How Does Tourists’ Emotional Involvement Mediate the Impact of Tourism Motivation on Domestic Tourism Participation? New Insights from Pakistan

Abstract

This study investigates the relationship between intellectual motivation, competency motivation, social motivation and health and physical motivation and tourism participation, while tourists’ emotional involvement has been used a mediating variable. Drawing on theories of travel motivation, such as Crompton’s (1979) push-pull framework, the study investigates how the desire for adventure, knowledge, cultural enrichment, and personal growth influences tourism behavior. A comprehensive review of literature highlights the role of tourism motivation in shaping destination choices, particularly for cultural, heritage, and educational tourism. In this study, survey method has been used to collect data and 242 respondents answered the Google form online. However, this study has used PLS-SEM model to get the robust results. The findings underscore the importance of tourism motivation as a key driver of tourism participation and tourist emotional involvement has week mediation impact on tourism participation. This study contributes to the understanding of travel motivation by emphasizing the significance of intellectual curiosity in shaping tourism behavior and provides practical implications for destination marketers and tourism planners seeking to attract intellectually motivated tourists. Future research directions include examining the moderating effects of demographic factors and the role of emerging trends, such as digital learning and virtual tourism, on intellectual motivation and tourism participation.