Effects of tourists' local food consumption value on attitude toward local food, food destination image, and behavioral intention

Abstract

Food globalization has resulted in increased interaction between tourists and local food, thereby generating rapid dietary acculturation in a destination. Generally, tourists have considerable opportunities to experience local food in a destination. The unique aspects of local food in terms of taste, history, nutritional value, and related cultural values enhance its attraction. For this reason, food consumption in a destination is a crucial experience for travelers. Ultimately, the concept of consumption value is critical to the research on food tourism marketing. Little research is designed to explore the kinds of consumption value tourists obtain while experiencing local food in a destination despite the necessity of studying consumption value from the tourists' perspective. Few studies link food consumption value to the overall attitude toward local food, food destination image, and behavioral intentions. In addition, previous food tourism studies are focused on local food in Western countries. To address this gap, considerable attention and academic contributions should be devoted to the food tourism in Asia. In order to narrow down the aforementioned gaps, the objectives of this study are to develop a scale that can measure tourist's local food consumption value, to examine the effects of tourist's local food consumption value on the overall attitude toward local food, food destination image, intention to recommend local food, and intention to visit the destination for food tourism, and to examine the moderating effect of tourist's cultural background among proposed constructs. This study develops hypotheses regarding the relationships among tourist's local food consumption value, attitude toward local food, food destination image, intention to recommend local food to others, and intention to visit the destination for food tourism. The cultural background of tourists is used as a moderating variable. First, the measurement of tourists' local food consumption value was developed through the process of literature review, in-depth interview, pre-test, and online pilot test. Then, the main survey was conducted in Hong Kong to investigate the proposed hypotheses. After the data collection, 875 questionnaires were collected and used for data analysis. The target samples were international tourists who are interested in tasting local food and had experienced local food during their visit to Hong Kong. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), structural equation modeling (SEM), and multi-group analysis were conducted to test hypotheses using SPSS and AMOS. This study's results show that 8 out of 13 hypotheses are supported, and one is partially supported. "Taste/quality value," "emotional value," and "epistemic value" significantly affect "attitude toward local food." "Attitude toward local food" significantly affects "food destination image," "intention to recommend local food," and "intention to visit the destination for food tourism." "Food destination image" affects the "intention to recommend local food" and "intention to visit the destination for food tourism." Finally, the cultural background of tourists partially moderates the relationships among the proposed constructs. From an academic perspective, this study adds to the current knowledge on "tourist" (demand) in terms of local food consumption. Particularly, this study contributes to the establishment of tourists' local food consumption value as a new measurement based on consumption value theory. The framework of the interrelationships among tourists' local food consumption value, attitude toward local food, food destination image, and behavioral intention was established and tested in the context of Hong Kong tourism. From a practical perspective, destination marketing organizations (DMOs) and food marketers can understand tourists' multidimensional local food consumption value and which types of local food consumption values can influence tourists' attitude toward local food, food destination image, intention to recommend the local food, and intention to visit the destination for food tourism. This understanding allows DMOs and food marketers to allocate their limited resources appropriately. DMOs and food marketers can also strategically decide on managing and consequently enhancing the effectiveness of the local food consumption value that they offer. Finally, DMOs are advised to promote their local food by utilizing consumption value, which in turn, can benefit the experiences of the tourists in a destination.