Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Abstract

In the post-pandemic era, a growing emphasis on elevating the quality of tourism consumption has been observed. This study explores how different language portfolios on product packaging can influence tourists’ perceptions and purchase intentions to promote sustainable consumption. Previous studies on tourism product strategies often addressed national identity, power perception, and stereotypes, but overlooked the fundamental role of multilingual packaging strategies for enterprises and tourists. This study focuses on sake, which combines cultural and natural attributes, as its experimental object. Sub-studies 1, 2, and 3 empirically analyzed how perceptions of competence and warmth are affected by monolingual, bilingual, and trilingual properties of language packaging, respectively, and their impact on tourists’ purchase intentions. The findings suggest that monolingual and bilingual packaging enhances tourists’ competence perception, while trilingual packaging enhances tourists’ warmth perception, thereby stimulating tourists’ positive purchase intentions. Additionally, cultural identity significantly moderates the effectiveness of multilingual packaging strategies. Understanding these dynamics can help tourism enterprises design more effective promotional activities and packaging language strategies for tourists’ preferences. It can also enhance the post-pandemic tourism industry.

Plain language summary

Impact of multilingual packaging on tourism products of competence and warmth: From the monolingual, bilingual, and trilingual perspectives

In this paper, we clarify the mechanism of how different types of language packaging and product attributes influence product perceptions, explore tourists’ preference for the tourism product attributes and their purchase responses. We focus on the tourism products and consider the effectiveness of multilingual packaging strategies according to the packaging language (portfolio) of tourism products and its embodied competence and warmth perceptions. We aim to provide novel theoretical and managerial insights in creating market positioning for tourism products.

Keywords

multilingual packaging competence perception warmth perception purchase intention cultural identity

Introduction

The outbreak of COVID-19 has severely damaged the development of the tourism industry, changed international tourism commodity trade and tourist consumption behavior(Li et al., 2021; Wang et al., 2021; Yi et al., 2022), and affected the entire tourism industrial chain. As an export-oriented economic model, the tourism economy highlights the significance of individual tourists’ demand for tourism products and services, which is crucial for supporting the development of the tourism industry (Manzoor et al., 2019). Therefore, tourism products are regarded as the basic carrier and main form of the tourism economy, accounting for a significant proportion of international trade exchanges (Cronjé & du Plessis, 2020).

Operators and decision-makers of tourism enterprises must effectively address the turbulent business environment and different consumption decisions in the post-pandemic era. Currently, with the rapid expansion of the international tourism market, many enterprises are innovating in the language design of tourism product packaging. This is typically based on the host country’s language to highlight the characteristics of tourism products, while also aligning with tourists’ native language and international common languages.

On the one hand, this aims to improve customers’ competence perception of tourism products, which is closely related to the image of the country of origin or other types of stereotypes (Chen & Hsu, 2021). For example, Japan has always been committed to technological excellence (Shapoval et al., 2018), and paid attention to environment-friendly designs and product recyclability (Li et al., 2022; Tseng et al., 2020). Therefore, including Japanese in product packaging stimulates consumers’ associations with high performance and sustainable development, while conveying the brand’s personality and cultural characteristics. Similarly, using English in product packaging can stimulate consumers’ association with fashion and modernization owing to its status as an international language (Smith et al., 2018). Hence, adding English to the packaging of tourism products can generate positive associations to maximize product benefits (Khalid et al., 2022). On the other hand, using large market languages including Chinese on the packaging of tourism products can improve customers’ warmth perception of the products by attracting language users and improving tourists’ preferences for tourism products (Stone & Nyaupanane, 2019). Recently, the high consumption of Chinese tourists traveling abroad has garnered significant attention from industry and academia(Hung et al., 2021; Jin et al., 2020; Wen et al., 2018; Ying & Wen, 2019). Businesses aim to improve the intimate perception of products through Chinese product packaging (Gao et al., 2020; Lin, 2017).

By leveraging competence and warmth perceptions through multilingual product packaging design, tourism products will be preferred by consumers significantly, thereby boosting tourists’ purchase intentions (Khan & Lee, 2020; Zhang & Lin, 2018).

Existing literature has extensively explored the role of language in the international market by focusing on consumer perceptions including perceived national identity, power perception, and stereotype perception. By examining consumer responses to packaging language information, enterprises can optimize product packaging strategies to attract consumers and enhance purchase decisions. In tourism shopping contexts, consumers often encounter tourism product packaging in multiple languages, which leads to diverse perspectives. However, limited research has addressed how tourists perceive tourism product packaging in different language portfolios and the role of cultural identity in shaping these perceptions. Therefore, in the post-pandemic era, this study aims to explore how consumers respond to different language portfolios on packaging. The study investigates perceptual differences caused by language diversity, discusses the role of cultural identity, and proposes effective packaging language strategies for enterprises aiming to enhance consumer purchase intention.

To explore the competence and warmth characteristics of multilingual packaging, this study selects monolingual, bilingual, and trilingual forms of language packaging of sake products for empirical analysis. The specific steps include: (1) Presenting pictures of sake with only Japanese (monolingual), Japanese and English (bilingual), and Japanese, English, and Chinese (trilingual) to the respondents. (2) Collecting data online by distributing and collecting questionnaires through an online professional research platform, analyzing the logical relationships between questionnaire options, and eliminating invalid responses. (3) Exploring the path mechanism of competence and warmth perceptions in multilingual packaging of tourism products in the post-pandemic era, verifying the mediating effect of consumers’ competence and warmth perceptions between multilingual packaging and purchase intention, and examining the moderating effect of cultural identity in the process. (4) Summarizing and comparing the similarities, differences, and characteristics of the three types of language packaging.

This study aimed to clarify the mechanism by which different types of language packaging and product attributes influence product perceptions. It also explores tourists’ preferences for tourism product attributes and their buying behavior. The study proposes that in the post-pandemic era, enterprises can infer the target market groups of tourism products according to the packaging language (portfolio) and its embodied competence and warmth perceptions. This can provide new theoretical insights for the market positioning of tourism products. Moreover, it has practical significance for formulating scientific and reasonable language strategies for tourism product packaging in a diversified international tourism market.

Specifically, this study is divided into three parts. Sub-study 1 discusses the case where only the host language (Japanese) appears on sake packaging. We analyze the path mechanism by which monolingual packaging influences tourists’ perceptions and purchase intentions, along with the moderating role of cultural identity. This provides preliminary support for the theoretical model of this study.

Sub-study 2 explores the case where the packaging includes the host language (Japanese) and one common international language (English). We examine the mechanism by which bilingual packaging triggers tourists’ perceptions and purchase intentions, and the moderating role of cultural identity by comparing its role with that of monolingual packaging to further verify the theoretical model.

Sub-study 3 investigates the case where the packaging includes the host language (Japanese), one common international language (English), and one large market language (Chinese). We delineate the mechanism by which trilingual packaging influences tourists’ perceptions and purchase intentions, as well as the moderating role of cultural identity. We also compare the differences among monolingual, bilingual, and trilingual packaging to provide strong support for validating the theoretical model in this study.

Literature Review and Research Hypotheses

Competence Perception of Tourism Products

The competence perception of tourism products is based on the cultural connotation and unique significance highlighted by tourism destinations. Previous studies indicate that the authenticity of tourism products (Fu et al., 2018; Zhang & Xie, 2019), cultural connotation(Gao et al., 2020; Mckercher, 2020; Su et al., 2019), origin realization (Volgger et al., 2021; Xie et al., 2012) and exoticness (Gorostidi-Martinez et al., 2017; Steenkamp, 2019) demonstrate the symbolism and uniqueness of tourism products, and thus fall under competence perception.

From a conceptual connotation perspective, cultural connotation and origin realization form the basis for the authenticity of tourism products. This authenticity reflects the close relationship between tourism products and their destinations to highlight the cultural connotation of tourism destinations (Melewar & Skinner, 2020; Park et al., 2019). Therefore, this study further categorizes the competence perception of tourism products into authenticity and exoticness. Authenticity is expressed as originality, legitimacy, and credibility (Soukhathammavong & Park, 2019). Enterprises can emphasize the authenticity of tourism products by highlighting origin characteristics, such as origin sales and the host country’s language, to effectively improve the symbolic meaning and value perception of tourism products (del Barrio García & Prados-Peña, 2019; Kim et al., 2020a).

