 ), “ Applying a transformative learning framework to volunteer tourism ”, Journal of Sustainable Tourism , Vol.  19 No.  6 , pp.  713 - 728 .

Coghlan , A. and Weiler , B. ( 2018 ), “ Examining transformative processes in volunteer tourism ”, Current Issues in Tourism , Vol.  21 No.  5 , pp.  567 - 582 .

Cruz , J. ( 2017 ), “ Pilgrimage in leadership ”, International Journal of Religious Tourism and Pilgrimage , Vol.  5 No.  2 , pp.  50 - 54 .

Davis , J. , Mengersen , K. , Bennett , S. and Mazerolle , L. ( 2014 ), “ Viewing systematic reviews and meta-analysis in social research through difference lenses ”, Springer Plus , Vol.  3 No.  511 , pp.  1 - 9 .

Deville , A. and Wearing , S. ( 2013 ), “ WWWOOFing tourists: beaten tracks and transformational paths ”, in Reisinger , Y. (Ed.), Transformational Tourism: Tourist Perspectives , CABI , Oxfordshire , pp.  151 - 168 .

Dillette , A.K. , Douglas , A.C. and Andrzejewski , C. ( 2019 ), “ Yoga tourism- a catalyst for transformation? ”, Annals of Leisure Research , Vol.  22 No.  1 , pp.  22 - 41 .

Galvani , A. , Lew , A.A. and Perez , M.S. ( 2020 ), “ COVID-19 is expanding global consciousness and the sustainability of travel and tourism ”, Tourism Geographies , Vol.  22 No.  3 , pp.  567 - 576 .

Ghisi , M.L. ( 2001 ), Au-delà de la modernité, du patriarcat et du capitalisme , L'Harmattan , Paris .

Gilbert , M. and Gillett , J. ( 2014 ), “ Into the mountains and across the country: emergent forms of equine adventure leisure in Canada ”, Society and Leisure , Vol.  37 No.  2 , pp.  313 - 325 .

Guttentag , D. ( 2019 ), “ Transformative experiences via Airbnb: is it the guests or the host communities that will be transformed? ”, Journal of Tourism Futures , Vol.  5 No.  2 , pp.  179 - 184 .

Hanson , B. ( 2013 ), “ The leadership development interface: aligning leaders and organizations toward more effective leadership learning ”, Advances in Developing Human Resources , Vol.  15 No.  1 , pp.  106 - 120 .

Higgins , D.F. and Mundine , R.G. ( 2008 ), “ Absences in the volunteer tourism phenomenon: the right to travel, solidarity tours and transformation beyond the one-way ”, in Lyon , K. and Wearing , S. (Eds), Journeys of Discovery in Volunteer Tourism , CABI , Cambridge , pp.  182 - 194 .

Hobson , P. and Welbourne , L. ( 1998 ), “ Adult development and transformative learning ”, International Journal of Lifelong Education , Vol.  17 No.  2 , pp.  72 - 86 .

Isaac , R.K. ( 2017 ), “ Transformational host communities: justice tourism and the water regime in Palestine ”, Tourism Culture and Communication, Cognizant Communication Corporation , Vol.  17 No.  2 , pp.  139 - 158 .

Jernsand , E.M. ( 2017 ), “ Engagement as transformation: learnings from a tourism development project in Dunga by Lake Victoria, Kenya ”, Action Research , Vol.  15 No.  1 , pp.  81 - 99 .

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Experience Tourism as a Smart and Sustainable Form of Tourism in the Twenty-First Century

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• Lubica Sebova 2 ,
• Radka Marcekova 2 ,
• Ivana Simockova 2 &
• Kristina Pompurova 2  

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Experience tourism is a form of tourism in which participants are motivated to seek experiences that are different from everyday life. It has two extreme approaches. The first is seeking and experiencing social contacts and contact with nature and cultural environments, which supports sustainable development of the destination, and the second is seeking experiences within attractions. Experiential tourism is associated with a personal and subjective experience in which main attribute is interactivity. Experience tourism can be distinguished from traditional tourism by the fact that it engages all human senses. In experience tourism, it is important to place greater emphasis on reconciling the economic, social and environmental objectives of the destination in order to ensure its sustainable development. It is essential that visitor gains unforgettable experiences, i.e., different from everyday life. The aim of this paper is to examine the supply and demand of experiential tourism products in a selected region with respect to smart and sustainable tourism development. Promoted visitor experience can be an important tool for destination marketing communication in the twenty-first century. If the destinations want to be competitive in a dynamically developing tourism market, the must adapt to this situation and offer the visitors an unforgettable authentic experience in smart and sustainable way. The goal is to create an offer that allows the visitors to actively engage in tourism activities and thus to intensify their emotions.

