Revista Argentina de Clínica Psicológica 2020, Vol. XXIX, N°1, 874-879
DOI: 10.24205/03276716.2020.119 874
P
SYCHOLOGICAL
P
ERCEPTION AND
B
EHAVIOR OF
H
OMESTAY
C
ONSUMERS
Xueguo Gong
*Abstract
Homestay tourism is an emerging form of travel that reflects the latest psychological perception of tourists. This paper analyzes the psychological perception and behaviors of homestay consumers, drawing on theory of consumer behavior and the principle of psychology. The research data were collected through a questionnaire survey on the homestay market in Kunming, a famous tourist destination in southwestern China, and were analyzed in detailed on the SPSS. The results show that over 70% of consumers choose homestay to alleviate mental pressure; the tourists prefer to choose homestays of moderate price and have a rational consumption concept; consumers are satisfied of the homestays in Kunming and willing to recommend them to friends and relatives. The research results help to promote the development of homestay tourism from the psychological perspective.
Key words: Homestay Tourism, Consumers, Motivation, Psychological Perception.
Received: 22-01-19 | Accepted: 06-07-19
INTRODUCTION
With the rapid development of economy and society, the quickening pace of life urges people to pursue a leisure life style and return to their natural state of mind. In this context, the homestay refers to utilize idle rooms to provide creative accommodation conditions in different forms for tourist consumers, and is popular with many consumers (Schmidt-Rinehart & Knight, 2004). Coupled with the support of national policies and the trend of market supply and demand, homestay plays a more and more important role in the development of tourism industry.
Regarding the concept of homestay, Knight, a British scholar, first defined Hotel as a place with a bed for sleep and breakfast (Knight & Schmidt-Rinehart, 2002). Later, the concept of homestay was improved as follows: Integrating the
School of Culture and Tourism. University of Jinan, Jinan 250002, China.
E-Mail: [email protected]
ecological environment, natural landscape and local folk culture, the operators transform and design the rooms to provide consumers with a place for accommodation, catering and tourism experience through the tourism industry so as to create a green, environmentally friendly and
unique atmosphere (Tsai, Lin, Hwang et al.,
2014). According to the management mode, the homestay can be divided into two types: individual operation and cooperative operation. According to the appearance style, it can be divided into Hui school architecture, Cantonese
features, courtyard dwellings, European
buildings and so on. According to the theme, it can also be divided into historical culture type, warm family type, natural landscape type, exotic style type and individual art type (Baty & Dold, 1977).
Foreign studies on the psychology of homestay consumers are relatively mature. According to Morris, homestay is a place where operators rent out spare rooms to consumers. Based on the full-cycle theory of industrial life, John made a preliminary exploration of the
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(Kontogorgopoulos, Churyen, & Duangsaeng,
2015). Harris summed up the development mode of the industrial scale formed by the homestay through a large number of case statistical analysis. Tom, through empirical research and data analysis, pointed out that the psychological perception of homestay consumers has some regularity (Jamal, Othman, & Muhammad, 2011). Based on the theory of consumer behavior, Jane studied the effects of gender, age, position and educational level on consumers' choice of homestay and analyzes the correlation among
influencing factors (Sood, Lynch, &
Anastasiadou, 2017). Young, based on the psychological and behavioral characteristics of homestay consumers, proposed a feasible marketing strategy, which greatly improves the competitiveness of homestay in tourism accommodation and encouraged scholars to make s deeper study on homestay tourism (Rivers, 2008).
The domestic research on homestay is still in the initial stage, which is mainly divided into two sectors: the theoretical analysis of homestay management and the empirical study of homestay management strategies. Edward studied the conditions and limitations of homestay development in China, and proposed a mode of homestay tourism management combining urban and rural development (Kayat, 2002). Lee put forward a series of restricting factors of Suzhou homestay development, including the operators’ consciousness and attitude, the tourists' concept is not updated and the management method is not standardized. Based on consumer experience psychology, Mike studied the motivations of tourists, including landscape experience, cultural exploration, and curiosity-hunting experience (Tavakoli, Mura, &
Rajaratnam, 2017). Terry compared the
characteristics and advantages and
disadvantages of homestay with traditional hotels in terms of market supply and demand, policy environment, publicity channels, and consumer experience, and found homestay to be more attractive to visitors (Marques & Gondim Matos, 2019). Long carried on the empirical analysis through the questionnaire survey, analyzed the tourists' psychological perception about the homestay, and established the mathematical model about the satisfaction degree of the homestay tourism (Blinman, 2010). Generally speaking, the operation of domestic homestay tourism is not mature at
present, especially the research on the psychological perception of consumers is not enough. Based on the theory of consumer behavior and the principle of psychology, this study takes Kunming as a typical case and adopts the means of questionnaire survey and online data analysis to deeply explore the psychological perception and behavior of urban homestay consumers, providing some theoretical guidance and data support for the management and operation practice of homestay tourism.