Exoticness is represented by an international orientation manifested in fashion and quality (Balabanis & Diamantopoulos, 2016). Therefore, when tourism product packaging includes an international common language while maintaining authenticity, consumers tend to perceive the international image of the products. This results in a stronger purchase intention (Steenkamp, 2019). However, incorporating non-tourist destination elements, such as large market language, may dilute the characteristics of tourist destinations(Gomez & Torelli, 2015).

This study posits that highlighting the host language and the international common languages can enhance tourists’ competence perception of tourism products. The host language enhances tourists’ original perception, while the international common language improves tourists’ exotic perception of the tourism products. Conversely, including a large market language may weaken both originality and exoticness perceptions. Therefore, this study proposes the following hypotheses:

H1a: Monolingual packaging has a significant positive effect on competence perception.

H1b: Bilingual packaging has a significant positive effect on competence perception.

H1c: Trilingual packaging has a significant negative effect on competence perception.

H1d: Competence perception has a significant positive effect on purchase intention.

H1e: Competence perception plays a significant mediating role between multilingual packaging and purchase intention.

Warmth Perception of Tourism Products

The warmth perception of tourism products is manifested in strengthening the emotional attachment and social connection of tourists, which offers tourism products more extensive and richer meanings (Lin et al., 2021). This study summarizes the warmth perception of tourism products as the perception of affinity and connection. Affinity is interpreted as the ultimate experience of warmth perception, derived from tourists’ identity in product design and their attachment and belonging to their own country (Pontinha & do Vale, 2019; Wood, 2020).

Previous studies have suggested that including consumers’ native language in product packaging helps consumers understand product information and enhances their emotional attachment and sense of belonging to their home country (Khan & Lee, 2020). This strengthened affinity for the products results in positive product evaluation and purchase intention (Ashraf et al., 2019).

Connectivity is manifested in the social connections facilitated by tourism products, which function as gifts conveying tourists’ memories and emotions about tourism destinations (Jin et al., 2020; Li & Ryan, 2018). When tourists perceive that tourism products can express their feelings and memories of the tourism destination to others, they develop a strong connection awareness, thereby leading to a strong purchase intention.

Therefore, this study posits that highlighting the large market language and the host country’s language can enhance tourists’ warmth perception of tourism products. The large market language increases tourists’ affinity for the products, while the host country’s language helps convey their feelings and memories of the tourism destination. This leads to a higher connection sensitivity. Conversely, the affinity and connection perceptions produced by the international common languages are lower, thus resulting in a weakened warmth perception. Therefore, this study proposes the following hypotheses:

H2a: Monolingual packaging has a significant positive effect on warmth perception.

H2b: Bilingual packaging has a significant negative effect on warmth perception.

H2c: Trilingual packaging has a significant positive effect on warmth perception.

H2d: Warmth perception has a significant positive effect on purchase intention.

H2e: Warmth perception plays a significant mediating role between multilingual packaging and purchase intention.

Significance of Multilingual Packaging

In recent years, owing to the impact of the pandemic, consumers have preferred sustainable “fashion.” This trend has led enterprises to incorporate sustainability concepts into tourism product packaging (Paiano et al., 2020). Part of this approach involves using visual language with natural elements, including a multilingual word portfolio, in packaging design (Festila & Chrysochou, 2018). Domestic and international marketing literature has extensively explored the role of language in the global market. For example, some scholars have examined the impact of international and national languages on perceived national identity. They suggest that international languages often emphasize global appeal, enhancing the “internationalism” of products and brands(Kizgin et al., 2020; Licsandru & Cui, 2019). Conversely, national languages foster consumer affinity and belonging. Regarding power perception, scholars have analyzed the influence of mainstream and subordinate languages. They argue that dominant languages are associated with social, economic, cultural, and political power, thereby suggesting more favorable social connections (Pezzuti et al., 2021). Furthermore, studies on stereotype perceptions highlight how specific languages can enhance a product’s symbolic identity and image perception. Tailoring language to target markets improves the congruence between product and language, enhancing marketing effectiveness (Hornikx & van Meurs, 2017; Pogacar et al., 2021).

This study further suggests that multilingual packaging can affect tourists’ purchase intention in two distinct ways. First, from the cognitive aspect, cognitive legitimacy plays a crucial role in shaping tourists’ perceptions of tourism products. Some studies indicate that higher cognitive legitimacy in multilingual packaging strategies enhances tourists’ recognition of tourism products as tangible embodiments of their tourism experiences (Kock et al., 2019), thereby fostering positive purchase intentions.

Second, from the emotional aspect, the emotional attachment conveyed through multilingual packaging significantly impacts tourists’ purchase intention (Dwyer et al., 2019). Attachment generates strong emotional desires but also increases individuals’ investment and commitment to maintaining the attachment relationship (DeMarco & Newheiser, 2019; Hur et al., 2020; Wang et al., 2020). This investment is reflected in tourists’ willingness to allocate personal resources to maintain their relationship with the tourism product (Han et al., 2019). Tourists with higher attachment levels tend to develop a sense of belonging and emotional connection through tourism products. This enhances their social relationships (Li & Ryan, 2018) and fosters positive purchase intentions. Therefore, this study proposes the following hypotheses:

H3a: Monolingual packaging significantly correlates positively with purchase intention.

H3b: Bilingual packaging significantly correlates positively with purchase intention.

H3c: Trilingual packaging significantly correlates positively with purchase intention.

Effects of Cultural Identity

Language significantly contributes to expressing cultural norms and beliefs (Carroll & Luna, 2011; Puntoni et al., 2009) and serves as a vital symbol of identity (Fitriati & Rata, 2021). The theory of target culture effect emphasizes that consumers perceive specific language strategies as targeting particular cultures rather than individuals residing in the country where the language is used. Consumer recognition of the underlying culture significantly influences their attitudes (Motsi & Park, 2020). Disagreement with the cultural values behind a language, even among its users, can lead to low product evaluations (Gopinath et al., 2013). Aligning language use with consumers’ cultural values can improve their consumption experience (Shavitt & Barnes, 2020).

Moreover, consumers’ cultural identity enhances the smoothness and comfort perceived when using language (Carroll & Luna, 2011). According to the selective access model, closer cultural distances intensify tourists’ emotional attachment through language strategies, thereby enhancing warmth. Conversely, cultural distances that accentuate differences between tourists’ national culture and others will be further strengthened (Liu et al., 2020). The language that effectively represents and highlights characteristics of the host country reinforces tourists’ sense of destination identity (Lai et al., 2018), which fosters perceptions of authenticity and exoticism and strengthens competence perception. Therefore, this study hypothesizes that consumers’ cultural identity will affect the competence and warmth perceptions caused by the multilingual packaging of tourism products. Hence, the study proposes the following hypotheses:

H4a: Cultural identity plays a significant moderating role between multilingual packaging and competence perception.

H4b: Cultural identity plays a significant moderating role between multilingual packaging and warmth perception.

Therefore, a theoretical model diagram of the product purchase intention promotion path via multilingual packaging is constructed, as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1.

Theoretical model diagram.

Research Design

With the onset of the global COVID-19 pandemic, tourism activities were among the first to cease. Countries shifted their focus to preventing virus spread and implementing emergency stimulus measures to mitigate economic slowdowns. While several studies document the pandemic’s immediate economic impact on tourism (Mariolis et al., 2020; Qiu et al., 2020; Yang et al., 2020), many scholars argue that it provides an opportunity for the tourism industry to prioritize a more sustainable tourism model over the traditional growth-oriented approach(Gössling, 2021; Niewiadomski, 2020; Prideaux et al., 2020; Sigala, 2020).

Sake, as a representative traditional drink of Japan, has a long history. It has become a crucial symbol of Japanese culture. Therefore, to align with the sustainable development goals advocated in the post-pandemic era, this study focuses on the packaging designs of sake that embody traditional culture and natural product attributes. Respondents are presented with sake packaging images in three different language portfolios: monolingual, bilingual, and trilingual versions. The monolingual packaging (Japanese only) highlights sake as a significant symbol of Japanese culture while emphasizing its tradition and locality. This appeals particularly to consumers seeking an authentic Japanese experience, particularly those deeply interested in Japanese culture (Li & Katsumata, 2020). The bilingual packaging (in Japanese and English) preserves the distinctive features of Japanese culture while being more adaptable to the international market, particularly in Europe and the United States. Including English makes product information more accessible to global consumers (Cleveland & Bartsch, 2019). This demonstrates the openness and adaptability of sake brands in cross-cultural communication. The trilingual packaging (Japanese, English, and Chinese) further expands market coverage and impact, particularly in the Chinese market. The introduction of Chinese enhances the appeal to Chinese consumers and reinforces the product’s cultural identity in the Chinese market (Su & Chun, 2021). Through this layered approach to language packaging, sake brands can accurately communicate their cultural identity and brand image. They also flexibly adjust their marketing strategies to influence Chinese consumers’ purchasing decisions and brand loyalty. This packaging strategy enhances the global competitiveness of sake and highlights its diversity and inclusiveness as a cultural product.

