Abstract
The objective of this longitudinal study is to explore whether changes in tourists’ outbound travel behavior can be explained by their demographic characteristics and by economic fluctuations over time. A multilevel model of outbound travel behavior that incorporates both individual characteristics and changes in the economy is proposed. Based on a large sample from a 10-year longitudinal study, our findings show that both individual- and macro-level factors directly influence tourist behavior. The multilevel model suggests that tourist travel behavior and the effects of tourist demographics are time-variant, and can be best explained by economic fluctuations. In addition, the findings suggest that the tourist life cycle and the economic cycle, and the cross-level interaction of both, jointly influence tourist travel behavior, thus suggesting a new cross-level, dual-cycle model of travel behavior.
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