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Acknowledgements

This research was funded by the Scientific Grant Agency of the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport of Slovak Republic VEGA, grant number 1/0368/20 “Sharing economy as an opportunity for sustainable and competitive development of tourist destinations in Slovakia”.

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Sebova, L., Marcekova, R., Simockova, I., Pompurova, K. (2023). Experience Tourism as a Smart and Sustainable Form of Tourism in the Twenty-First Century. In: Katsoni, V. (eds) Tourism, Travel, and Hospitality in a Smart and Sustainable World. IACuDiT 2022. Springer Proceedings in Business and Economics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-26829-8_12

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Moscow metro to be more tourist-friendly

A new floor sign system at the Moscow metro's Pushkinskaya station. Source: Vladimir Pesnya / RIA Novosti

For many years now, Moscow has lagged behind St. Petersburg when it comes to making life easy for tourists, especially where getting around the city is concerned. Whereas the northern capital installed English-language maps, signs and information points throughout its subway system in the late 2000s, the Russian capital’s metro remained a serious challenge for foreign visitors to navigate.

Recent visitors to Moscow may have noticed some signs that change is afoot, however. In many stations of the Moscow subway, signs have appeared on the floor – with large lettering in Russian and English – indicating the direction to follow in order to change lines. Previously, foreign visitors using the Moscow metro had to rely solely upon deciphering the Russian-language signs hanging from the ceilings.

Student volunteers help tourists find their way in Moscow

However, this new solution has a significant drawback. “The floor navigation is visible only to a small stream of people – fewer than three people per meter. During peak hours, this navigation will simply not be noticed,” said Konstantin Trofimenko, Director of the Center for Urban Transportation Studies.

One of the biggest problems for tourists in the Russian capital remains the absence of English translations of the names of subway stations in the station vestibules and on platforms. The Department of Transportation in Moscow has not commented yet as to when this problem will be solved. However, Latin transliterations of station names can already be found in the subway cars themselves.

Finding the right exit

At four of the central stations – Okhotny Ryad, Teatralnaya, Ploshchad Revolyutsii, Lubyanka and Kuznetsky Most – the city authorities have now installed colorful stands at the exits with schematic diagrams of the station’s concourse and surrounding area, which provide information about the main attractions and infrastructural facilities.

The schematic diagrams are the work of British specialists from the City ID and Billings Jackson Design firms, who have already implemented successful projects in New York and London.

According to Alexei Novichkov, expert at the Design Laboratory at the Higher School of Economics, the design of these information booths raises no objections: The color solutions, font, layout and icons are consistent with international standards.

However, the stands do have some shortcomings. “Many questions are raised about the fact that the developers of these maps did not apply orientation to the north, and have provided layouts of the surrounding areas with respect to the exits,” says Novichkov. “A system like that is used for road navigators, but most of the ‘paper’ guides and maps are oriented strictly to north. The subway map is also oriented to north, so people may become confused.”

Muscovites and foreign visitors are generally positive about these navigation elements, with most of them citing the numbered exits from the subway as the most useful feature.

The fact is that many Moscow subway stations have several exits. One of the busiest central stations of the Moscow subway in particular, Kitay-Gorod, has more than a dozen exits. Previously, these exits were differentiated from each other only with signs in Russian referring to the names of streets and places of interest to which they led – making it easy for tourists and those with poor navigation skills to get confused.

Now, when making an appointment to meet a friend, instead of struggling to find the right spot when they tell you: “I'll meet you at the exit to Solyanka Street,” you can just propose to meet under a specific exit number.