Following the guidelines for multilingual packaging design outlined above, the fourth author, as a researcher with Japanese participant relations, conducted in-depth visits with academic teachers and classmates to deepen his understanding of the Japanese cultural market during initial product determination and evaluation. These exchanges elucidated the role and significance of sake in Japanese culture (Lee & Shin, 2015; Sasaki et al., 2019).

Subsequently, the first, second, third, and fourth authors collaborated to design the research framework by focusing on Chinese tourists purchasing products in Japan. The research scenario emphasizes alignment among products, individuals, and cultures. Specifically:

Sub-study 1 analyzes the effect of monolingual packaging strategies (e.g., sake packaging solely in Japanese) on competence and warmth perceptions of tourism products, their effects on tourists’ purchase intention, and the moderating role of cultural identity.

Sub-study 2 extends Sub-study 1 by adding language (e.g., English) and analyzing the effects of bilingual packaging (e.g., Japanese and English) on competence and warmth perceptions, purchase intention, and cultural identity moderation.

Sub-study 3 builds upon Sub-study 2 by introducing another language (e.g., Chinese) to investigate the effects of trilingual packaging (e.g., Japanese, English, and Chinese) on competence and warmth perceptions, purchase intention, and cultural identity moderation. To maintain experimental rigor, the packaging variations across these studies are limited to language differences, while other elements including accessories and colors remain consistent. This approach ensures the integrity and reliability of the studies.

The measurement items for each variable are adapted from established scales, and tailored to fit the objectives of this study. Among them, multilingual packaging is assessed using five items from Zaichkowsky’s (1994) product involvement scale, including “the language information on the product packaging (Japanese only/including Japanese and English/including Japanese, English, and Chinese) is important to you.” Cultural identity is evaluated with five items from Cleveland et al.’s (2015) national and ethnic identity scale, such as “you are willing to learn the culture and lifestyle of other countries.” Competence perception adopts four items from Fu et al.’s (2018) authenticity scale and three items from Strizhakova and Coulter’s (2015) quality function scale, including “you think the product is processed from local materials” and “you think that the packaging language of the product can be used as a sign of its characteristics and quality.” Warmth perception utilizes six items from Khan and Lee’s (2020) consumer ethnocentric scale and seven items from Hollebeek et al.’s (2014) independent brand connection scale, such as “the product is packaged in a language designed to be friendly to you and even your country” and “you will recommend the product to friends and family.” Purchase intention refers to five items from Dodds et al.’s (1991) purchase intention scale, such as “you think buying this product is worthy of recognition.” All variables are measured using a five-point Likert scale. The specific questions are listed in Table 1.

Table 1.

Questionnaire Measurement Items.

Variables	Measurement items
Multilingual packaging	The language information on the product packaging (Japanese only/including Japanese and English/including Japanese, English, and Chinese) is important to you.
	You are willing to give and receive timely feedback on the language packaging (Japanese only/including Japanese and English/including Japanese, English, and Chinese) of this product.
	You will carefully consider and analyze the language information on the product packaging (Japanese only/including Japanese and English/including Japanese, English, and Chinese) when making a travel product purchase decision.
	You actively collect linguistic information on the packaging of this product (Japanese only/including Japanese and English/including Japanese, English, and Chinese).
	You consider the use of packaging language (Japanese only/including Japanese and English/including Japanese, English, and Chinese) on the packaging of this product to be necessary.
Cultural identity	You are willing to learn the culture and lifestyle of other countries.
	You are willing to spend time with people from other cultures or countries and learn about their perspectives.
	You enjoy observing people from different cultures and want to learn from them.
	You are willing to exchange ideas with people from other cultures or countries.
	You are interested in learning more about people who live in other countries.
Competence perception	You believe that the product is produced in its country of origin.
	You think the product reflects local customs and culture.
	You think the product is processed from local materials.
	You think the product is made by local people.
	You think that the packaging language of the product can be used as a sign of its characteristics and quality.
	You have chosen this product because it has properties that are relevant to the country or region.
	The language of the packaging tells you a lot about the country or region.
Warmth perception	You think the product is available in your country.
	The product is packaged in a language designed to be friendly to you and even your country.
	You feel that the language of the packaging has been designed to make you feel emotionally attached to the product.
	You think the product has elements of your country or region.
	The language of the packaging is easy for you to read.
	The product gives you a sense of belonging.
	You would discuss the product with friends or family.
	You will recommend the product to friends and family.
	The product connects you more closely with others.
	You would like to take the product back to your place of residence.
	You think the product could be a gift for someone else.
	You would like to show the product to people in your neighborhood.
	The product is a good fit for someone in your circle.
Purchase intention	The likelihood of you buying this product is high.
	You would consider this product if you were to buy a travel product.
	You would consider buying this product based on the information in the language of the product packaging.
	You think buying this product is worthy of recognition.
	You are willing to buy tourism products and services provided by tourism enterprises.

The study analyzes perceptions of competence and warmth of different language portfolios in tourists’ purchase intention. It also compares the monolingual, bilingual, and trilingual properties of language packaging, to comprehensively and systematically explore the mechanism of the influence of multi-language packaging strategies on the purchase decision of broadly defined tourism products. The study aims to offer a novel perspective on understanding the purchase decisions related to tourism products.

Sub-study 1: Products with Monolingual Packaging

Sub-study 1 analyzes how the monolingual packaging strategy affects tourists’ competence and warmth perceptions of international tourism products and their purchase intention. Besides, it explores how cultural identity moderates between monolingual packaging and competence perception and warmth perception to build the purchase intention promotion mechanism for products with monolingual packaging.

Sample and Methodology

Sub-study 1 first presented pictures of sake in Japanese to the 138 respondents, as shown in Figure 2. Then the online professional research platform was used to distribute and collect the questionnaire data. After eliminating invalid questionnaires with incorrect answers, missing questions, and inconsistent logic, 113 valid questionnaires were finally obtained, with a questionnaire validity rate of 81.88%. In terms of gender, the number of men and women remained the same; 52.2% were men and 47.8% were women. Concerning age, the participants under the age of 45 account for 64.6%. Concerning educational background, several participants received a high school education or a bachelor’s degree totaling 74 persons, accounting for 65.5%. Regarding monthly disposable income, most of them had a monthly income from 6,001 to 8,000 yuan. The details are presented in Table 2.

Figure 2.

Picture presentation of the monolingual packaging.

Table 2.

Demographic Information of the Monolingual Packaging Model.

Items	Category	Number	Percentage (%)
Gender	Male	59	52.2
Gender	Female	54	47.8
Age	Below 18 years old	21	18.6
	18–30 years old	26	23.0
	31–45 years old	26	23.0
	46–60 years old	18	15.9
	Above 60 years old	22	19.5
Education	Junior high school and below	16	14.2
	High school, junior college, or technical school	34	30.1
	College or bachelor’s degree	40	35.4
	Postgraduate and above	23	20.4
Monthly disposable income	RMB 2,000 and below	17	15.0
	RMB 2,001–4,000	15	13.3
	RMB 4,001–6,000	24	21.2
	RMB 6,001–8,000	28	24.8
	RMB 8,001–10,000	12	10.6
	RMB 10,001 and above	17	15.0

Findings

The measurement model analysis results are as follows. First, the PLS-SEM analysis results suggest that the factor distribution of each dimension conforms to the expected setting of the scale. To ensure the reliability of the data, the required indicators for the composition are above .65. The output results indicate that the data structure is relatively reasonable, and the five indicators required have received satisfactory feedback. Second, the standardized results are used for analysis. As listed in Table 3, the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient of each latent variable exceeded .8, the composite reliability (CR) exceeded .8, and the average variance extracted (AVE) exceeded 0.5. This indicated that the reliability and validity of each latent variable were significant. Third, as listed in Table 4, in the model test, the R² values of warmth perception, competence perception, and purchase intention were all above .5, and the model fit index (NFI) was 0.742. This indicated that the model-fitting effect was robust in this study.

Table 3.

Construct Reliability and Validity of the Monolingual Packaging Model.

