The role of hedonism in ethical tourism

Abstract

This paper investigates the role of emotion in the ethical choice processes of tourists. Specifically, it explores how hedonism is experienced and the links between hedonic experiences and intentions for future ethical behaviour. It adopts an interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) approach to examine the experience of emotion in self-defined ethical tourists' consumption of places. The findings highlight that emotionally charged experiences are powerful motivators of consumers' ethical choice. It identifies the role hedonism plays in rationalizing and reinforcing current and intended ethical behaviour. Finally, the paper discusses the importance of emotional experiences as a source of hedonic value in engaging individuals in consumption encounters.

Appealing to Goodwill or YOLO-Promoting Conservation Volunteering to Millennials

“…While this is consistent with earlier findings about travelers' desires to enhance their own personal wellbeing through engagement in volunteering (e.g., Brown and Lehto 2005;Campbell & Smith 2006;Lepp 2008;Rehberg 2005;Andereck et al 2012), Malone et al (2014) additionally emphasize hedonic experiences generate emotional responses that reinforce ethical types of tourism. Their approach is derived from Holbrook and Hirschman (1982) framework for hedonic experiences-''multisensory, fantasy, and emotive aspects of one's experience with products'' (p. 92).…”

“…It evoked the primal desires of adventure and excitement about the type of experiences who can enjoy by participating in conservation projects. The results suggest promotion messages are better received (more persuasive) because they induce expectations in line with general view of conservation volunteering as a hedonic experience (Malone et al 2014). …”

“…In this, light conventional tourism stands for more traditional consumer values of material possessions or personal wealth (Fournier and Richins 1991) leading to convenience, variety, quality, or low price seeking behavior, while travel for conservation volunteering is associated with positive emotions and emotional desires. These positive emotional desires translate into a person's need for pleasurable and interesting experiences (Pearce 2009;Alba and Williams 2013;Malone et al 2014). Lemelin et al (2008) suggested that research has made a faulty assumption that visitors to wildlife areas share positive environmental ethics, biocentric values, and intrinsic motives (e.g., Acott et al 1998;Honey 1999).…”

“…This is not to argue that Millennials would not seek volunteer travel opportunities. On the contrary, as Malone et al (2014) suggestion, a quest for positive emotions-and specifically hedonic experiences-can reinforce the informed ethical tourism choices within this group. Opportunities such as conservation volunteering may appeal to their 'you only live once' ('YOLO') mentality and can reward travelers with a tremendous amount of bragging rights.…”

“…Ethical consumption in tourism is another pertinent and yet understudied issue in contemporary travel and tourism extensively discussed by Malone et al (2014), who argue that emotional travel experiences inspire consumers to making more ethical travel choices. While this is consistent with earlier findings about travelers' desires to enhance their own personal wellbeing through engagement in volunteering (e.g., Brown and Lehto 2005;Campbell & Smith 2006;Lepp 2008;Rehberg 2005;Andereck et al 2012), Malone et al (2014) additionally emphasize hedonic experiences generate emotional responses that reinforce ethical types of tourism.…”