“I’ve lived in Moscow for seven years,” says Angelika, a designer from Voronezh, “but I still don’t always know where to go to find the place I need, so the new schematic diagrams will be very useful. Previously, some subway stations had maps, but not with so much detail.”

Teething problems

Foreigners, meanwhile, focus their attention on other elements. “It is good that the new information boards have QR-codes, which can be ‘read’ by smartphones,” says Florentina, a writer from Vienna. But there are also shortcomings. “The English font of the information on posters and in the captions to theaters and museums is too small – you have to come very close to see it well,” she says.

Pleasant encounters on the streets of Moscow

Florentina was also dissatisfied with the fact that such posters are not provided at all subway stations: “When I was trying to find Tsaritsyno Park (a museum and reserve in the south of Moscow) at a subway station with the same name, it turned out to be quite difficult,” she says.

“There are no maps with landmarks for other areas, such as those already in the city center. There were no clear pointers in the English language, and the passers-by I met did not speak in English, so they could not help me,” she adds.

Officials say that the navigation system is gradually being redeveloped and improved. According to Darya Chuvasheva, a press representative for the Department of Transport of Moscow, the introduction of a unified navigation system will take place in stages.

“By the end of 2014, the system will first appear on the first subway stations on the Circle Line. By the end of 2015, we plan to install the system at all major stopping points, subway stations and transport interchange hubs,” says Chuvasheva.

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“We don’t usually have this kind of tourism — it’s not common,” said Edgar Augusto González-Zatarain, the mayor of Mazatlán, Mexico. “Nature is giving us this opportunity, and we have to take advantage of it.”

Various indicators suggest the eclipse will bolster the economies in the path of totality, a roughly 110-mile-wide belt that will stretch from Mazatlán to Montreal. Hertz said car reservations had jumped 3,000 percent from a year ago. Airbnb has reported a 1,000 percent increase in searches for listings. In Oklahoma, the Choctaw Nation had seen a 200 percent increase as of mid-March in reservations at its resorts and casinos.

Mazatlán has long relied heavily on its port and fisheries, but the beach town has had growth in tourism, which now accounts for 80 percent of its economy. Still, it is often overshadowed by other Mexican resort towns and has had recent instances of cartel violence that may spook tourists. Mazatlán will experience the eclipse longer than many other cities, at more than four minutes. Hotels there are fully booked, and officials expect 120,000 visitors and an economic output of 500 million pesos (about $30 million).

Indianapolis is expecting roughly 100,000 visitors for the eclipse, said Chris Gahl, the chief executive of the city’s tourism marketing organization, who estimates the visitors will bring in $28 million to $48 million for the city. The city is used to hosting major events — including this year’s N.B.A. All-Star Game and the N.F.L.’s scouting combine — but the eclipse is a chance for the city to promote more of its arts and culture scene.

“We view hosting and being in the path of totality as an opportunity to diversify and broaden the audiences that might consider visiting Indy,” Mr. Gahl said.

Tourism officials in Austin, Texas, reported higher-than-usual hotel occupancy rates for the weekend before and the day of the eclipse. The city has the highest hotel inventory per capita in the state and is used to handling large influxes of tourists for events like South by Southwest and the Formula 1 United States Grand Prix.

“Our city is very much prepared and very experienced with large events and large influxes of people coming into the city,” said Wesley Lucas, a spokeswoman for Austin’s tourism marketing organization.

Bulent Temel, an economics professor at the University of Texas at San Antonio, estimated that eclipse tourism would add $285 million to the state’s economy. In an opinion essay, he called the event “ the most profitable 22 minutes in Texas history .”

But towns in the Texas Hill Country, which offers a better view of the eclipse, are far less accustomed to such events. Kerrville, a town of roughly 25,000, is preparing for its population to more than triple, town officials said.

The tourist-attracting event also presents a potential nuisance for public safety. Business owners and town officials have been preparing for several years, drawing on the experiences of the 2017 eclipse.

“This is going to be a great big economic shot in the arm for us,” said William Thomas, the emergency management coordinator for Kerr County, which includes Kerrville. “At the same time, it’s also going to be a tremendous drain on resources.”

Doug Hetzler, the manager of Gibson’s Discount Center in Kerrville, said his store was staying open longer during the week leading up to the eclipse and stocking its shelves with Moon Pies and wind chimes.