Variable	Cronbach’s alpha	rho_A	CR	AVE
Monolingual packaging	.840	.845	.887	0.612
Cultural identity	.861	.870	.900	0.644
Warmth perception	.866	.868	.895	0.516
Competence perception	.831	.834	.881	0.597
Purchase intention	.832	.837	.881	0.598

Table 4.

Predictive Power of the Monolingual Packaging Model.

Variable	R ²	Adjusted R²
Warmth perception	.655	.645
Competence perception	.722	.715
Purchase intention	.747	.740

The results of the structural model analysis are presented in Table 5. First, monolingual packaging had a significant positive effect on tourists’ competence perception and warmth perception (β_competence = .599, p < .001; β_warmth = .240, p < .01), which is consistent with H1a and H2a. Second, monolingual packaging had a significant positive effect on tourists’ purchase intention (β = .335, p < .001), thus H3a is verified. Third, competence perception and warmth perception had a significant positive effect on tourists’ purchase intention (β_competence = .216, p = .012; β_warmth = .469, p < .001), which is consistent with H1d and H2d. Fourth, both competence perception and warmth perception played a significant mediating role between monolingual packaging and consumers’ purchase intention (P_competence = 0.016; P_warmth = 0.015), thus H1e and H2e are verified. Fifth, cultural identity had a significant moderating effect between language packaging and competence perception and warmth perception (P_competence = 0.032; P_warmth = 0.008), thus H4a and H4b are verified.

Table 5.

Path Coefficients of the Monolingual Packaging Model.

Path	Original sample (O)	Sample mean (M)	Standard deviation (STDEV)	T statistic (\|O/STDEV\|)	p value
Monolingual packaging → warmth perception	0.240	0.239	0.091	2.621	.009
Monolingual packaging → competence perception	0.599	0.583	0.129	4.632	.000
Monolingual packaging → purchase intention	0.335	0.331	0.093	3.598	.000
Warmth perception → purchase intention	0.469	0.474	0.057	8.170	.000
Competence perception → purchase intention	0.216	0.216	0.085	2.528	.012
Moderating effect 1 → competence perception	−0.231	−0.246	0.108	2.145	.032
Moderating effect 2 → warmth perception	0.202	0.200	0.076	2.660	.008
Monolingual packaging → competence perception → purchase intention	0.129	0.124	0.054	2.405	.016
Monolingual packaging → warmth perception → purchase intention	0.112	0.113	0.046	2.440	.015

Discussion

This sub-study explored the mechanism of tourists’ perceptions and purchase intention in the case of monolingual packaging, which provided preliminary support for the theoretical model of this study. By displaying pictures of sake in Japanese to the respondents, and analyzing the data from 113 questionnaires, the study suggests that when tourism products are packaged in one language, consumers’ competence perception and warmth perception are improved, thereby enhancing their intention to buy the products. However, the monolingual packaging will lead to enhanced tourists’ perception of the authenticity of tourism products, that is, the effect on competence perception is stronger than that of warmth perception. In addition, cultural identity also plays a significant moderating role between monolingual packaging and tourists’ perceptions, especially because it can strengthen tourists’ perception of warmth to balance the perceptions of competence and warmth of tourism products. However, this sub-study only discusses the case of the host country’s language (Japanese), which has limitations, and it is unknown whether and how the path mechanism will change if the international common language (English) is added to the product packaging, which leads to the next sub-study.

Sub-study 2: Products with Bilingual Packaging

Sub-study 2 incorporates an additional language based on Sub-study 1 to analyze how the monolingual packaging strategy affects tourists’ competence and warmth perceptions of international tourism products, as well as tourists’ purchase intention. Moreover, it explores how cultural identity moderates between bilingual packaging and competence perception and warmth perception to build the purchase intention promotion mechanism for products with bilingual packaging.

Sample and Methodology

Sub-study 2 first presented pictures of sake in Japanese and English to the 113 respondents, as shown in Figure 3. Then the online professional research platform was used to distribute and collect the questionnaire data. After eliminating invalid questionnaires with incorrect answers, missing questions, and inconsistent logic, 105 valid questionnaires were finally obtained, with a questionnaire validity rate of 92.92%. The number of men and women remained the same. Men were 45.7% and women 54.3%; the majority are under 45 years old, accounting for 61.9%. The educational background and monthly disposable income were distributed quite evenly. The details are presented in Table 6.

Figure 3.

Picture presentation of the bilingual packaging.

Table 6.

Demographic Information of the Bilingual Packaging Model.

Items	Category	Number	Percentage (%)
Gender	Male	48	45.7
Gender	Female	57	54.3
Age	Below 18 years old	23	21.9
	18–30 years old	26	24.8
	31–45 years old	16	15.2
	46–60 years old	17	16.2
	Above 60 years old	23	21.9
Education	Junior high school and below	28	26.7
	High school, junior college, or technical school	19	18.1
	College or bachelor’s degree	32	30.5
	Postgraduate and above	26	24.8
Monthly disposable income	RMB 2,000 and below	23	21.9
	RMB 2,001–4,000	16	15.2
	RMB 4,001–6,000	17	16.2
	RMB 6,001–8,000	16	15.2
	RMB 8,001–10,000	17	16.2
	RMB 10,001 and above	16	15.2

Findings

The measurement model analysis results are as follows. First, the PLS-SEM analysis results suggest that the factor distribution of each dimension conforms to the expected setting of the scale. To ensure the reliability of the data, the required indicators for the composition are above .65. The output results indicate that the data structure is relatively reasonable, and the five indicators required have received good feedback. Second, the standardized results are used for analysis. As listed in Table 7, the Cronbach’s alpha coefficient of each latent variable exceeded .8, the CR exceeded .8, and the AVE surpassed 0.5, indicating that the reliability and validity of each latent variable are high. Third, as listed in Table 8, in the model test, the R² values of warmth perception, competence perception, and purchase intention all exceeded .75, while the model fit index (NFI) was 0.760. This indicated that the model fitting effect was robust in Sub-study 2.

Table 7.

Construct Reliability and Validity of the Bilingual Packaging Model.

Variable	Cronbach’s alpha	rho_A	CR	AVE
Bilingual packaging	.854	.869	.895	0.632
Cultural identity	.910	.913	.933	0.735
Warmth perception	.909	.915	.924	0.504
Competence perception	.926	.927	.940	0.692
Purchase intention	.903	.906	.928	0.721

Table 8.

Predictive Power of the Bilingual Packaging Model.

Variable	R ²	Adjusted R²
Warmth perception	.814	.809
Competence perception	.809	.803
Purchase intention	.820	.815

The results of the structural model analysis are presented in Table 9. First, bilingual packaging has a significant positive effect on tourists’ competence perception( β = .519, p < .001), and it has a significant negative effect on tourists’ warmth perception (β = −.264, p < .001), which is consistent with H1b and H2b. Second, bilingual packaging has a significant positive effect on tourists’ purchase intention (β = .205, p < .001), thus H3b is verified. Third, both competence perception and warmth perception can significantly and positively affect tourists’ purchase intention (β_competence = .696, p < .001; β_warmth = .194, p = 0.015), which is consistent with H1d and H2d. Fourth, both competence perception and warmth perception play a significant mediating role between bilingual packaging and consumers’ purchase intention (P_competence < 0.001; P_warmth = 0.034), thus H1e and H2e are verified. Fifth, cultural identity has a significant moderating effect between bilingual packaging and perceptions of competence and warmth (P_competence < 0.001; P _warmth < 0.001), thus H4a and H4b are verified.

Table 9.

Path Coefficients of the Bilingual Packaging Model.

