A Conservation of Resources schema for exploring the influential forces for air-travel stress

Abstract

Effective air-travel stress management is increasingly crucial in determining tourist satisfaction and travel choices, particularly in a time of intensive fear about virus, terrorism, and plane crashes. However, research about air-travel stress, particularly what and how various influential forces shape passenger stress levels, is still in its infancy. The current research proposes the adoption of Conservation of Resources (COR) theory as a holistic schema to identify through resource dynamics the potential influential forces for air-travel stress across leisure travel stages. The findings, based on surveying passengers at the gate of multi-country international and domestic airports, demonstrates the capability of COR schema to predict and explain the influences on air-travel stress from an array of personal and situational/trip-specific factors. The theoretical advances from COR-based cross-stage stress analyses, and the guidance for customized airline/airport stress-soothing service strategies are discussed.

Highlights

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  Introduce a COR-adapted schema as a guideline to investigate air-travel stress.

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  The schema identifies sources and mechanisms of influences on air-travel stress.

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  Personal and situational shaping factors with access efficiency are identified.

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  Cross-country findings suggest the need for stressor-based stress attribution analyses.

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  Foundation for a holistic stress exploration across travel stages.