促进还是抑制?——中国入境旅游需求的主-客文化差异效应研究

Promotion or Inhibition:Impacts of Host-Guest Cultural Differences on China's Inbound Tourism Demand

主-客文化差异是影响客源地对中国入境旅游需求的重要因素。然而,学术界尚缺乏关于主-客文化差异对中国入境旅游需求影响的系统性成果。研究基于2002—2018年联合国世界旅游组织《旅游统计年鉴》中66个主要客源地对中国入境旅游人次数据和多种稳健性检验方法,试图厘清主-客文化差异不同维度对中国入境旅游需求的影响。结果表明:中国入境旅游需求的主-客文化差异效应具有维度异质性和区域异质性。具体而言,在世界客源地市场中,语言差异对中国入境旅游需求无显著影响,宗教差异和正式制度差异有显著促进效应,价值观差异和实践差异有显著抑制效应。在亚太客源地市场中,价值观差异对中国入境旅游需求有显著负向影响。在美洲客源地市场中,正式制度差异对中国入境旅游需求有显著正向影响。研究以期对中国入境旅游企业制定更具针对性的市场营销策略有所助益。

Host-guest cultural differences are important determinants of China's inbound tourism demand.However,there is a lack of high-quality research on impacts of host-guest cultural differences on China's inbound tourism demand.A prominent problem lies in the neglect of the definition of core concepts and a lack of rigorous research design,which makes existing conclusions generally not reliable and even contradictory.Based on the data of international arrivals of 66 major origin regions gathered from the Yearbook of Tourism Statistics issued by the United Nations World Tourism Organization from 2002 to 2018 and the use of a variety of robustness testing methods,this study attempts to clarify the impact of host-guest cultural differences on China's inbound tourism demand from the dimension level.The results indicate that impacts of host-guest cultural differences on China's inbound tourism demand have the characteristics of dimensional heterogeneity and regional heterogeneity.Specifically speaking,in the global tourism-source market,the impact of language difference is not significant.Religious difference and formal institutional difference deliver a positive impact.Values difference and practices difference bring a negative impact.In the Asia-Pacific tourism-source market,values difference has a significant negative impact on China's inbound tourism demand.In the American tourism-generating market,formal institutional difference has a significant positive impact on China's inbound tourism demand.The research serves as an inspiration and guidance for China's inbound tourism enterprises to formulate more targeted marketing strategies and improve their profitability in the post COVID-19 era.In terms of theoretical contribution,this study identifies the different effects of some dimensions of host-guest cultural differences(i.e.language difference,religious difference,values difference,practices difference and formal institutional difference)on China's inbound tourism demand.This is not only helpful to clarify the controversial issue of"cultural distance paradox"of China's inbound tourism demand,but also enriches the interpretation of the effects of host-guest cultural differences in the theoretical framework of tourism demand.Specifically,this study finds that the different effects of host-guest cultural differences on tourism demand are related to the specific types of host-guest cultural differences and the subdivided visitor source markets in different geographical regions.Furthermore,the influencing factors of hostguest cultural differences in tourism demand can be divided into two categories:repulsive cultural differences factors and gravitational cultural differences factors.Repulsive cultural differences factors,including values difference and practices difference,refer to the host-guest cultural differences that can lead to visitors'insecurity feeling and higher risk perception,and thus have a significant inhibition effect on tourism demand.Gravitational cultural difference factors,including religious differences and formal institutional differences,refer to the host-guest cultural differences that can be used as an important attraction to visitors and thus have a significant promoting effect on tourism demand.In addition,as the geographical location of the visitor source market segment changes,some repulsive or gravitational cultural differences factors will lose their original role.