Path	Original sample (O)	Sample mean (M)	Standard deviation (STDEV)	T statistic (\|O/STDEV\|)	p value
Bilingual packaging → warmth perception	−0.264	−0.252	0.062	4.248	.000
Bilingual packaging → competence perception	0.519	0.506	0.070	7.419	.000
Bilingual packaging → purchase intention	0.205	0.205	0.058	3.526	.000
Warmth perception → purchase intention	0.194	0.203	0.080	2.424	.015
Competence perception → purchase intention	0.696	0.687	0.075	9.285	.000
Moderating effect 1 → competence perception	0.285	0.273	0.062	4.629	.000
Moderating effect 2 → warmth perception	−0.261	−0.248	0.053	4.883	.000
Bilingual packaging → competence perception → purchase intention	0.361	0.350	0.069	5.253	.000
Bilingual packaging → warmth perception → purchase intention	−0.051	−0.051	0.024	2.119	.034

Discussions

Sub-study 2 adds the international common language (English) to Sub-study 1 to explore the mechanism of tourists’ perceptions and purchase intention in the case of bilingual packaging, which provides further support for the theoretical model of this study. Through presenting sake packaging containing Japanese and English to the respondents, and analyzing 105 measurement objects, the results suggest that the use of bilingual packaging for tourism products can enhance consumers’ competence perception, whereas the warmth perception will decline. However, owing to the greater effect of competence perception on purchase intention, bilingual packaging can enhance the purchase intention of products through competence perception. Cultural identity also plays a significant moderating effect between bilingual language packaging and perceptions of competence and warmth. Although this sub-study enriches the languages based on Sub-study 1 and discusses the combination of the host language (Japanese) and the international common language (English), however, as a result of the rapid expansion of the scale of the international tourism market, the number of tourists whose mother tongue is the large market language is increasing, and the language with a large proportion of market capacity will inevitably be used on the packaging of tourism products, which leads to Sub-study 3.

Sub-study 3: Products with Trilingual Packaging

Sub-study 3 adds one more language based on Sub-study 2 to analyze how the trilingual packaging strategy affects tourists’ competence and warmth perceptions of international tourism products as well as their purchase intention. Moreover, it explores how cultural identity moderates between trilingual packaging and competence perception and warmth perception to build the purchase intention promotion mechanism for products with trilingual packaging.

Sample and Methodology

This sub-study adopts a similar method. First, the pictures of sake in three languages (Japanese, English, and Chinese) were displayed to the respondents, as shown in Figure 4. Then the data were collected online, and 117 valid questionnaires were finally obtained. In terms of gender, the number of men and women remains the same, of which 47.9% are men and 52.1% are women; In terms of age, participants under the age of 45 account for 63.2%; In terms of educational background, the number of participants with junior college or a bachelor’s degree is the largest, with a total of 37 persons, accounting for 31.6%; Their monthly disposable income is mostly between 4,001 and 8,000 yuan. The details are presented in Table 10.

Figure 4.

Picture presentation of the trilingual packaging.

Table 10.

Demographic Information of the Trilingual Packaging Model.

Items	Category	Number	Percentage (%)
Gender	Male	56	47.9
Gender	Female	61	52.1
Age	Below 18 years old	21	17.9
	18–30 years old	24	20.5
	31–45 years old	29	24.8
	46–60 years old	22	18.8
	Above 60 years old	21	17.9
Education	Junior high school and below	30	25.6
	High school, junior college, or technical school	21	17.9
	College or Bachelor’s degree	37	31.6
	Postgraduate and above	29	24.8
Monthly disposable income	RMB 2,000 and below	12	10.3
	RMB 2,001–4,000	14	12.0
	RMB 4,001–6,000	26	22.2
	RMB 6,001–8,000	25	21.4
	RMB 8,001–10,000	18	15.4
	RMB 10,001 and above	22	18.8

Results

The measurement model analysis results are as follows. First, the PLS-SEM analysis results suggest that the factor distribution of each dimension conforms to the expected setting of the scale. To ensure the reliability of the data, the required indicators for the composition are above .65. The output results indicate that the data structure is relatively reasonable, and the five indicators required have received good feedback. Second, the standardized results are used for analysis. As listed in Table 11, the Cronbach’s Alpha coefficient of each latent variable is greater than .7, the composite reliability (CR) is greater than .8, and the average variance extracted (AVE) is greater than 0.5, indicating that the reliability and validity of each latent variable are high. Third, as listed in Table 12, in the model test, the R² values of warmth perception, competence perception, and purchase intention are all above .5, and the model fit index (NFI) is 0.797, indicating that the model fitting effect is good in Sub-study 3.

Table 11.

Construct Reliability and Validity of the Trilingual Packaging Model.

Variable	Cronbach’s alpha	rho_A	CR	AVE
Trilingual packaging	.872	.875	.907	0.661
Cultural identity	.914	.914	.935	0.744
Warmth perception	.954	.955	.959	0.645
Competence perception	.714	.721	.822	0.537
Purchase intention	.861	.863	.900	0.643

Table 12.

Predictive Power of the Trilingual Packaging Model.

Variable	R ²	Adjusted R²
Warmth perception	.847	.843
Competence perception	.747	.740
Purchase intention	.718	.711

The results of the structural model analysis are presented in Table 13. First, trilingual packaging has a significant positive effect on tourists’ perception of warmth (β = .571, p < .001), which has a significant negative effect on tourists’ competence perception (β = −.215, p < .01), which is consistent with H1c and H2c. Second, trilingual packaging does not have a significant positive effect on tourists’ purchase intention (β = −.076, p = .432), thus H3c is not verified. Third, both competence perception and warmth perception can significantly and positively affect tourists’ purchase intention (β_competence = .296, p < .001; β_warmth = .756, p < .001), which is consistent with H1d and H2d. Fourth, both competence perception and warmth perception play a significant mediating role between trilingual packaging and consumers’ purchase intention (P_competence = 0.023; P_warmth < 0.001), thus H1e and H2e are verified. Fifth, cultural identity has a significant moderating effect between trilingual packaging and competence perception and warmth perception (P_competence < 0.001; P_warmth = 0.045), thus H4a and H4b are verified.

Table 13.

Path Coefficients of the Trilingual Packaging Model.

Path	Original sample (O)	Sample mean (M)	Standard deviation (STDEV)	T statistic (\|O/STDEV\|)	p value
Trilingual packaging → warmth perception	0.571	0.572	0.039	14.740	.000
Trilingual packaging → competence perception	−0.215	−0.221	0.069	3.107	.002
Trilingual packaging → purchase intention	−0.076	−0.071	0.096	0.786	.432
Warmth perception → purchase intention	0.756	0.753	0.092	8.211	.000
Competence perception → purchase intention	0.296	0.300	0.063	4.657	.000
Moderating effect 1 → competence perception	0.334	0.329	0.064	5.181	.000
Moderating effect 2 → warmth perception	−0.081	−0.084	0.040	2.009	.045
Trilingual packaging → competence perception → purchase intention	−0.064	−0.067	0.028	2.282	.023
Trilingual packaging → warmth perception → purchase intention	0.432	0.431	0.062	6.966	.000

Discussions

Sub-study 3 adds the large market language (Chinese) to Sub-study 2, which provides strong support for the theoretical model of this study. Through presenting sake packaging containing Japanese, English, and Chinese to the respondents, and analyzing 117 measurement objects, the results suggest that the use of trilingual packaging for tourism products can enhance consumers’ warmth perception whereas their competence perception declines, and consumers’ perceptions of value and quality also decline. However, because warmth perception has a greater effect on purchase intention, trilingual packaging can enhance the purchase intention of the products through warmth perception. Cultural identity also plays a significant moderating role between trilingual packaging and perceptions of competence and warmth.

Conclusions and Discussion

Conclusions

In the post-pandemic era, the consumption phenomenon with tourism shopping as the main purpose has attracted extensive attention from the industry and academia. It has become an urgent problem for tourism enterprises to think and explore how to skillfully use multilingual packaging strategies for tourism products, stimulate tourists’ perceptions (competence perception and warmth perception), and enhance tourists’ purchase intention in combination with cultural identity. As the language portfolio for tourism product packaging is different, tourists’ perceptions of product attributes will also be different. Therefore, this study makes an empirical analysis of the perceptions of competence and warmth in the multilingual packaging of tourism products and explores the moderating effect of cultural identity therein.

Firstly, the higher the level of authenticity of tourism products when they are packaged in one language, the higher the level of consumers’ perception of the brand value. In addition, tourism products packaged in one language can be used as gifts to convey tourists’ memories and emotions about tourism destinations, enhance the connection of tourists’ social relations, and improve consumers’ competence perception and warmth perception, which is moderated by cultural identity to enhance their purchase intention (Sub-study 1). Second, the use of bilingual packaging in tourism products can enhance consumers’ competence perception, whereas warmth perception will decline. However, because competence perception has a greater effect on purchase intention, bilingual packaging can enhance their purchase intention through competence perception, and cultural identity also plays a significant moderating role between bilingual packaging and perceptions of competence and warmth (Sub-study 2). Finally, when trilingual packaging is used for tourism products, it can enhance consumers’ warmth perception to the detriment of their competence perception and consumers’ perception of value and quality. However, owing to the greater effect of warmth perception on purchase intention, trilingual packaging can enhance their purchase intention of the products through warmth perception, and cultural identity also plays a significant moderating role between trilingual packaging and perceptions of competence and warmth (Sub-study 3).