Mr. Hetzler said the store would offer a deal for tourists looking for precious space to park their cars during the event: Parking costs $50, but if you spend $100 in the store, you get that $50 back.

Mr. Hetzler hopes that the eclipse, more than creating a financial windfall, gives visitors a lasting impression of a town — and an old-time store — that they otherwise might not visit.

“Our opportunity is really to expose people to a store like this and a culture like this,” he said.

Santul Nerkar is a reporter covering business and sports. More about Santul Nerkar

J. Edward Moreno is a business reporter at The Times. More about J. Edward Moreno

Things to Do in Elektrostal, Russia - Elektrostal Attractions

Things to do in elektrostal.

• 5.0 of 5 bubbles
• 4.0 of 5 bubbles & up
• Good for a Rainy Day
• Good for Kids
• Good for Big Groups
• Adventurous
• Budget-friendly
• Hidden Gems
• Good for Couples
• Honeymoon spot
• Good for Adrenaline Seekers
• Things to do ranked using Tripadvisor data including reviews, ratings, photos, and popularity.

1. Electrostal History and Art Museum

2. Statue of Lenin

3. Park of Culture and Leisure

4. museum and exhibition center.

5. Museum of Labor Glory

7. Galereya Kino

8. viki cinema, 9. smokygrove.

10. Gandikap

11. papa lounge bar, 12. karaoke bar.

• Statue of Lenin
• Electrostal History and Art Museum
• Park of Culture and Leisure
• Museum and Exhibition Center
• Museum of Labor Glory

My son was feeling left behind. What kids with autistic siblings want you to know.

My son has taught me that sometimes the greatest need isn't right before our eyes. sometimes the greatest need lies deep within the kid who seems just fine..

Today, on National Siblings Day and in the middle of Autism Acceptance Month , I'd like to bring our attention to a group of kids we mark as resilient, whose silent retreat, I fear, we may be mistaking for strength.

These kids, the amazing siblings to autistic children , are so full of understanding and grace, but that doesn't mean there isn't also pain.

Naturally a parent's attention goes to the child struggling most, and just as naturally, the sibling of a disabled child will fall into place to accommodate those same needs while receiving subtle messaging over time that there may not be a lot of space for their own.

"We tend to forget that siblings go through these feelings and stages of grief," Tara Reynolds , mom of two and a fierce autism advocate , shared with me on Monday evening.

Here's what our boys, both siblings to autistic children, had to share.

Brothers who still need mothers

Reynolds has a son close in age to my own. Henry, 13, has a 6-year-old autistic brother, Robby. It's just the two of them at home. Calvin, 12, is the second oldest of my four. My oldest, Lily, is autistic, diagnosed at 3 years old. Henry and Calvin are some of the most amazing humans this world will ever know. Tara and I agree on that.

"Not a lot of children experience that type of growth at this level before age 13," Reynolds shared, referring to how our children have had to watch their siblings struggle and make accommodations for them on their own.

"Henry never makes my husband, his brother or I feel guilty at all," she shared. "He always is so supportive of what Robby might need in order to have a good day."

Calvin, too, has worked hard to help his sister cope over the years. But as he's gotten older, he's been able to communicate that he doesn't want to be left to figure life out when I only have space to act as a buffer between Lily and her hard day.

Calvin has taught me that sometimes the greatest need isn't right before my eyes. Sometimes the greatest need lies deep within the kid who seems just fine.

We cannot forget them.

Hold me, too

I have held my son many times the past year as he's let out heavy cries. It's been harder for him to keep big feelings inside post-divorce as he's been given more tools to process hard things. As he's processed some of the bigger things, topics like this have been easier for him to address.

We sat down this week to talk about what he may want to say about growing up alongside Lily.

"You just have to focus on her a lot," he shared with me. "Like, if she's stimming when I'm trying to show you something, you have to focus on that first," Calvin said.

I asked him the biggest positive to his experience growing up with an autistic sibling, to which he said, "Well, you learn how (autistic people) feel."

"But do you feel there needs to be more care around how you feel?" I asked him.

"Well, yeah," he shared, "But I just hope that families like ours won't give more care to kids like me over their autistic children because they feel their lives aren't worth it."

