Tourism as consumption

The present research studies tourism in terms of consumption, using the approach of economic psychology to interpret it. Holidays are considered less and less as an occasional experience or a luxury good; in western societies like ours, a holiday is seen more and more like a need, an indispensable time to escape the routine and stress of everyday life and at the same time as a status symbol and a sign of social prestige. The holiday becomes a behavioural norm which is paramount both for the individual’s integration in the membership group and as an opportunity to be part of “other reference groups”. Over the last few years we have witnessed a change in the meaning attributed to products that, alongside consumer evolution, change especially in terms of intangibility and status: nowadays all new prestige goods are intangible. And so a new classification (Kotler et al., 1984-1985) has been devised for such goods in which the basic products can be distinguished from specialities, that is to say those that have a psychological meaning. The differentiation is given by the trend towards personalised consumption, which allows an individual to distinguish from others (Jones, 1980 in Kotler et al., 1984-1985). Moreover, alternating fashions are the expression of an imitational behaviour which produces the characteristic trickle effect. Thus, tourism takes on the connotation of a social norm (Ragone, 1974) which realises itself through consumption acting, that is to say through the use of economic goods to satisfy human needs. The present study has allowed us to devise a 70-item six-point Likert-type scale, which is easy and speedy to administer, for the investigation of tourism in terms of consumption. The instrument is expression of five factors and five clusters that address the core elements of tourism and of the role of the holiday in the more economically developed western countries. The holiday has become less and less an occasional luxury good; rather, it represents such an occasion for personal development and integration in reference groups, that the consumer is prepared to invest money even in the absence of high spending potential. Tourism is therefore legitimately part of that category of intangible goods that, by bringing prestige, attract consumers’ financial potential.