In summary, this study reveals the mechanisms of the perceptions of competence and warmth behind different language packages, and how cultural factors affect the decision-making process of consumers, thus highlighting the role and importance of language packages in the transmission of emotions, brand value, social ties and so on. This not only helps to promote the development of market positioning and promotion strategies for tourism products but also provides new theoretical perspectives and empirical evidence for the study of cross-cultural marketing and consumer behavior.

Theoretical Implications

Theoretically, the findings of this study are of great significance in the following three aspects. First, starting from the multilingual packaging strategy that reflects the natural attributes of products, this study considers the effectiveness of multilingual packaging strategies for tourism products from the perspective of enterprises’ market positioning and tourist perceptions. Previous studies on tourism product strategies were mainly from the perspectives of national identity perception (Stone & Nyaupane, 2019), power perception (Kim et al., 2020b), and stereotype perception (Shen et al., 2019), but the basic fact that multilingual packaging strategy serves enterprises and tourists was ignored. Therefore, from the perceptive and emotional angles, this study proposes that in the post-pandemic era, enterprises can infer the target market groups of tourism products according to the language (portfolio) used in the tourism products packaging, and divide the product packaging language into monolingual, bilingual and trilingual versions; that is, tourists regard tourism products as targeted at a country or culture according to the packaging language portfolio, to provide new theoretical insights for the market positioning of tourism products of enterprises in the post-pandemic era.

Second, this study is not limited to the definition of tourism products in traditional tourism management research, namely, the concept of tourism souvenirs in a narrow sense (Ho et al., 2021; Keskitalo et al., 2021; Sthapit, 2018), but extends the concept of tourism products and summarizes its characteristics as competence attributes (authenticity and exoticness) and warmth attributes (affinity and connection) to further investigate the effects of multilingual packaging strategies on the basic attributes of tourism products, explore the attribute preferences of tourists for tourism products and final purchase decisions, and comprehensively and systematically consider the effect mechanism of multilingual packaging strategies on the purchase decision of tourism products in a broad sense to make theoretical contributions to the existing research on the purchase decision of tourism products.

Third, this study divides the multilingual scenes into monolingual, bilingual, and trilingual, comparing the effects of multilingual packaging on tourists’ competence perception and warmth perception under the three language scenarios, which confirms that under the monolingual packaging, the consumer’s competence perception and warmth perception will be improved; under the bilingual packaging, consumers’ competence perception is enhanced, but the warmth perception will be weakened; and under the trilingual packaging, consumers’ warmth perception is enhanced, but their competence perception will be weakened. This shows that the cultural connotation and emotional connection in different multilingual packaging scenarios will be biased. Therefore, this study proposes that the advantages of different languages can be weighed, thus furnishing novel ideas in the marketing field in the post-pandemic era.

Practical Implications

The diversified market characteristics of the international tourism market make it difficult for enterprises to grasp the needs of consumer groups and their positioning. Based on the basic characteristics of the international tourism market and the market positioning of enterprises, this study attempts to divide multilingual strategies into monolingual, bilingual, and trilingual forms to deeply discuss the effects of three types of language packaging on tourists’ purchase decisions of tourism products to provide managerial enlightenment for tourism enterprises to grasp the reasonable positioning of tourism product sales in the international tourism market in the post-pandemic era and formulate reasonable and effective packaging strategies of tourism products.

This study suggests that in the post-pandemic era, enterprises should focus on the internal needs of consumers in the process of formulating tourism product packaging language strategies. In the purchase decision of tourism products, tourists will not only pay attention to the tourism destination characteristics of tourism products (i.e., the symbolic characteristics such as authenticity and place of origin realization) but also consider the characteristics of pragmatic tendencies such as affinity and connection of tourism products. When enterprises adopt a specific packaging language strategy, they often need to make trade-offs between different characteristics. For instance, when enterprises adopt trilingual designs including Japanese, English, and Chinese on sake products, they must weigh the authenticity and affinity of products. Moreover, in this process, the factor of consumer cultural identity should be considered, which will facilitate tourism enterprises to understand better the consumption needs of tourists (Yi et al., 2021), design packaging language strategies closer to the tourists’ consumption needs, improve the competitiveness of tourism products and enhance the image of tourism destinations.

Research Limitations and Prospect

This study explores the mediating role of competence and warmth perceptions between multilingual packaging (monolingual, bilingual, and trilingual) of tourism products and tourists’ purchase intention, as well as the moderating role of cultural identity to build the purchase intention promotion mechanism. However, owing to various subjective or objective reasons, this study is unavoidable with limitations. First, although this study discusses the effect of competence perception (authenticity and exoticness) and warmth perception (affinity and connection) produced by multilingual packaging on purchase intention, this approach is not the only one, and subsequent studies can attempt to explore this mechanism from different theoretical perspectives. Second, this study only discusses the moderating role of cultural identity between multilingual packaging and tourist perceptions, but they may be affected by consumers’ characteristics and knowledge structure, which can be further explored in subsequent research. Third, this study considers the natural attributes of tourism products and takes them as part of the experimental design, however, it does not verify whether the environmental factors will affect tourists’ perceptions and purchase intention. Therefore, future research can consider the role of environmental factors and expand the theoretical model of this study to further deepen the sustainable development concept of tourism in the post-pandemic era.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

We appreciate the time and effort that reviewers put into reviewing our manuscript and providing us with valuable comments and suggestions.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This study is supported by the funding of Social Science Planning Project in Nanchang City (XW202404); Humanities and Social Sciences Planning Fund of the Ministry of Education (24YJA860021); National Social Science Fund Post-funding Project (22FXWB020); Graduate Innovation Special Fund Project in Jiangxi Province (YC2023-S431); The 18th Student Research Project of Jiangxi University of Finance and Economics (20231013234221093); National Natural Science Foundation of China (72102151); National Natural Science Foundation of China (72362017); National Statistical Science Research Project (2024LZ030); Ganpo Talent Support Program for Cultural Leaders Funding Project.

Ethical Approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Informed Consent

Informed Consent was obtained from all participants included in the study.

ORCID iD

Yingqi Wu

Data Availability Statement

All data relevant to the study are included in the article. In addition, the data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request, but restrictions apply to the availability of these data, which were used under license for the current study, and so are not publicly available.

References

Ashraf

Ismawati Jaafar

Sulaiman

(2019). System- vs. consumer-generated recommendations: Affective and social-psychological effects on purchase intention. Behaviour & Information Technology, 38(12), 1259–1272. https://doi.org/10.1080/0144929x.2019.1583285

Balabanis

Diamantopoulos

(2016). Consumer xenocentrism as determinant of foreign product preference: A system justification perspective. Journal of International Marketing, 24(3), 58–77. https://doi.org/10.1509/jim.15.0138

Carroll

Luna

(2011). The other meaning of fluency. Journal of Advertising, 40(3), 73–84.https://doi.org/10.2753/JOA0091-3367400306

Chen

Hsu

C. H. C.

(2021). Tourist stereotype content: Dimensions and accessibility. Annals of Tourism Research, 89, 103212. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2021.103212

Cleveland

Bartsch

(2019). Global consumer culture: Epistemology and ontology. International Marketing Review, 36(4), 556–580. https://doi.org/10.1108/imr-10-2018-0287

Cleveland

Laroche

Takahashi

(2015). The intersection of global consumer culture and national identity and the effect on Japanese consumer behavior. Journal of International Consumer Marketing, 27(5), 364–387. https://doi.org/10.1080/08961530.2015.1014281

Cronjé

D. F.

du Plessis

(2020). A review on tourism destination competitiveness. Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management, 45, 256–265. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhtm.2020.06.012

del Barrio-García

Prados-Peña

M. B.

(2019). Do brand authenticity and brand credibility facilitate brand equity? The case of heritage destination brand extension. Journal of Destination Marketing & Management, 13, 10–23. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jdmm.2019.05.002

DeMarco

T. C.

Newheiser

A. K.

(2019). Attachment to groups: Relationships with group esteem, self–esteem, and investment in ingroups. European Journal of Social Psychology, 49(1), 63–75. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2500

10.

Dodds

W. B.

Monroe

K. B.

Grewal

(1991). Effects of price, brand, and store information on buyers’ product evaluations. Journal of Marketing Research, 28(3), 307–319. https://doi.org/10.1177/002224379102800305

11.

Dwyer

Chen

Lee

(2019). The role of place attachment in tourism research. Journal of Travel & Tourism Marketing, 36(5), 645–652. https://doi.org/10.1080/10548408.2019.1612824

12.

