Marine tourism and environmental preservation: determinants of tourists’ ecofriendly behavior and promotion through word-of-mouth

ABSTRACT

This study aims to explore the factors that impact tourists’ engagement in environmentally friendly behaviors (BI) and their promotion of a destination through word-of-mouth (WOM) while attending marine tourism. The research uses a stringent methodology, including sufficient/necessary condition analysis and fsQCA, to examine the essential and sufficient conditions for the presence of BI and WOM. By comparing established theory with the proposed model, this research also identifies a combination of factors, such as the presence of moral norm and the absence of social norm, that influence BI and WOM. This study holds potential for theoretical expansion in future tourism studies.

KEYWORDS:

• Marine tourism
• tourist eco-friendly behavior
• word-of-mouth
• social norm
• moral norm
• image of sustainable behavior

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

This research project was partially supported by Office of the Ministry of Higher Education, Science, Research and Innovation, Thailand under the Reinventing University System / Visiting Professor Program.