ABSTRACT Smartphones appear to perfectly match travelers' needs due to their portability and easy access to the Internet. The current literature in management information systems (MIS), communication, marketing, and tourism provides a basic foundation with which to understand the adoption and use of information communication technology (ICT) such as smartphones. However, a critical review of this literature indicates that there is a need to develop a much richer theoretical framework that describes the use of smartphones for travel. In particular, our understanding of the use of smartphones for travel is largely established from a quantitative perspective method, and as such, it is argued that this perspective cannot provide an in-depth understanding of the mechanisms that affect the use of smartphones in travel which, in turn, shapes the travel experience. That is, it appears that there is a lack of integration of the various models describing the nature of the use of ICT in travel. Additionally, it is argued that the processes shaping the use of technology which were developed in the organizational settings have been inappropriately applied at the individual level, and therefore should be critically examined within the travel context. The overall goal of this dissertation is to develop a theoretical framework describing the mechanisms shaping the use of smartphones for travel, and can be addressed by answering the following questions: (1) What are the uses of smartphones in the context of travel? (2) What are the factors influencing the use of smartphones in the context of travel? And, (3) What are the mechanisms shaping the use of smartphones for travel (i.e. How are the factors working to shape the use of smartphones in travel context?). A phenomenological approach was used to answer these questions as quantitative methods are believed to be inadequate in describing the processes underlying the use of smartphones for travel. Twenty-four Americans who own one kind of smartphones and traveled at least once for leisure purpose in the most recent three months were interviewed extensively to gain an in-depth understanding of their uses of smartphones and resulting travel experience. Qualitative content analysis was used to analyze the interview transcripts, and data triangulation based upon a series of follow-up interviews and member check was used to ensure the trustworthiness of the interpretation. This study identified four categories of uses of smartphones for travel (including 25 unique activities) including the uses of smartphones for communication, entertainment, facilitation, and information search. Five sets of factors that are associated with the use of smartphones for travel were identified from both contexts of travel and everyday experience. Three sets of factors that directly lead travelers to use smartphones for travel are travelers' motivations to use smartphones as a tool to achieve some purposes, their cognitive beliefs toward the use of smartphones, and other situational facilitators (e.g. no computer access) that lead the informants to use smartphones rather than any other alternative ways. Besides the three sets of direct factors, the informants indicated that their use of smartphones changed their travel experience. More important, the everyday use of smartphones and the changes brought to people's lives appear to be indirect factors influencing the use of smartphones for travel. These results describing smartphone's uses, outcomes and the mechanisms shaping this behavior were used as the primary basis in proposing a theoretical framework describing the use of smartphones for travel including its antecedents, process, and outcomes. The theoretical framework suggests four propositions. First, the underlying processes shaping the use of smartphones for travel is a process of appropriation in which a person "makes it his/her own" whereby the smartphone user learns, adjusts, and internalizes the `essence' of the smartphone based on their uses in everyday context as well as previous travel experiences (Proposition 1). Second, the use of smartphones in everyday context lead to the changes of communication, information consumption, and the uses of other digital devices, and these changes influenced the use of smartphones for travel through transformation effect and spillover effect (Proposition 2). Third, the changes in everyday experience influence the use of smartphones for travel by influencing traveler's motivations in the context of travel (Proposition 3). Finally, this study indicates that the appropriation process leads to changes in the travel experience. In particular, people change their travel activities including pre-trip planning, en-route arrangements, after-trips activities as well as their interpretations toward trips and sensations (Proposition 4). This study clearly delineates the relationships between use of smartphones and the impact of this use on travel behavior, and suggests several new perspectives with which to study the impact of technology on travel. First, this study indicates that a systems view should be adopted in tourism studies. Travelers are not isolated from their daily lifestyles, personalities, social connections, and other individual background (e.g. knowledge, preferences, etc.). As such, the behavior of travelers cannot be understood without consideration of the influence of other settings. Therefore in tourism studies, a systems perspective is important so as to reflect the intimate relationships (and influences) of the various `subsystems. Second, this study suggests a dynamic view for studies of technology and travel. The results of this study indicate that the uses of smartphones in travel are shaped by the interactions of a variety of factors. Therefore, in the studies of technology and travel it is important to understand the dynamic processes which shape the use of technology for travel. Third, this study suggests a development view for the study of technology and travel. This perspective includes not only the recognition that adoption of new technology may influence travelers and travel experience, but also the evolving use of the new ICT tools (e.g. smartphones) along with the development of these tools may substantially change travelers' behavior and travel experience. Additionally, this study suggests a new perspective is needed regarding the concept of travel experience in that the use of smartphones reconfigures the current relationships between travelers, space, and time and as such, implies that the conceptualization of travel experience should go beyond the argument of the dichotomy of everyday life and travel and evolve with the development of information technology. This study also offers several managerial implications in the areas of mobile marketing, destination marketing and management, and the design of travel information services on the smartphones platform. / Business Administration/Interdisciplinary

