Resident attitudes, place attachment and destination branding: a research framework

Ning (Chris) Chen () and Tina Šegota ()
Additional contact information
Ning (Chris) Chen: College of Business and Law, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand
Tina Šegota: Faculty of Economics, University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia

Tourism and Hospitality Management, 2015, vol. 21, issue 2, 145-158

Abstract: Purpose – This paper aims to propose a new line of research that explores the relationship between residents and destination brand building behaviours through the concept of place attachment. Design and methodology – We conducted a literature review on place attachment and brand building behaviour, and focused more specifically on place identity as an accumulation based dimension of place attachment and word-of-mouth as a behavioural outcome. Approach – With the emergence of new technologies, tourism managers no longer have a complete control over the development of destination brand, since various communication tools enable for residents to engage in the destination branding process. This calls for rethinking the role of residents in destination branding and the necessity to explore various place attachment dimensions and their outcomes. Findings – This study proposes a conceptual framework to understand the role of residents in the construction of the image of their place of residence as a tourism destination. Within this framework, we suggested that place satisfaction may affect residents’ internalisation process, contributing to residents’ behavioural output process, resulting in positive word-of-mouth, participation in tourism activities, and demonstration of destination ambassador behaviour. Originality – Despite the wide interest of researchers in human-place relationship, few studies have focused on residents’ place attachment and its outcomes. This framework suggests that it is important to understanding how residents form place attachment; how they perceive their place of residence as a tourism destination, and what they communicate in order to create positive destination image and strong destination brand.

Keywords: Local residents; place attachment; self-congruity; destination branding; brand building behaviours; WOM (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: L83 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hrcak.srce.hr/index.php?show=clanak&id_clanak_jezik=220779 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:tho:journl:v:21:y:2015:n:2:p:145-158

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Tourism and Hospitality Management from University of Rijeka, Faculty of Tourism and Hospitality Management
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Ana Montan ( this e-mail address is bad, please contact ).