A study of the propensity for loyalty in tourism.

Consumer loyalty has been under investigation for over 40 years, most commonly the research has been conducted in the retail or banking environment. Most researchers agree that 'true' loyalty is a multidimensional construct and ideally the measurement of loyalty should incorporate both behavioural as well as psychological components. However, the psychological measurement has proven elusive and what can be concluded from consumer loyalty research is that there are a large number of operational measures used and there is limited comparability between studies. With regard to consumer loyalty towards holiday destinations, there have been few attempts to measure it. The key problem for destination loyalty research is the infrequent holiday buying behaviour and lack of destination loyalty conceptualisation. This study focuses on loyalty as a behaviour and part of personality. Psychology is used to explain why some individuals have a higher propensity to become loyal towards destinations. The research process evolved through two separate pilot studies and the final study used a triangulation of optimum stimulation level instrument called arousal seeking tendency (AST-I), a revised tourist's inherent loyalty tendency scale (rTILTS) and primary behavioural measure (based on the subject's five-year travel career). In so doing, the inherently loyal tourists could be separated from variety seeking tourists. This also opens direct marketing opportunities for the independent businesses within a destination. This study identified a positive correlation between AST-I and rTILTS. Furthermore, these psychological measures were also predictive of behavioural outcome. The findings lead to the conceptualisation of inherent destination loyalty. The key finding of this study is that the loyal segment for holiday destination is substantial; 60% of the respondents spent three or more holidays in the same destination over the five-year survey period. Furthermore, the positive attitude towards destination results in expressions of self-confidence, suggesting that this attitude is strong (outcome of repeater personal behaviour) and centrally held