The purpose of this thesis was to investigate how children experience their everyday travel. More specifically how do certain travel characteristics influence children’s current mood, experiences of their everyday travel, and their cognitive performance. The thesis consists of two papers (Papers I and II). In Paper I, 206 children (101 girls) in grade 4 (aged 10), in the city of Staffanstorp in Sweden, recorded all their journeys in a diary during one school week, along with reports of their travel mode, their current mood while travelling (ranging from very sad to very happy and from very tired to very alert), their activities on arrival, and their experiences regarding those activities. In Paper II, a sample of 344 children (165 girls) between the ages of 10 and 15 was taken at five public schools in Värmland County, Sweden. The children rated their current mood, filled out the Satisfaction with Travel Scale (capturing the travel experience), reported details about their journeys, and took a word-fluency test. The findings show that children’s immediate affective experiences (current mood) vary with how they travel and where they go, and that there is a difference between boys’ and girls’ experiences. Children who travel by car experience the lowest degree of quality and activation, something which is also maintained throughout the school day (as the case with activation). Social activities during travel add to higher degree of quality and excitement, while solitary activities bring more stress. The findings further show that using a smartphone or doing a combination of activities during the journey results in better cognitive performance, as do longer traveling times. It is concluded that where and how children travel, what they do when traveling, and for how long they travel all affect children’s travel experiences, mood, and/or cognitive performance. This thesis sheds light on a neglected research area – which is the experiences of travel – through the lens of a child. / The purpose of this licentiate thesis is to examine how children experience their everyday travel. More specifically, do travel mode, travel time, and travel activities influence children’s experiences of their everyday travel, how they feel, and how they perform at school. In Paper 1 we investigate whether children’s moods, while travelling, vary with travel mode and destination. In Paper 2 we investigate whether children’s experiences of travel and current mood vary with travel mode, traveling time, and activities during travel. We also investigate whether the travel experience affects cognitive performance. The overall findings of the two studies suggest that where and how children travel, what they do when traveling, and for how long they travel all affect children’s travel experiences, moods, and cognitive performance. These novel findings bring important knowledge of the impact of a journey. Children are the next generation of traveler; how they experience their day-to-day travel may contribute toward their future travel behavior and influence how societies travel in the future.

The images of tourist destinations significantly influence travel choices. Accordingly, destination marketers make great efforts to inform their potential consumers about their destinations using deliberately designed projected images. This research focuses on a Chinese tourism destination, Qingdao, exploring the relationships between the images projected by Qingdao government agencies and those perceived by current visitors and by residents. It also examines the factors that influence the image formation of visitors and residents. Three sources of information are used in this research: promotional materials issued by the Qingdao municipal government and the Qingdao Tourism Administration, key informant interview transcripts and a questionnaires survey. The promotional materials were collected from the aforementioned agencies in May 2009. Key informant interviews were conducted in April and May 2009. Self-administered surveys of 578 visitors and 337 residents of Qingdao were administered throughout May and June 2009. The image construct was conceptualized as having three dimensions: cognitive, affective and overall images. The cognitive image attributes included seafood, scenery, beaches, local people, green space, special events, ethnic attractions, weather, squares, architecture, relaxing atmosphere, resorts, hygiene and cleanliness, cultural attractions, golf course, highway system, accommodation, public transport, shopping, fashion shows, value for money, transportation cost, nightlife, football games, airline schedules, and traffic congestion. The affective image attributes included arousing-sleepy, exciting-gloomy, pleasant-unpleasant, and relaxing-distressful. Qualitative evaluation suggested greater congruence between the images projected by Qingdao government agencies and those perceived by visitors than quantitative correlation analysis. The projected images of Qingdao and images perceived by visitors were consistent in their emphases on certain image themes. However, the correlations between these two types of images suggested that the extent to which these image themes were emphasized differed. Similar results were found in the comparison between the images projected by Qingdao and those perceived by residents. Furthermore, most visitors and residents held positive images of Qingdao. Both similarities and differences were discovered in the cognitive, affective and overall images perceived by visitors and residents. Residents were generally more positive than visitors in their cognitive and affective images. It was found that sex, education, place of residence, and previous travel experience only significantly affected visitors’ images of one or two attributes, while age, occupation, primary motivation, most important information source used and number of sources used significantly influenced visitors’ images of between 5 and 8 attributes. Additionally, place attachment and importance of the 2008 Olympic Games were significantly positively correlated with most of the image attributes examined in this study, while importance of German Heritage and Qingdao International Beer Festival were significantly positively correlated with fewer attributes (8 and 6 attributes, respectively). With regard to the factors influencing resident images, it was discovered that sex, education, age, occupation, length of residence, most important source used and number of sources used significantly affected residents’ images to different degrees, ranging from 7 to 18 attributes. Furthermore, place attachment and the importance of German heritage, the 2008 Olympic Games and Qingdao International Beer Festival were significantly positively correlated with the majority of the image attributes examined in this research. This study is one of very few that compares projected and perceived images although methodological challenges for undertaking such research remain. It is also innovative in that it encompasses both tourists’ and residents’ images. Very few such studies have been undertaken in China which has a massive domestic tourism industry and is a major player in international tourism.

