Considering Residents’ Behavioral Support for Tourism Development: A Theoretical Examination of the Emotional Solidarity Theory and the Theory of Planned Behavior

Abstract

This study examines the intimate relationships that exist between residents and tourists (i.e., based on residents’ emotional solidarity (ES) with tourists) from attitudes to actual behavior in ultimately explaining residents’ behavioral support for tourism development (BSTD). This study linked two complementary theoretical frameworks (i.e., the theory of Emotional Solidarity and the Theory of Planned Behavior or TPB) to ultimately explain residents’ BSTD. The main purpose of this study was to gain an understanding of how the emotional solidarity scale (ESS) (i.e., welcoming nature, emotional closeness, and sympathetic understanding) affects and predicts residents’ behavioral intentions (BI) to support tourism development and how that in turn predicts actual behavioral support for tourism development through the application of TPB. To date, no research has been undertaken that extends the TPB model by including residents’ emotions or their ES with tourists in efforts to explain residents’ BI or BSTD. The proposed study intends to close this literature gap and draw the attention of tourism scholars by linking the ES to the TPB to predict residents’ BI and BSTD. Data for this study was collected through on-site self-administered questionnaires distributed to Turkish residents living in the coastal city of Izmir. The survey was conducted in four key districts in the city (i.e., the Izmir city center, Çeşme, Menderes, and Selçuk) based on the concentration of tourism facilities in each area. Each scale within the proposed model was confirmed through CFA and supported through SEM. All scales demonstrated high internal consistency (i.e., reliability) and construct validity. CFA and SEM results indicate that the measurement and structural models had good model fit based on the CFI, IFI, TLI, and RMSEA scores. Results indicated that Izmir residents’ ES with tourists did significantly influence their attitudes towards tourism and that attitudes with the inclusion of subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control significantly predicted their BI. Ultimately, residents’ BI was a significant predictor of their BSTD, explaining approximately 23% of the variance in the construct. Results are explained based on the ES theory and the TPB, as implications, limitations, and future research are discussed at the close of the paper.