Understanding the role of risk (perception) in destination choice: A literature review and synthesis

Safety and security are key aspects for the success of tourism in every destination. Rather than objective risks, it is rather the tourist\u27s individual and subjective perception of these risks that mostly influence destination choice and in the long run tourism flows from one country to another. The concept of risk perception has been highly studied in tourism, however the literature remains fragmented resulting in lack of a cohesive and comprehensive framework. It is not yet clear how risk perception as one important determinant of destination choice acts as an influencing factor in the destination choice process. The purpose of this paper is to review and synthesise literature from tourism research and other disciplines on risk and particularly risk perception to develop a framework that offers a better understanding of the role of risk (perception) in the destination choice process. Although travel decision-making and destination choice is a negotiation process between tourist needs and destination offer, most past research has mainly concentrated on the tourist rather than the specific attributes of a destination. The aim is therefore to develop a literature-based framework, including tourist and destination attributes, which is built upon a meta-review of fundamental and recent studies from various disciplines