Evaluating the role of national culture on tourist perceptions: an empirical survey

In tourism industry, the analysis of consumer perceptions is a key factor useful to manage and control the effects of collective marketing programs planned in tourist destination (TD) and, therefore, to improve its competitiveness. In this perspective, destination image is one of the most important issues to manage collective marketing efforts aimed to drive tourists’ destination choice. Mani studies examined the empirical evidence on the causal relationships among destination image, tourist attribute and overall satisfaction, and destination loyalty. In the viewpoint of the work, the analysis of cultural values could represent a critical issue in destination marketing research, as relevant characteristics that influences traveller behaviour and interaction with destination residents and/or tourism staff. The aim of the paper is to analyse its influence on destination image, tourist satisfaction and behavioural intention. We study the tourist perceptions in a specific case of travellers that participate in a mega-event planned in a host destination: America’s Cup World Series organised at Naples in April 2012. The research design is based on Hofstede’s cultural dimensions (Hofstede, 1984; 2004) to analyse its influence on destination image, tourist satisfaction and behavioural intention. Analysing the tourist perceptions, we defined tourist measures for each constructs as follows: a. destination image was based on eight perceptive items related to place-specific resources, hygienic factors and tourism services; b. tourist satisfaction was measured on value perception related to six items (regatta-related and public village-related); c. behaviour intention was based on four items, analysing both intent to return and intent to recommend at level of TD and ACWS event 2013. The analysis outlined two main outcomes. In the first study, we verified the presence of effective difference of tourist perceptions employing an Independent T-Test on the different measures. Rather, a second study was developed using a correlation analysis among cultural variables and tourist perceptions measures in order to test in deep the research hypothesis.