THEORETICAL BASIS AND EMPIRICAL ANALYSIS OF HOMESTAY TOURISM
Theory of consumer behavior
The theory of consumer behavior is a value theory put forward by Wade in 1998 from the
perspective of tourists' psychological
perception, which mainly focuses on the motivation, consumption decision-making and satisfaction evaluation of tourists' purchase of tourist products so as to guide the development of tourism products and homestay management strategies. Based on the theory of consumer behavior, this study carries on the questionnaire survey and SPSS data analysis, and deeply
analyzes the consumers’ psychological
perception and behaviors from the tourist motivation, tourist decision-making, tourist
experience and tourist evaluation. The
theoretical framework of consumer behavior is shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1
.
Theoretical framework of
PSYCHOLOGICAL PERCEPTION AND BEHAVIOR OF HOMESTAY CONSUMERS 876
Investigation and analysis of homestay consumption
Taking Kunming's homestay market as a classic case, this study focuses on the psychological capacity and behavior perception of homestay consumers. The SPSS data are analyzed with on-the-spot questionnaires based on the method of Lee's scale. A total of 250 questionnaires are sent out, and 200 valid questionnaires are collected, that’s, the effective collection rate is 80%.
According to the demographic statistics, the proportion of males and females is 54.6% and 45.4%, respectively. The age levels are mainly distributed in 21-45 years, accounting for 49.2%. Most of the homestay tourists have income levels above the middle level, and their
occupations include students, enterprise
employees, teachers, civil servants and retired elderly, with the distribution of each occupation shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2
.
Occupational distribution of
homestay consumers
Homestay consumers have a high level of education, with 124 undergraduates and above, accounting for 62% of the total. The number of visitors with the education of high schools and below is only 11, or 5.5%. The distribution of educational attainment of homestay consumers is shown in Figure 3.
Figure
3
.
Educational
background
distribution of homestay consumers
DECISION ANALYSIS OF HOMESTAY CONSUMERS
There are many factors that influence the decision-making of homestay consumers, such as tourist information channel, homestay price, distance from homestay to scenic spots and travel time.
Figure 4
.
Analysis on the tourism purpose of
homestay consumers
Motivation analysis
As shown in Figure 4, from the perspective of the tourist motivation of the consumers, the proportion of the consumers with the purpose of relieving pressure is the highest, reaching 73%; secondly, landscape appreciation and cultural
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respectively; the proportion of homestay consumers for enjoying special cuisine is 53.2%; the proportion of homestay consumers for shopping and entertainment is 31%; the proportion for promoting affection is lowest, 17% only.
Tourist information channels
Figure 5 shows the consumer tourist information channels. The proportion of tourists who get tourist information from the Internet (computer, mobile phone app) is 87%. Online information source is the most important information channel for tourists. The reason is that, with the popularization of the network technology and the improvement in the convenience of information acquisition, most of the travel consumers, especially the students who account for the highest proportion, obtain the travel information through apps such as Meituan, Qunar, Fliggy or WeChat public number. In addition, the proportion of tourists having consultation from traditional tourism agencies has been greatly reduced, accounting for 23%. 46% tourists receive recommendation from friends, 16% from television channels and 11% from other channels.
Figure 5
.
Tourist information channels for
homestay consumers
Homestay price
The homestay price is determined by the market supply and demand of the city, and is also be influenced by the location, traffic conditions and decoration style of homestay itself. Figure 6 shows the impact of homestay price on consumer decision-making. The price range of more than 120 yuan and less than 320 yuan is the
most popular in the market, which accounts for 59% of the total since it can meet the basic demands of tourists with comparatively appropriate price. The popularity of homestay below 120 yuan is the second, accounting for 18% of the total, and the group who chose this price range are basically students, and the type of homestay is mostly youth hostels. In addition, the proportion of homestay with a price range of 320 yuan to 520 yuan is 14%, and the proportion of homestay with a price of 520 yuan or more is 9%. Generally speaking, the price of homestay is lower than that of traditional hotels, the price of homestay chosen by tourists is relatively moderate, and the overall consumption concept tends to be rational.
