Who is easier to please? A cognitive appraisal mechanism of tourists’ hierarchical experiences

Yuli Bai, Wenlin Su, Feng Xu and Yin Yang

Current Issues in Tourism, 2025, vol. 28, issue 17, 2871-2890

Abstract: The ethnic ancient cities, as ‘cultural contact zone’, carries a large number of tourists, who may have the same or different cultural background from the host culture. Combining experience economy theory and cognitive appraisal theory, this study constructed a cognitive appraisal mechanism of tourist’ hierarchical experiences in ethnic ancient cities. The PLS-SEM results of 489 tourists in Kashgar Ancient City and 474 tourists in Qingzhou Ancient City reveal that cognate cultural destinations require more effort to please tourists than non-cognate cultural destinations. In non-cognate cultural contexts, the cultural contact has a greater impact on interaction immersion, while in cognate cultural contexts, the authenticity experience has a greater impact on interaction immersion. Moreover, compared to other experiential types, the impact of escapist experience, which has high-level engagement and high-level connection, on destination satisfaction is negatively moderated by destination familiarity. These findings provide practical insights for managers to innovate experiential forms and promote tourists’ revisits in different cultural destinations.

Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1080/13683500.2024.2388796

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