The images of tourist destinations significantly influence travel choices. Accordingly, destination marketers make great efforts to inform their potential consumers about their destinations using deliberately designed projected images. This research focuses on a Chinese tourism destination, Qingdao, exploring the relationships between the images projected by Qingdao government agencies and those perceived by current visitors and by residents. It also examines the factors that influence the image formation of visitors and residents. Three sources of information are used in this research: promotional materials issued by the Qingdao municipal government and the Qingdao Tourism Administration, key informant interview transcripts and a questionnaires survey. The promotional materials were collected from the aforementioned agencies in May 2009. Key informant interviews were conducted in April and May 2009. Self-administered surveys of 578 visitors and 337 residents of Qingdao were administered throughout May and June 2009. The image construct was conceptualized as having three dimensions: cognitive, affective and overall images. The cognitive image attributes included seafood, scenery, beaches, local people, green space, special events, ethnic attractions, weather, squares, architecture, relaxing atmosphere, resorts, hygiene and cleanliness, cultural attractions, golf course, highway system, accommodation, public transport, shopping, fashion shows, value for money, transportation cost, nightlife, football games, airline schedules, and traffic congestion. The affective image attributes included arousing-sleepy, exciting-gloomy, pleasant-unpleasant, and relaxing-distressful. Qualitative evaluation suggested greater congruence between the images projected by Qingdao government agencies and those perceived by visitors than quantitative correlation analysis. The projected images of Qingdao and images perceived by visitors were consistent in their emphases on certain image themes. However, the correlations between these two types of images suggested that the extent to which these image themes were emphasized differed. Similar results were found in the comparison between the images projected by Qingdao and those perceived by residents. Furthermore, most visitors and residents held positive images of Qingdao. Both similarities and differences were discovered in the cognitive, affective and overall images perceived by visitors and residents. Residents were generally more positive than visitors in their cognitive and affective images. It was found that sex, education, place of residence, and previous travel experience only significantly affected visitors’ images of one or two attributes, while age, occupation, primary motivation, most important information source used and number of sources used significantly influenced visitors’ images of between 5 and 8 attributes. Additionally, place attachment and importance of the 2008 Olympic Games were significantly positively correlated with most of the image attributes examined in this study, while importance of German Heritage and Qingdao International Beer Festival were significantly positively correlated with fewer attributes (8 and 6 attributes, respectively). With regard to the factors influencing resident images, it was discovered that sex, education, age, occupation, length of residence, most important source used and number of sources used significantly affected residents’ images to different degrees, ranging from 7 to 18 attributes. Furthermore, place attachment and the importance of German heritage, the 2008 Olympic Games and Qingdao International Beer Festival were significantly positively correlated with the majority of the image attributes examined in this research. This study is one of very few that compares projected and perceived images although methodological challenges for undertaking such research remain. It is also innovative in that it encompasses both tourists’ and residents’ images. Very few such studies have been undertaken in China which has a massive domestic tourism industry and is a major player in international tourism.