Figure 6
.
Trend of price distribution of
homestay
ANALYSIS OF THE EXPERIENCE OF HOMESTAY CONSUMERS
The experience of the homestay consumers is the psychological perception and behavioral reaction to the homestay in the way of direct or
indirect contact, and is the subjective
embodiment of the psychological
communication process between the homestay operators and consumers. The theoretical model of consumer experience mainly analyzes the consumer experience from four aspects such as
aesthetics, entertainment, education and
emotion, and applies it to the psychological experience of customer entities and online. The characteristic of homestay is a very important concern when tourists consume. A homestay with a local design style and a local culture can lead tourists to better appreciate natural
PSYCHOLOGICAL PERCEPTION AND BEHAVIOR OF HOMESTAY CONSUMERS 878
scenery and experience folk culture, so that customers can quickly integrate into the scenic spot and fully experience the unique charm of tourism.
Features and design style of homestay
Figure 7
.
The influence of design style on
homestay consumers
The features of homestay can be divided into three styles from the angle of decoration design: Chinese style, European style and Japanese style. Through SPSS data analysis of the questionnaire, as shown in Figure 7, the proportion of homestay consumers who choose Chinese style is the highest, accounting for more than 50%, for which is that people have a strong sense of conversion to Chinese culture, liking its simple and classical cultural atmosphere. European architecture is the second most popular, accounting for 32% of the total. The decoration style of Japanese style is a trend rising in the youth group, with a small audience scope, accounting for only 17%, but it shows an increasing trend.
Recommendation will of homestay consumers
Figure 8 shows the tourists' recommendation will of homestay in Kunming.
As can be seen from Figure. 8, 130 homestay consumers express strong recommendation, accounting for 65% of the statistical sample, and 54 consumers recommend but retain some opinions, accounting for 27%. In addition, 8% of consumers have poor experience, saying they would not recommend it. On the whole, the homestay in Kunming has made a good
impression on most tourists, and the consumers' satisfaction and recommendation will remain at a high level, indicating the location and the decoration design style of the homestay in Kunming is more attractive to tourists. On the other hand, for tourists who won’t recommend or retain some opinions, relevant reasons are recorded in the questionnaire, mainly including long distance from the scenic spot, somewhat monotonous design style, and too little public entertainment space for tourists. Homestay operators may make repairs and improvements on the basis of the above opinions.
Figure 8
.
Recommendation will of homestay
in Kunming
CONCLUSIONS
Based on the theory of consumer behavior and the principle of psychology, this study adopts the method of questionnaire and SPSS data analysis, taking Kunming's homestay market as a typical case, and deeply analyzes the
psychological perception and behavior
characteristics of urban homestay consumers. The conclusions are as follows:
(1) From the perspective of tourism motivation, most consumers choose homestay to relieve pressure, followed by landscape appreciation and cultural experience. From the perspective of homestay information channel, with the improvement in the convenience of online information, the proportion of consumers who get homestay information on the Internet is the highest.
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(2) The price range of more than 120 yuan and less than 320 yuan is the most popular among consumers. The homestay price is lower than that of traditional hotels, and the price standard for tourists to choose homestay is
relatively moderate, and the overall
consumption concept tends to be rational. More than half of the homestay consumers choose the homestay of Chinese style, indicating that people have a strong sense of conversion to Chinese culture, liking its simple and classical cultural atmosphere. For Japanese decoration style, although the audience range is relatively small, but there is an increasing trend.
(3) The homestay in Kunming has left a good reputation among most tourists, and consumers' satisfaction and recommendation will be maintained at a high level, showing the location and decoration design style of homestay in Kunming is more attractive to tourists. On the other hand, for tourists who won’t recommend or retain some opinions, major reasons include long distance from the scenic spot, somewhat monotonous design style, and too little public entertainment space for tourists.
Acknowledgements
This project is the Shandong Provincial Social Science Planning Project "Shandong Province homestay Industry Development Strategy and Method. Research -Research Results Based on the Global Tourism Concept (Project No. 16BLYJ01).
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