1,721,007 research outputs found
From culinary heritage to foodie destinations in the Mediterranean perspective: Key trends and insights for theory and practice
No full textIntroduction: Post Covid-19 tourism: a pathway towards sustainable development in the Mediterranean Region
No full textSpecial issue of European journal of tourism research “smart tourism destinations: Advancing theory and practice”
No full textA process-based perspective of smart tourism destination governance
No full textThe tourism management literature has recently shown increasing interest in exploring the potential offered by the smart tourism destination initiative, conceived as the integrated use of ICT solutions for achieving greater efficiency and sustainability, enriching the tourist experience and boosting destination competitiveness. However, innovative technologies risk to be ineffective without adequate governance structures that are required to ensure the effective coordination and integration of tourism firms, government and communities in implementing a holistic smart-oriented development plan for destinations. This paper aims to integrate the recent smart approach with the destination governance theory to develop a governance process framework for smart tourism destinations. The framework explains how the smart approach can inform the planning and implementation of smart development goals, and specifically how smartness principles, tools and methods can be applied to increase the sustainable competitiveness of destinations beyond the mere technology dimension, making explicit the role of collaborative structures, user-driven services, social innovation and local community involvement. At the theoretical level, the paper offers an integrative perspective for designing and implementing effective smart tourism destination governance structures and processes. In practical terms, the framework can be viewed as a flexible tool in the hands of destination managers and policy makers: it shows how to match the design of governance structures and processes with the specific destination context and how to exploit “smart dimensions” for its development by relying on an incremental logic based on subsequent, interdependent stages
Leveraging Smart Open Innovation for Achieving Cultural Sustainability: Learning from a New City Museum Project
No full textIn recent years, cultural sustainability has attracted increasing attention within the discourse of sustainable development and sustainable cities. Notwithstanding some effort put on conceptualizing the relationship between culture and sustainability, research on the issue is still in a pre-paradigmatic stage and related empirical studies are scant. In particular, further knowledge is required to understand not only how cultural sustainability has been addressed strategically but also implemented in practice. In this direction, research has pointed out the role of social structures (e.g., partnerships, collaborations, etc.) for achieving cultural sustainability goals. However, focusing on smart cities, attention is limited to how collaborative arrangements can be leveraged within the development of new city services (e.g., smart open innovation) to sustain goals of environmental, economic and social sustainability, with cultural sustainability still playing a marginal role. This paper develops a new framework linking together the strategic level and the practice level in addressing cultural sustainability and conceptualizing the role of collaborative structures in the development of smart innovation. The framework is then used as a frame of reference for analyzing the case of MuseoTorino, a new city museum realized within the smart city strategy of Turin (Italy). The analysis provides evidence of some practices adopted to leverage collaboration and stakeholders' engagement to strategically address cultural sustainability and to realize it in practice throughout the new service development process
Tourism Studies on the Mediterranean Region (Vol.2) "Tourism, Hospitality and Culture 4.0: shifting towards the metaverse"
No full textThe emergence and uprise of technologies 4.0, including Internet of Things, Big Data Analytics, Location-based Services, Artificial intelligence, Blockchain, Robots, Virtual Assistant, Chatbots, Augmented Reality, Virtual Reality, Mixed Reality, etc., have been transforming both how businesses operate and the customer experience in all sectors, with tourism, hospitality and culture not being an exception (e.g., Hoyer et al., 2020; Ivanov et al., 2020; Stankov & Gretzel, 2020). The key role of these technologies have become even more evident since the COVID-19 pandemic (Yung et al., 2021), when they have been successfully adopted to mitigate the effects generated by this health-related crisis on organizations and to keep in touch with customers while guaranteeing hygiene, promoting social