How to make guests behave more environmentally friendly in hotel rooms? : The exploration of motivation factors from guests' perspective 

Hotel industry, as the largest sub-sector of tourism often generates huge negative environmental impacts, including waste of freshwater, consumption of energy and carbon dioxide emissions. It is clear that the guests’ choices and actions in hotel rooms shape the environmental sustainability of the hotel industry. Previous studies offer concrete theoretical foundations for promoting hotel guests’ environmental behavior, either by specifying environmental performances or examining various factors that influence guests’ environmental behaviors. However, the research results have somewhat overlooked the disconnection between guests’ attitudes and behaviors. Based on this, this study focuses on exploring guests’ opinions about how different factors can motivate them to behave environmentally friendly in hotel rooms. Aligning with ongoing discussion within Tourism Research and the so called Environmental Responsible Behavior model (ERB) within Environmental Education, the main factors are categorized as internal and external factors. While internal factors include environmental knowledge, environmental attitudes, individual responsibility, external factors consist of governmental regulation, marketing strategies and social norms. Empirical material of the study was collected through ten qualitative structured interviews among hotel guests. The analysis of this study show how majority of the interviewees emphasized the importance of internal factors in their own environmentally friendly behaviors in hotel rooms. This indicated that participants considered that their consciousness played a direct and effective role in their environmental behaviors. At the same time, the thesis suggests that different elements act different roles for how factors can effectively motivate guests’ environmental behaviors in hotel rooms, the elements are benchmark (environmental knowledge), psychological distance (environmental attitudes), personal good feeling and moral obligation (individual responsibility), indirect influences and mandatory regulation (governmental regulation), personal interests (marketing strategies), instructional function (social norms). The study suggests that the knowledge about guests’ opinions can be further used, for instance, by authorities and the supply side of hotels. Then, refining motivational strategies can contribute to environmental sustainability in hotel rooms.