Title of Paper

Do Visitors’ Expressed Experiences and Emotions Vary Between Scales and Reviews？

Author Bios (50 Words for each Author)

Zhenshan Xu (xu_zhenshan@hotmail.com) is a PhD candidate in the Waikato Management School at the University of Waikato, New Zealand. He obtained his Master's degree (in Tourism) from Shaanxi Normal University, China. His research focuses mainly on destination marketing, theme parks, tourist behavior, and visitor emotion.

Yingsha Zhang, Ph.D. (zhangysh67@mail.sysu.edu.cn), is an associate professor of tourism in the School of Tourism Management at Sun Yat-sen University, China. Yingsha’s research mainly focuses on destination marketing and management, tourist behavior and decision-making, tourism economics, and tourism geography, with special emphasis on theme parks. Yingsha is the corresponding author.

Chris Ryan, Ph.D. (chris.ryan@waikato.ac.nz), is a professor of tourism in the Waikato Management School at the University of Waikato, New Zealand. He gained his doctoral degree at the Aston Business School, Birmingham, UK and his research interests relate to tourist motivations, behaviours and the consequences of those behaviours. He has published approximately 250 refereed journal articles.

Abstract (150 Words)

Given the importance attached by management to user-generated reviews, it is vital to assess whether visitors’ expressed experiences and emotions reflected in textual reviews differ from those measured by scales. A total of 1660 questionnaires were collected from visitors to six different types of theme parks in China. This study examines the consistency in theme park visitors’ expressed experiences and emotions between scales and reviews and tests the influences of visitors’ personalities. Results show that visitors’ expressed experiences and emotions tend to be more positive in scales than in reviews, and the effects of experience dimensions on emotion vary between reviews and scales. A high frequency of experience dimensions mentioned in reviews leads to a small difference in the effect of these dimensions on emotion between scales and reviews. Certain personalities influence visitors’ emotions and post-trip behavioral intentions and moderate some relationships between experience, emotion, and review-post intention.

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Do Visitors’ Expressed Experiences and Emotions Vary Between Scales and Reviews？

Given the importance attached by management to user-generated reviews, it is vital to assess whether visitors’ expressed experiences and emotions reflected in textual reviews differ from those measured by scales. A total of 1660 questionnaires were collected from visitors to six different types of theme parks in China. This study examines the consistency in theme park visitors’ expressed experiences and emotions between scales and reviews and tests the influences of visitors’ personalities. Results show that visitors’ expressed experiences and emotions tend to be more positive in scales than in reviews, and the effects of experience dimensions on emotion vary between reviews and scales. A high frequency of experience dimensions mentioned in reviews leads to a small difference in the effect of these dimensions on emotion between scales and reviews. Certain personalities influence visitors’ emotions and post-trip behavioral intentions and moderate some relationships between experience, emotion, and review-post intention.