Ski – resort and regional development: profile of visitors ... - E-Journal

Leisure tourists’ considerations regarding destinations recently experiencing safety and/or security problems
in Iraq, security concerns affect not only the individual tourism decision-making process, but
also the larger environment in which the leisure industry operates and the way in which
individual destinations are perceived.
BACKGROUND LITERATURE
Travel surveys consistently show that safety and security are important concerns among
tourists (Poon and Adams, 2000). In the recent past the influence of natural disasters on
tourism demand has received increased attention as well (Faulkner, 2001; Mazzocchi and
Montini, 2001). It has been identified that the risks associated with one’s safety, i.e. potential
terrorist attacks and political instability, were particularly influential in changing travelers’
intentions and perceptions on different destinations, even among experienced travelers (Sonmez
and Graefe, 1998a). Sonmez (1998) maintains that, when faced with the threat of terrorism,
tourists tend to engage in a number of behaviours, including that of substituting risky destinations
with safer alternatives and generalizing potential risks to other countries in the affected region
as well. Tourists tend to exhibit cultural variations in their reactions, with US tourists most
likely to perceive higher levels of risk in foreign destinations (idem).
Sonmez, Apostolopoulos and Tarlow (1999) observe that travel statistics from all over the
globe clearly suggest that tourism demand decreases as the perception of risks associated with
a destination increases. Richter (1983) explains that when tourists are victimized worldwide,
media broadcasts heighten the perceptions of risk associated with a particular destination.
Sonmez and Graefe (1998b) found that perceptions of risk or safety concerns are of paramount
importance in the decision-making process of tourists, since they can alter rational decisionmaking,
as it pertains to travel modes and the choice of a destination. Due to media coverage,
perceived risks associated with a particular destination could even surpass the actual conditions
in the travel decision-making process, causing entire regions to be perceived as risky (Sonmez,
1998).
A case in point would be the outbreak of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS
epidemic) (2002-2003), which had the effect of reducing Hong Kong’s hotel occupancy rate
to 15% from a seasonal norm of 82%, having implications with global ramifications as well.
Similarly, Singapore had a drop of 67% year on year (The Economist, 2003). With regard to
SARS, Peter Harbison, founder of the Centre for Asia-Pacific Aviation, notes that “SARS
itself is arguably largely a media and travel syndrome. It was unpredicted, unprecedented and,
once it gained momentum, unstoppable (Thomas, 2003a).
Building on the media’s power to manipulate individuals’ perception of reality, as well as to
help at the formation of an attitude which manifests this reality, Jean-Paul Sartre suggested
that individuals make their own reality. Attitudes (interpretations of ‘reality’) are a psychological
tendency which forms the basis of antecedent cognitive, affective and behavioural processes
(Eagly and Chaiken, 1993).
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