An attitude-behavioral model to understand people’s behavior towards tourism during COVID-19 pandemic

Abstract

The impact of pandemics on the tourism industry should be explored from the perspective of those who will travel, go to the tourist places on vacation, and avail services from tourism and hospitality-related organizations. This study has aimed to identify the reasons for the changed human psychology towards tourism during the COVID-19 Pandemic to develop an attitude-behavioral model. This investigation thus conducted an extensive empirical study among tourists to capture their social, emotional, and financial beliefs. The research then examined the measurement model through confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) before investigating the cause-effect relationship through the structural model. Analysis revealed that the negative effect of attitude on behavioral intention toward this new equilibrium is controlled by the emotional aspect of attitude. Furthermore this paper made several contributions to the literature on human psychology, crisis management, human behavior, marketing, and tourism.