distancing (e.g., Del Chiappa et al., 2021) and providing them with personalized experiences (e.g., Gursoy & Chi, 2020; Ivanov et al 2020; Seyitoğlu & Ivanov, 2020), also remotely (Lau, 2020). Based on current research, the rapid and massive digital transformation that has been occurring in the last few years, put at risk a human-centric experience design perspective which, in turn, harms the chance to support transformations towards wellbeing and sustainability (e.g., Stankov & Gretzel, 2020) and challenges individuals in their ability to cope with this technological injection at mental, physical and cultural level. The analysis of the opportunities and threats deriving from these technologies has gained huge and growing attention in both the Accademia and the industry. Despite that, a number of issues related to this research area still need to be further explored and looked at in detail. For example, although several studies have hitherto showed the advantages and disadvantages of Artificial Intelligence (AI) (e.g., Ivanov et al., 2020; Techlabs, 2017; Wilson et al., 2017), additional research is needed on the role of AI in tourism, looking at the actual financial e non-financial costs and benefits of an AI and robotized based business models. Cross-sectional research focused on the customer acceptance of AI technologies (e.g., Ivanov et al., 2018) should be complemented by longitudinal studies, also adopting a multi-service and multi-cultural perspective (Lu et al., 2019; Tuomi et al., 2021), in order to develop new interpretive models of such a rapidly evolving technological scenario (e.g., Lin et al 2020). Moreover, additional research might be needed to: identify new constructs in the context of AI robot interactivity and consumer perceptions, attitudes, trust, and reactions (e.g. Belanche et al., 2020; Go et al. 2020; Tussyadiah et al., 2020); investigate the role of customer relationship orientation of robot influences (Qiu et al., 2020) and the extent to which consumers are willing to pay for a robotized-based experience (Ivanov & Webster, 2021), etc. An extensive number of studies have been devoted to analysing the acceptance of Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) in different settings (e.g., Vishwakarma et al., 2020; Han et al., 2019; tom Dieck & Jung, 2018; Jung et al., 2018). However, deeper knowledge is still needed about the adoption of augmented reality wearable devices (Han et al., 2019a) and the array of subjective, objective and contextual factors that might influence their acceptance (tom Dieck & Jung, 2018). Mainly focusing on consumers, existing literature has analyzed the influence of VR, AR and Mixed Reality (MR) on tourist’s decision making and related responses, and their role in enhancing the consumption experience and the advertisement efforts (e.g., Buonincontri et al, 2017; Han et al. 2019; Trunfio & Campana, 2020; Israel et al., 2019; Leung et al., 2020; Zeng et al., 2020; Lo et al., 2020). However, future studies should investigate the perceived value of VR and AR based on a multiple stakeholders-based perspective also acknowledging the views of other actors, such as managers, local councils, and policy makers (tom Dieck & Jung, 2017). Furthermore, studies relying on innovative methods, such as those based on recording biometric/physiological parameters (e.g., skin conductance responses, hearth rate variability) or brain activities (e.g., electroencephalographic, EEG), would be needed to effectively capture the ebb and flow of consumers’ emotions and to more precisely measure their effects on individual responses (Han et al., 2019b). Yet, there is a need to carry out more studies adopting an interdisciplinary (Hoyer et al., 2020) and multidisciplinary perspective (Yung & Khoo-Lattimore, 2019) to gain a better understanding about key topics including software development, user interfaces and user movement within the virtualized environment (Beck et al., 2019). Again, further studies might address the characteristics of different segments of tourists experiencing tourism attractions through VR applications, also considering other visitor-based (e.g., personality), technology related (e.g., visual appeal) and/or social variables (e.g., as social presence) that could exert a significant role in shaping a VR-mediated experience (Errichiello et al., 2019). Finally, despite literature has quite recently started to analyse the influence of VR on the perceived authenticity of the experience (e.g., Atzeni et al., 2021), further room for investigation exist in this regard (Yung & Khoo-Lattimore, 2019). For example, it would be useful to understand the role that the perceived authenticity, as elicited by a virtualized experience, might have in shaping experience memorability and in incentivising short-term online behaviour such as intensification and content generation (Atzeni et al., 2021).
