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Tourists' information search: the differential impact of risk and uncertainty avoidance
Author(s) -
Quintal Vanessa Ann,
Lee Julie Anne,
Soutar Geoffrey N.
Publication year - 2010
Publication title -
international journal of tourism research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.155
H-Index - 58
eISSN - 1522-1970
pISSN - 1099-2340
DOI - 10.1002/jtr.753
Subject(s) - uncertainty avoidance , tourism , information seeking , psychology , discriminant validity , risk seeking , differential (mechanical device) , social psychology , marketing , economics , business , computer science , political science , information retrieval , engineering , psychometrics , clinical psychology , internal consistency , individualism , law , market economy , collectivism , aerospace engineering
While studies in and out of tourism contexts have explored risk and/or uncertainty avoidance's impact on information search, few have clarified whether the two constructs impact differentially on information search. To examine this issue, data were collected from large online panels in Australia, China and Japan. The risk and uncertainty avoidance scales were reliable, had convergent and discriminant validity and were invariant across the three country samples. As expected, uncertainty avoidance was positively related to the extent of information search in all three country samples, whereas risk avoidance was not. This suggests that the constructs are distinct and may impact at different stages of decision‐making. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.