Festila

Chrysochou

(2018). Implicit communication of food product healthfulness through package design: A content analysis. Journal of Consumer Behaviour, 17(5), 461–476. https://doi.org/10.1002/cb.1732

13.

Fitriati

S. W.

Rata

(2021). Language, globalisation, and national identity: A study of English-medium policy and practice in Indonesia. Journal of Language, Identity & Education, 20(6), 411–424. https://doi.org/10.1080/15348458.2020.1777865

14.

Liu

Wang

Chao

R. F.

(2018). How experiential consumption moderates the effects of souvenir authenticity on behavioral intention through perceived value. Tourism Management, 69, 356–367. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tourman.2018.06.023

15.

Gao

Liu

Sun

(2020). Branding cultural products in international markets: A study of hollywood movies in China. Journal of Marketing, 84(3), 86–105. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022242920912704

16.

Gomez

Torelli

C. J.

(2015). It's not just numbers: Cultural identities influence how nutrition information influences the valuation of foods. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 25(3), 404–415. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcps.2015.01.005

17.

Gopinath

Glassman

Nyer

(2013). How culture of targeting impacts the evaluation of products with multilingual packaging. Psychology & Marketing, 30(6), 490–500. https://doi.org/10.1002/mar.20622

18.

Gorostidi-Martinez

Zhao

(2017). A study of the Chinese consumers’ product-country image of Spain. Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics, 29(5), 947–977. https://doi.org/10.1108/APJML-12-2016-0250

19.

Gössling

(2021). Tourism, technology and ICT: A critical review of affordances and concessions. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, 29(5), 733–750. https://doi.org/10.1080/09669582.2021.1873353

20.

Han

J. H.

Kim

J. S.

Lee

C. K.

Kim

(2019). Role of place attachment dimensions in tourists’ decision-making process in Cittáslow. Journal of Destination Marketing & Management, 11, 108–119. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jdmm.2018.12.008

21.

C. I.

Liu

L. W.

Yuan

Liao

H. H.

(2021). Perceived food souvenir quality as a formative second-order construct: How do tourists evaluate the quality of food souvenirs? Current Issues in Tourism, 24(4), 479–502. https://doi.org/10.1080/13683500.2020.1715928

22.

Hollebeek

L. D.

Glynn

M. S.

Brodie

R. J.

(2014). Consumer brand engagement in social media: Conceptualization, scale development and validation. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 28(2), 149–165. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.intmar.2013.12.002

23.

Hornikx

van Meurs

(2017). Foreign languages in advertising as implicit country-of-origin cues: Mechanism, associations, and effectiveness. Journal of International Consumer Marketing, 29(2), 60–73. https://doi.org/10.1080/08961530.2016.1243996

24.

Hung

Ren

Qiu

(2021). Luxury shopping abroad: What do Chinese tourists look for? Tourism Management, 82, 104182. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tourman.2020.104182

25.

Hur

W. M.

Moon

T. W.

Kim

(2020). When does customer CSR perception lead to customer extra-role behaviors? The roles of customer spirituality and emotional brand attachment. Journal of Brand Management, 27(4), 421–437. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41262-020-00190-x

26.

Jin

Moscardo

Murphy

(2020). Exploring Chinese outbound tourist shopping: A social practice framework. Journal of Travel Research, 59(1), 156–172. https://doi.org/10.1177/0047287519826303

27.

Keskitalo

E. C. H.

Schilar

Heldt Cassel

Pashkevich

(2021). Deconstructing the indigenous in tourism. The production of indigeneity in tourism-oriented labelling and handicraft/souvenir development in Northern Europe. Current Issues in Tourism, 24(1), 16–32. https://doi.org/10.1080/13683500.2019.1696285

28.

Khalid

Okafor

L. E.

Sanusi

O. I.

(2022). Exploring diverse sources of linguistic influence on international tourism flows. Journal of Travel Research, 61(3), 696–714. https://doi.org/10.1177/0047287520988909

29.

Khan

Lee

(2020). A sociolinguistic perspective of the effects of packaging in bilingual markets. Journal of Brand Management, 27(2), 130–142. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41262-019-00176-4

30.

Kim

Duffy

L. N.

Moore

(2020a). Tourist attractiveness: Measuring residents’ perception of tourists. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, 28(6), 898–916. https://doi.org/10.1080/09669582.2019.1708919

31.

Kim

J. H.

Song

Youn

(2020b). The chain of effects from authenticity cues to purchase intention: The role of emotions and restaurant image. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 85, 102354. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhm.2019.102354

32.

Kizgin

Dey

B. L.

Dwivedi

Y. K.

Hughes

Jamal

Jones

Kronemann

Laroche

Peñaloza

Richard

M.-O.

Rana

N. P.

Romer

Tamilmani

Williams

M. D.

(2020). The impact of social media on consumer acculturation: Current challenges, opportunities, and an agenda for research and practice. International Journal of Information Management, 51, 102026. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2019.10.011

33.

Kock

Josiassen

Assaf

A. G.

(2019). Toward a universal account of country-induced predispositions: Integrative framework and measurement of country-of-origin images and country emotions. Journal of International Marketing, 27(3), 43–59. https://doi.org/10.1177/1069031x19857692

34.

Lai

M. Y.

Khoo-Lattimore

Wang

(2018). A perception gap investigation into food and cuisine image attributes for destination branding from the host perspective: The case of Australia. Tourism Management, 69, 579–595. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tourman.2018.06.033

35.

Lee

Y. S.

Shin

W. J.

(2015). Marketing tradition-bound products through storytelling: A case study of a Japanese sake brewery. Service Business, 9(2), 281–295. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11628-013-0227-5

36.

Ryan

(2018). Souvenir shopping experiences: A case study of Chinese tourists in North Korea. Tourism Management, 64, 142–153. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tourman.2017.08.006

37.

Katsumata

(2020). The impact of multidimensional country distances on consumption of specialty products: A case study of inbound tourists to Japan. Journal of Vacation Marketing, 26(1), 18–32. https://doi.org/10.1177/1356766719842280

38.

Ouyang

Zhang

Shang

W. L.

Huang

Gao

(2022). Evaluating food supply chain emissions from Japanese household consumption. Applied Energy, 306, 118080. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2021.118080

39.

Dahana

W. D.

Peng

Zhou

(2021). How does shopping duration evolve and influence buying behavior? The role of marketing and shopping environment. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 62, 102607. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jretconser.2021.102607

40.

Licsandru

T. C.

Cui

C. C.

(2019). Ethnic marketing to the global millennial consumers: Challenges and opportunities. Journal of Business Research, 103, 261–274. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2019.01.052

41.

Lin

Zhang

Gursoy

(2021). Effects of tourist-to-tourist interactions on experience cocreation: A self-determination theory perspective. Journal of Travel Research, 61(5), 1105–1120. https://doi.org/10.1177/00472875211019476

42.

Lin

(2017). Food souvenirs as gifts: Tourist perspectives and their motivational basis in Chinese culture. Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change, 15(5), 439–454. https://doi.org/10.1080/14766825.2016.1170841

43.

Liu

Hultman

Eisingerich

A. B.

Wei

(2020). How does brand loyalty interact with tourism destination? Exploring the effect of brand loyalty on place attachment. Annals of Tourism Research, 81, 102879. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2020.102879

44.

Manzoor

Wei

Asif

Haq

M. Z. U.

Rehman

H. U.

(2019). The contribution of sustainable tourism to economic growth and employment in Pakistan. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 16(19), 3785. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph16193785

45.

Mariolis

Rodousakis

Soklis

(2020). The COVID-19 multiplier effects of tourism on the Greek economy. Tourism Economics, 27(8), 1848–1855. https://doi.org/10.1177/1354816620946547

46.

McKercher

(2020). Cultural tourism market: A perspective paper. Tourism Review, 75(1), 126–129. https://doi.org/10.1108/tr-03-2019-0096

47.

Melewar

T. C.

Skinner

(2020). Territorial brand management: Beer, authenticity, and sense of place. Journal of Business Research, 116, 680–689. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2018.03.038

48.

Motsi

Park

J. E.

(2020). National stereotypes as antecedents of country-of-origin image: The role of the stereotype content model. Journal of International Consumer Marketing, 32(2), 115–127. https://doi.org/10.1080/08961530.2019.1653241

49.