Digital and virtual world development are now facing the challenge of moving from a set of sophisticated and independent immersive environments to an integrated network of 3D virtual words, the so-called “Metaverse”. The metaverse is a network of interconnected experience and applications, devices and product tools and infrastructure generating a “new” world where everyday life and economic-related activities are conducted by virtual avatars, replacing individuals in reality, interacting among them and with 3D digital objects in a complex manner that mimics the real world (Kim, 2021). Research has shed light on the main features of the metaverse, such as realism, ubiquity, interoperability and scalability (Dionisio et al 2013). It is quite evident that this innovative network of 3D virtual words has the potential to significantly alter the dynamics of the tourism and travel sector creating opportunities for new companies, products and services and challenging all the elements of tourism and related marketing dynamics (e.g. customer journey, proliferation of touch pints, targeting, etc.) giving value to “experience of interest” rather than “physical point of interest” and creating even greater need for sophisticate data analytics. Yet, it represents a completely unexplored research area that future studies should develop by adopting both supply and demand-side perspectives
Tourism Studies on the Mediterranean Region (Vol.3) "Evolving the perspectives on the value of gastronomy for Mediterranean destination development"
No full textGastronomy has always been closely linked with tourism. Travellers at first re-garded food on holiday as a necessity and a secondary element of regional cul-ture to enjoy during culinary experiences at restaurants (Hall and Mitchell, 2001; Quan and Wang, 2004). With the expansion of global travel, gastronomy became a significant asset to attract tourists to specific destinations and offer them en-gaging, novel and memorable experiences (Richards, 2021). Gastronomy tour-ism, therefore, gained increasing attention within the academia (Hjalager and Richards, 2002; Ellis et al., 2018) and among tourism suppliers, food producers and policymakers (OECD, 2012; UNWTO, 2012). The growing interest from trav-ellers – boosted since 2010 – led to an increasing sophistication of the gastro-nomic practice. New proposals and attractions appeared in the market, changing the way of experiencing local gastronomy, which was limited to purchasing food, tastings and visits to local producers (Garibaldi, 2017; Richards, 2021). Today, gastronomy tourism encompasses a variety of experiences that deal with pleas-ure (Therkelsen, 2015), socialisation (Fernandes, 2021), involvement (Garibaldi, 2021), and learning (Ignatov and Smith, 2006). They allow travellers to gain knowledge of the cultural, social, and economic practices related to the produc-tion and consumption of food and, definitively, to get a sense of the place and the society. We should consider gastronomy tourism a more varied and dynamic set of experiences based on the place's unique (food and non-food) aspects con-tinuously evolving through the interactions between the travellers and the local community.
In the last three years, the tourist's consumption has changed. The COVID-19 pandemic, the changed geopolitical context, the inflationary pressure and the higher cost of living have led consumers to adapt their holiday plans and seek new travel options (Booking.com, 2022; American Express Travel, 2023; Ernst and Young, 2023). Gastronomic proposals are still among the preferred experi-ences while travelling. For example, enjoying natural/rural landscapes and gas-tronomic experiences are the two most preferred activities by European tourists for their holidays between June and November 2023 (European Travel Commis-sion, 2023).
Given the current (and evolving) evolving scenario, where does the future of gas-tronomy tourism lie? By reviewing the academic literature and market studies (see Garibaldi, 2023a), we can identify four major driving forces that will shape the discourses of this practice
Behavioural Decision-Making and Network Dynamics: A Political Perspective
No full textThe blurring of organizational boundaries and the adoption of networks as a prominent form of governance have largely contributed to reinforcing interdependence between internal and external organizational networks as well as between formal and informal ties. This chapter tries to broaden existing theoretical models in order to explain the behavioral decision-making process of the firm and how it is shaped by the complex and interactive dynamics of these networks. The theoretical perspective employed in the chapter suggests that a firm’s behavior is influenced by organizational politics. Although this actually does not constitute a fresh perspective within organizational and management studies, in this chapter it is revamped and widened in light of the mentioned changes within and across firms’ organizational boundaries. The starting point of our discussion is March’s seminal work (March in Journal of Politics 24(4):662–678, 1962) and his model of “the business firm as a political coalition”. Subsequently, drawing also on later organizational politics literature we show the limits and opportunities of adopting such an imagery not only for the traditional business firm but also for the contemporary network organization: through it we can improve our understanding of how organizational boundaries are defined today, why company leaders choose the strategies they choose, and how and why those strategies are (or are not) implemented. In order to explain patterns of organizational behavior in a world of blurred-but existent firm boundaries we finally draw on a more recent sociological literature on social movements that also highlights for “patterns of mobilization distinct from both lines of formal authority and the personal ties of informal organization” (Clemens, Where Do We Stand? Common Mechanisms in Organizations and Social Movements Research, in Davis G, McAdam D, Scott WR, Zald M (eds) Social movements and organization theory. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, p. 356, 2005). Indeed, such a literature recognized the central role of networks, their evolutionary dynamics, and interactions between the internal and the external and between the formal and the informal
- …