<p>“Daka Travel” is trending to become a popular travel style in Chinese tourism market in recent years, especially for Chinese millennial travelers. This study is concerned with understanding the characteristics of Daka travel and deeply investigate travelers’ travel experience of Daka travel. To investigate the travel experience, a conceptual model based on experience economy was proposed and empirically tested. The context of the empirical study was conducted among Chinese millennials travelers. The study includes two steps. Firstly, 15 travelers who had Daka travel experience selected randomly via social media platforms were invited to participate in the semi-structured interview, the interviews were performed to identify interesting characteristics of Daka travelers and attributes of Daka travel. Secondly, people who had Daka travel experience was selected randomly online to participate in the survey. A total of 471 valid questionnaires were collected. Factor analysis and mediation analysis were conducted by using Statistical Product and Service Solutions (SPSS) 26.0. According to the findings of this study, there are several distinctive characteristics of Daka travelers could be concluded: 1. Daka travelers get Daka tourism information from social media especially short-video applications; 2.<i> </i>Social envy is one of major motivations of Daka Travel; 3. Daka travelers share travel experience with the main purposes of recording travel memory; 4. Natural scenic spots and Food & Beverage shops are the two most popular Daka destinations. For the travel experience, the research verified that all of the dimensions (includes entertainment, esthetics, education, escapism, personalization, serendipity, localness and communitas) of experience-scape model significantly influenced the perception of travel experience for Daka travelers. Further, travel experience could contribute to creating memorable travel experience which potentially influenced travelers’ sense of well-being and meaningfulness. In addition, the multiple regression analysis revealed interesting results showing that among the eight dimensions of travel experience-scape, each realm had different influence on travelers’ sense of well-being and meaningfulness. For well-being, “Entertainment” was the most influential factor, however, “Localness” did not have significant influence at all. In contrast, for meaningfulness, “Communitas” and “Personalization” played the most important role. “Entertainment”, “Esthetic” and “Escapism” did not have significant influence. The findings of this research contribute both conceptually and practically to Daka travel destination planning and management to create a satisfying and memorable travel experience. They can improve their ability of providing tourism products and services in a more targeted and meaningful way. More detailed findings and implications will be presented in the manuscript. </p>

Aeronautical revenue from landing and handling charges to carriers is falling significantly below 60% of total revenue and will not persist as the main source of income for airports. Airports in Europe cannot continue to rely on profits from airlines; operating companies need to improve the competitiveness through commercial income from different traveler types. The purpose of this multiple case study was to understand the elements of successful sales strategies by concessionaires (retailers) at the metropolitan airport system of Zurich and Basel in hopes of improving the nonaeronautical revenue from leisure travelers, a price-sensitive customer segment. The conceptual framework was corporate strategic planning with the underlying concept of sustainable business operations. Semistructured interviews included 9 executives and senior managers of concessions and retail operations at Zurich International and Basel EuroAirport, and covered major themes such as managing the shopping experience of passengers as well as collaboration between concessionaires, airports, and airlines. The key findings, which emerged from an inductive analysis of the data, were that the identification of personalized offerings and the inclusion of individual travelers' needs are required to ensure a flexible approach by each airport and shop location throughout the terminal. The collected data contained indicators for holistic and targeted concepts by retail concessions in cooperation with airport stakeholders. Social implications include sustainable retail strategies by promoting value adding products and services, improving the passenger's travel experience, and ensuring the profitability of concessionaires in a changing aviation market.

Syftet med denna intervjustudie var att undersöka hur ett antal nyckelaktörer inom turismnäringen såg på matens roll och hur de arbetade med matupplevelser i praktiken. Insamling av data genomfördes genom semi-strukturerade intervjuer som transkriberades och analyserades utifrån en mall för kvalitativ bearbetning av text. De aktörer som fungerade som informanter för undersökningen arbetade samtliga med matturism på nationell, regional eller lokal nivå.  De aktörer som deltog i studien var Landsbygdsdepartementet, Visit Sweden, Regional Matkultur Småland, Smaka på Skåne, Kristianstad Kommun och Idala Gård. Undersökningens resultat visade att samtliga aktörer ansåg att maten hade en given roll inom turismnäringen.  Informanterna betonade vikten av att producenter ser matens potential till att bli en matupplevelse och synliggör den för turister. Ett skäl till att detta inte alltid görs kunde bero på den bild svenskar har av svensk mat och svensk matkultur menade informanterna.  De förespråkade en stolthet över svensk mat och mattradition. I undersökningen framkom även att matupplevelser fått en alltmer självklar plats inom turismnäringen, både som en huvudanledning till, eller som en betydande del av resan.  Informanterna framhöll att fördelen med matupplevelser jämfört med andra upplevelser var att matupplevelsen aktiverar samtliga sinnen och därmed bidrar till en total turismupplevelse. / The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine how key stakeholders see food as a part of the tourist industry and how they work with food experiences in practice. Data collection was collected by semi-structured interviews which were transcribed and analyzed within the model of processing a qualitative text. The stakeholders which participated were Landsbygdsdepartementet, Visit Sweden, Regional Matkultur Småland, Smaka på Skåne, Kristianstad Kommun and Idala gård. The interviewed stakeholders are working with food tourism at national, regional and local level. The results showed that all the participants thought food had a specific role within the tourist industry. In this study, it became clear that the respondents emphasized the importance for producers to see the potential food have to become a food experience and at the same time to make it more visible for tourists. A reason for this would be the view of Swedish food culture that the respondents think Swedish people have. It is important to see the unique assets which are available and to be proud of the culture.  It also shows that food experiences have a more obvious role in tourist industry, both as the main reason or as part of the travel. The advantage of the food experiences in relation to other experiences is the use of all the senses, thus providing a total tourism experience.