Are we all environmental tourists now? The role of biases in social comparison across and within tourists, and their implications

Abstract

From a management and research perspective, it is important to get a better understanding of what influences tourists in their decision to choose environmentally friendly travel options, and how these are related to social cognitive processes. This paper reports findings from two separate studies investigating the role of biases in social comparison, with particular reference to tourists' perception of their personal roles as environmentally friendly tourists, and especially tourists’ views of the environmental attitudes of other tourists. Samples of N = 1607 and N = 2076 tourists, respectively, were obtained for two studies in Western Norway. Results indicate that tourists perceive themselves to hold more pro-environmental attitudes than other tourists (i.e. “typical tourist”, “average tourist”, “tourists”). This suggests that there are differences in the perception of the self and others when it comes to social comparisons concerning issues of environmental sustainability. The findings also suggest that tourists hold overly positive views of themselves generally concerning issues of environmental sustainability and that their environmental attitudes reflect perceived desirable standards. The theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed from a social psychological perspective, and implications for tourism managers and researchers noted.

我们现在都是环境旅游者吗？旅游者中的社会对比中偏见的职责，和他们的意义

从一个管理和研究的看法，对什么影响旅游者在他们选择环境友好的旅行选择决策和这些因素如何联系到社会能更好的理解是非常重要的。该文章报告了从两个独立的调查社会对比中偏见的职责的研究中取得的结果，文章特别关注旅游者对他们作为环境友好的旅游者的个人职责的看法，特别是旅游者对其他旅游者的环境态度的看法。在挪威西部的两个研究中分别以旅游者N=1607和N=2076的数据来收集。结论显示旅游者认为他们自己比其他旅游者有着更加亲环境的态度（例如：“典型旅游者”，“平均旅游者”，“旅游者”）。这建议在对考虑到环境可持续性的因素的社会对比时，对自己和对其他人的看法有着很多的不同。结论也建议旅游者在关于环境可持续性的因素时对自己的看法总体来说过分正面，并且他们的环境态度反映了他们理解意义上的最理想标准。结论的理论和实践的意义从一个社会心理方面来讨论，并且对旅游管理者和研究者有意义。

Keywords:

• sustainable tourism
• environmental sustainability
• environmental attitudes
• social comparison
• typical tourists
• self-perception

关键词:

• 可持续性旅游
• 环境可持续性
• 环境态度
• 社会对比
• 典型旅游者
• 自我看法

Acknowledgements

We thank Prof. Wibecke Brun (1961–2011) who made valuable contributions during the initial phases of this research project.

Additional information

Funding

We thank the Meltzer Foundation for partially funding the research presented in this paper.

Notes on contributors

Rouven Doran

Rouven Doran is a research fellow and PhD candidate at the Department of Psychosocial Science, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway. His research interests include social psychological aspects in tourism with an emphasis on sustainable travel behaviours and travel motivation.

Svein Larsen

Svein Larsen is professor in general psychology at the Department of Psychosocial Science, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway and adjunct professor in social psychology at the Norwegian School of Hotel Management, University of Stavanger, Stavanger, Norway. His research interests include the psychology of tourist experiences, risk and risk judgements in tourists, social cognition in tourism, and psychological issues in service management.