Ian Baxter

Sites imbued with an intense sense of history and cultural heritage enable tourists to engage in transformative activities. A temporary mode of being occurs when tourists are immersed in their surroundings; sites become spaces enabling and facilitating transformative engagement. In theorising this impact, this theory testing case study is founded on the conceptualisation of liminality, combining it with contemporary theories of engagement. The theoretical contribution is delivered by exploring how liminal spaces deepen tourists’ engagement when visiting cultural heritage sites by testing and proving a ‘Conceptual Model of the Liminoid Space.’ Applying liminality to visitor engagement at cultural heritage sites enables two theoretical contributions. This is the first paper that applies liminality to a cultural heritage site and investigates the relationship between liminality and engagement by empirically testing and proving Taheri’s (2017) model. This research has practical and managerial implications; an increased understanding of how this liminal space deepens engagement enables business owners to make better site management decisions and secure long-term community employment and wealth generation for the area.

Using data collected from 538 Iranian tourists undertaking the religious pilgrimage of Umrah (i.e. voluntary travel to the holy city of Mecca at any time throughout the year), this study investigates the concept of play and its relationship with self-expression and hedonism in an Islamic tourism context. By testing a theoretically derived structural model, the findings suggest that self-expression strongly influences tourists’ sense of play. Here, play is realised when tourists feel that they can express themselves freely and augment their self-image while travelling, irrespective of the religious context. Nonetheless, the pilgrimage environment is characterised by the religious congregation – with tourists engaging in communal experiences that reflect themselves and their faith. Therefore, the ideal experience, where tourists feel a sense of escapism from the pressures of everyday life, is a product of their ability to project, develop, and ratify their self-concept. Finally, the study suggests that pilgrimage managers and marketers should focus on the importance of play, enabling their destinations to heighten the intensity of the ‘enjoyable’ elements of religious travel (e.g. group camaraderie, escapism and positive emotional reactions) alongside their inherent religious benefits.

This paper examines the influence of negotiation intention, recreational shopper identity, and social shopping orientation on both servicescape and visitors’ overall shopping value in the Istanbul Grand Bazaar, Turkey. We developed and tested a conceptual model using a sample of 300 international visitors to the Bazaar. The results demonstrate that bargaining intention, recreational functions, and social interactions influence servicescape. This implies that, when tourists are motivated by bargain hunting, recreation, and socialisation, their attitude towards the shopping environment is more positive, which subsequently results in increased overall shopping value. Implications for managerial practice are also presented alongside suggestions for future research.

Services reliant on revenue generated from tourism are often beholden to how authentic visitors perceive their offering to be. From a managerial perspective, this is exacerbated when they serve a dual-purpose, as both actively ingrained in local culture and showcased international tourist attractions. As such, this study contributes to Kolar and Žabkar’s (2010) consumer-based model of authenticity by assessing the relationships between serious leisure, object-based and existential authenticity, and visitor word-of-mouth (WOM) recommendations in Iranian cultural tourism. Utilising partial least-squares structural equation modelling, and drawing upon responses from 615 visitors to the Tabriz Grand Bazaar, it thus extends the model’s applicability to the developing Middle Eastern context. The results extend extant research by emphasising the importance of object-based authenticity, as opposed to existential authenticity, in stimulating positive visitor WOM recommendations. Consequently, this study advances the prevailing understanding of the role of authenticity in stimulating positive behavioural intentions by highlighting how destinations can stimulate visitor recommendations.

This paper examines the links between cosmopolitanism, self-identity, and a desire for social interaction on perceived destination image and behavioural intentions. A model was tested using a sample of 538 Iranian visitors to Mecca for the purpose of Umrah. The result from the structural model suggests that destination attributes influence perceived destination image. Further, such tourists are likely to revisit or recommend Islamic destinations if their experience matches their perceived image of the destination. This implies that, while the religious characteristics of the destination remain important, destination managers cannot disregard the tangential, non-religious attributes of a destination which are crucial in order to satisfy more conventional tourist desires. As such, this study suggests that those managing religious travel destinations should endeavour to foster a welcoming image, where experience, interaction, and tolerance are at the forefront of the destination's offering

This paper examines the effects of negotiation intention, bargaining propensity, and discount satisfaction on word-of-mouth (WoM) behaviours for tourists visiting Tabriz bazaar, Iran. Data from 615-survey respondents highlight that tourists are motivated to conduct WoM behaviour when they are experientially satisfied with the opportunity to negotiate and bargain, and when they are satisfied with the discount they receive. This paper makes theoretical contributions to social exchange theory and presents managerial implications for policy-makers to generate tourism development.

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