Niewiadomski

(2020). COVID-19: from temporary de-globalisation to a re-discovery of tourism?. Tourism Geographies, 22(3), 651–656. https://doi.org/10.1080/14616688.2020.1757749

50.

Paiano

Crovella

Lagioia

(2020). Managing sustainable practices in cruise tourism: The assessment of carbon footprint and waste of water and beverage packaging. Tourism Management, 77, 104016. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tourman.2019.104016

51.

Park

Choi

B. K.

Lee

T. J.

(2019). The role and dimensions of authenticity in heritage tourism. Tourism Management, 74, 99–109. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tourman.2019.03.001

52.

Pezzuti

Leonhardt

J. M.

Warren

(2021). Certainty in language increases consumer engagement on social media. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 53, 32–46. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.intmar.2020.06.005

53.

Pogacar

Angle

Lowrey

T. M.

Shrum

L. J.

Kardes

F. R.

(2021). Is Nestlé a lady? The feminine brand name advantage. Journal of Marketing, 85(6), 101–117. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022242921993060

54.

Pontinha

V. M.

do Vale

R. C.

(2019). Brand love measurement scale development: An inter-cultural analysis. Journal of Product & Brand Management, 29(4), 471–489. https://doi.org/10.1108/jpbm-10-2018-2094

55.

Prideaux

Thompson

Pabel

(2020). Lessons from COVID-19 can prepare global tourism for the economic transformation needed to combat climate change. Tourism Geographies, 22(3), 667–678. https://doi.org/10.1080/14616688.2020.1762117

56.

Puntoni

De Langhe

Van Osselaer

S. M. J.

(2009). Bilingualism and the emotional intensity of advertising language. Journal of Consumer Research, 35(6), 1012–1025. https://doi.org/10.1086/595022

57.

Qiu

R. T.

Park

Song

(2020). Social costs of tourism during the COVID-19 pandemic. Annals of Tourism Research, 84, 102994. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2020.102994

58.

Sasaki

Ravasi

Micelotta

(2019). Family firms as institutions: Cultural reproduction and status maintenance among multi-centenary Shinise in Kyoto. Organization Studies, 40(6), 793–831. https://doi.org/10.1177/0170840618818596

59.

Shapoval

Wang

M. C.

Hara

Shioya

(2018). Data mining in tourism data analysis: Inbound visitors to Japan. Journal of Travel Research, 57(3), 310–323. https://doi.org/10.1177/0047287517696960

60.

Shavitt

Barnes

A. J.

(2020). Culture and the consumer journey. Journal of Retailing, 96(1), 40–54. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jretai.2019.11.009

61.

Shen

Lin

(2019). Application of the stereotype content model to destination image: Evidence from residents of mainland China. Journal of Destination Marketing & Management, 14, 100375. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jdmm.2019.100375

62.

Sigala

(2020). Tourism and COVID-19: Impacts and implications for advancing and resetting industry and research. Journal of Business Research, 117, 312–321. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2020.06.015

63.

Smith

K. C.

Welding

Kleb

Washington

Cohen

(2018). English on cigarette packs from six non-Anglophone low- and middle-income countries. International Journal of Public Health, 63(9), 1071–1079. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00038-018-1164-9

64.

Soukhathammavong

Park

(2019). The authentic souvenir: What does it mean to souvenir suppliers in the heritage destination?. Tourism Management, 72, 105–116. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tourman.2018.11.015

65.

Steenkamp

J. B. E.

(2019). Global versus local consumer culture: Theory, measurement, and future research directions. Journal of International Marketing, 27(1), 1–19. https://doi.org/10.1177/1069031x18811289

66.

Sthapit

(2018). The more the merrier: Souvenir shopping, the absence of choice overload and preferred attributes. Tourism Management Perspectives, 26, 126–134. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tmp.2017.10.001

67.

Stone

L. S.

Nyaupane

G. P.

(2019). The tourist gaze: Domestic versus international tourists. Journal of Travel Research, 58(5), 877–891. https://doi.org/10.1177/0047287518781890

68.

Strizhakova

Coulter

R. A.

(2015). Drivers of local relative to global brand purchases: A contingency approach. Journal of International Marketing, 23(1), 1–22. https://doi.org/10.1509/jim.14.0037

69.

H. Y.

Chun

C. C.

(2021). Chineseness, Taiwaneseness, and the traditional and simplified Chinese scripts: Tourism, identity, and linguistic commodification. Language & Communication, 77, 35–45. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.langcom.2020.10.005

70.

M. M.

Wall

Wang

(2019). Integrating tea and tourism: A sustainable livelihoods approach. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, 27(10), 1591–1608. https://doi.org/10.1080/09669582.2019.1648482

71.

Tseng

M. L.

Sujanto

R. Y.

Iranmanesh

Tan

Chiu

A. S.

(2020). Sustainable packaged food and beverage consumption transition in Indonesia: Persuasive communication to affect consumer behavior. Resources, Conservation and Recycling, 161, 104933. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.resconrec.2020.104933

72.

Volgger

Erschbamer

Pechlaner

(2021). Destination design: New perspectives for tourism destination development. Journal of Destination Marketing & Management, 19, 100561. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jdmm.2021.100561

73.

Wang

Chen

Sun

(2021). SNS use leads to luxury brand consumption: Evidence from China. Journal of Consumer Marketing, 38, 101–112. https://doi.org/10.1108/jcm-09-2019-3398

74.

Wang

Zhang

(2020). The pauper wears Prada? How debt stress promotes luxury consumption. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 56, 102144. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jretconser.2020.102144

75.

Wen

Josiam

B. M.

Spears

D. L.

Yang

(2018). Influence of movies and television on Chinese tourists’ perception toward international tourism destinations. Tourism Management Perspectives, 28, 211–219. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tmp.2018.09.006

76.

Wood

E. H.

(2020). I remember how we all felt: Perceived emotional synchrony through tourist memory sharing. Journal of Travel Research, 59(8), 1339–1352. https://doi.org/10.1177/0047287519888290

77.

Xie

P. F.

T. C.

Hsieh

H. W.

(2012). Tourists’ perception of authenticity in indigenous souvenirs in Taiwan. Journal of Travel & Tourism Marketing, 29(5), 485–500. https://doi.org/10.1080/10548408.2012.691400

78.

Yang

Zhang

Chen

(2020). Coronavirus pandemic and tourism: Dynamic stochastic general equilibrium modeling of infectious disease outbreak. Annals of Tourism Research, 83, 102913. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annals.2020.102913

79.

Chen

(2022). Appeal of word of mouth: Influences of public opinions and sentiment on ports in corporate choice of import and export trade in the post-COVID-19 era. Ocean & Coastal Management, 225, 106239. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2022.106239

80.

Peng

Wang

(2021). Empathic psychology: A code of risk prevention and control for behavior guidance in the multicultural context. Frontiers in Psychology, 12, 781710. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.781710

81.

Ying

Wen

(2019). Exploring the male Chinese tourists’ motivation for commercial sex when travelling overseas: Scale construction and validation. Tourism Management, 70, 479–490. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tourman.2018.09.014

82.

Zaichkowsky

J. L.

(1994). The personal involvement inventory: Reduction, revision, and application to advertising. Journal of Advertising, 23(4), 59–70. https://doi.org/10.1080/00913367.1943.10673459

83.

Zhang

Lin

(2018). Predicting the helpfulness of online product reviews: A multilingual approach. Electronic Commerce Research and Applications, 27, 1–10. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.elerap.2017.10.008

84.

Zhang

Xie

P. F.

(2019). Motivational determinates of creative tourism: A case study of Albergue art space in Macau. Current Issues in Tourism, 22(20), 2538–2549. https://doi.org/10.1080/13683500.2018.1517733

Impact of Multilingual Packaging on Tourism Products of Competence and Warmth: From the Monolingual,Bilingual and Trilingual Perspectives

Abstract

Plain language summary

Keywords

Introduction

Literature Review and Research Hypotheses

Competence Perception of Tourism Products

Warmth Perception of Tourism Products

Significance of Multilingual Packaging

Effects of Cultural Identity

Research Design

Sub-study 1: Products with Monolingual Packaging

Sample and Methodology

Findings

Discussion

Sub-study 2: Products with Bilingual Packaging

Sample and Methodology

Findings

Discussions

Sub-study 3: Products with Trilingual Packaging

Sample and Methodology

Results

Discussions

Conclusions and Discussion

Conclusions

Theoretical Implications

Practical Implications

Research Limitations and Prospect

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

Funding

Ethical Approval

Informed Consent

ORCID iD

Data Availability Statement

References