And that is just like Calvin to say.

To parents of a newly-diagnosed child: One day you will bake a cake

'I try to find the joy in the little things'

Before Henry's autistic brother, Robby, was born, he was an only child for seven years, Reynolds shared with me.

"We did all the typical things that now seem like a lifetime ago," she said. As Robby began to grow, he began to elope, and he has "sensory aversions to some environments," Reynolds said. "It’s such a small thing, but when all of those missed restaurant family dinners, Target runs and sleepovers add up, I feel like I’m not giving Henry everything he deserves in a childhood."

Henry has learned, just as Calvin has, that his sibling's needs "might come first the majority of the time."

"And even though we try so hard for him not to feel like his aren’t as important, it can definitely feel like that to him sometimes," Reynolds shared.

"Henry has seen his brother struggle during meltdowns or difficult situations that his body can’t control," Reynolds said. "Processing those feelings isn’t easy on anyone, let alone a young child who has had to do this for years."

Henry, just like Calvin, has seen some tough days, but he, just like Calvin, has seen a beautiful relationship unfold between he and his autistic sibling over the years.

Henry had a few words of his own to share for National Siblings Day.

"I try to find the joy in the little things with Rob," he shared. "Like playing outside, jumping on the trampoline or swimming, because seeing his smile lights up my day."

As for the hardest part, Henry longs to know his brother in a deeper way. "He knows how much it makes me happy that he's happy. He shows me in his own way, but I wish I could talk to him," he said.

Fostering connection

"I just want you to pay attention to me," Calvin told me at the end of our conversation Monday. And I think, if anything, this is what us parents need to hear.

When I weed through my day-to-day moments, I feel that I am a present mom, and he agrees, but also stresses that his pain comes from the moments when he is reaching, and I cannot choose him, because in that moment, I am acting as that buffer between Lily and her hard day.

Because Calvin is patient, because he is gracious, because he is understanding and kind, I did not see his retreat when it happened, not until the kitchen conversations about his day dwindled down to nothing and the "mom, want to watch a show together?" stopped.

His limbs may not be flailing. His voice may not be wailing. He may not seem visibly distressed.

But he needs me to come to his rescue.

And so I do now. Every night. I've created a little more space to reach back – no matter what noises are coming from upstairs.

You can follow Tara Reynold's family's journey here and her online store promoting messages of acceptance here . You can follow my family's journey here .

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Solar eclipse 2024: Follow the path of totality

Solar eclipse, how to help your kids enjoy the solar eclipse.

The NPR Network

Getting your kids ready to enjoy the eclipse? If you've got curious kiddos enjoying the eclipse today, here are some resources from the NPR Network to help get the most out of the experience:

Eclipse learning guide for kids via Vermont Public

• Pre-K to Grade 2
• Grade 3 to 5
• Grade 6 to 12

Amy Nickell with Dallas Arboretum helps Dani Turin, 5, look down the ruler at the sun and the moon to see the perspective of the eclipse Monday at Dallas Cotton Bowl Stadium. Yfat Yossifor/KERA hide caption

Amy Nickell with Dallas Arboretum helps Dani Turin, 5, look down the ruler at the sun and the moon to see the perspective of the eclipse Monday at Dallas Cotton Bowl Stadium.

Not able to get outside? Stream totality with your kiddo .

• WATCH: The difference between a solar and a lunar eclipse from KERA Kids
• LISTEN: has a new episode out about solar eclipses from But Why , Vermont Public's podcast for curious kids

Kid at heart? The Texas Standard has tips from Bill Nye on the best ways to enjoy the eclipse .

Do some color-based experimentation! The celestial phenomena can alter the way we see colors, so keep an eye on reds and greens and how they change over the course of totality!

• What do I do if my kid won't keep their eclipse glasses on?
• How can I make sure my eclipse glasses are legit?
• Simple tips to safely photograph the eclipse with your cellphone

And be prepared: As we found with kids who enjoyed the eclipse in 2017 , little ones may totally forget this celestial experience, so don't sweat it too much!

NPR will be sharing highlights from across the NPR Network throughout the day if you're unable to get out and see it in real time.

NPR's Emily Alfin Johnson produced this piece.