Purpose: The 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak is projected to have adverse consequences on the global tourism and hospitality industry. This paper aims to examine how the outbreak may alter Chinese tourists’ lifestyle choices, travel behaviour and tourism preferences in the short and long term.Design/methodology/approach: This paper is based on the synthesis of news broadcasted by several media outlets to be supported by an overview of the related literature on tourism marketing, tourism management and tourist behaviour. The authors’ experiences investigating trends in tourism and hospitality at the local and international level have also contributed to the study.Findings: This paper predicts that COVID-19 will likely affect Chinese travellers’ consumption patterns, such as the growing popularity of free and independent travel, luxury trips and health and wellness tourism. New forms of tourism including slow tourism and smart tourism may also drive future tourism activities. Such changes are likely to force businesses to reconsider their service designs and distribution channels.Research limitations/implications: While Chinese and other potential visitors rethink how they travel, professionals, too, should reflect upon how to bring positive or negative changes to the tourism industry following this pandemic. Subsequent research should also consider how to mitigate the effects of similar public health crises in the future.Practical implications: Recommendations for industry practitioners and policymakers focus on tailoring travel arrangements to tourists’ backgrounds. The suggestions may help to alleviate outbreak-related stress, offer travellers newly enriching experiences and partially mitigate the effects of COVID-19 on the tourism and hospitality industry. These recommendations can also apply more broadly to global tourist markets.Social implications: The COVID-19 outbreak has already brought significant impacts to nearly every society and industry. Tourism scholars and practitioners should carefully consider this tragedy and how it may inform industry and social practices. This and other public health crises represent sterling opportunities to view the industry holistically in terms of its effects on the environment, climate and travellers themselves.Originality/value: This paper presumably represents a frontier study, critically examining the possible impacts of COVID-19 on Chinese travellers’ consumption patterns and how the tourism and hospitality industry may respond to such changes in the future.

Purpose: This study aims to examine the effects of three self‐congruity constructs: the brand's personality congruity (BPC), the brand's user imagery congruity and the brand's usage imagery congruity, in consumers' attitude and brand loyalty toward two luxury fashion brands.Design/methodology/approach: Using a sample of Australian consumers, this study examines two luxury fashion brands (CK and Chanel) from two product categories, watches and sunglasses. Structural equation modeling is used to test the hypotheses.Findings: This study finds that user and usage imagery congruity are stronger predictors for brand attitude and brand loyalty than BPC in the context of the luxury fashion brands tested. Both user and usage imagery congruity have significant effects in brand attitude and brand loyalty in most analyses. This study finds no significant effect of BPC in either brand attitude or brand loyalty for the two brands tested.Research limitations/implications: Future studies should include more populations, product categories and more brands in each category.Practical implications: Symbolic benefits are key motivations behind luxury brand purchases. Symbolic benefits are from non‐product‐related attributes like imagery. One important implication of the study is that user and usage imagery are more important to build than attempts to develop a brand's personality. Because most luxury brands market in multiple product categories, attention should be paid to the core perceptions of user and usage imagery for the brand when designing communication strategies for different categories.Originality/value: This study provides the first evidence that these self‐congruity concepts may represent different imageries that lead to different effects in brand attitude and brand loyalty. Findings from this study add to the understanding of the consumption of luxury brands.

Purpose: – This research aims to examine the use of emotional and rational advertising appeal regarding service options that differ in terms of their experience and credence properties and exploring the moderating role of individual difference in affect intensity on the consumers’ varying reliance on rational vs emotional appeals.Design/methodology/approach: – Study 1 is a 2 (service type: restaurant vs dentist) × 2 (advertising appeal: emotional vs rational) between-subjects design. In total, 137 undergraduate students took part in this study. Study 2 is a 2 (service type: airline vs hospital) × 2 (advertising appeal: emotional vs rational) between-subjects design. In total, 84 MBA students were randomly assigned to each of the experimental conditions. Study 3 is a 2 (service type: airline vs hospital) × 2 (advertising appeal: rational vs emotional appeal) × 2 (affect intensity: high vs low) between-subjects design. The sample size was 170 undergraduates.Findings: – The results of the first two studies provided support that an emotional advertising appeal led to a higher purchase intention in the experience service condition, while a rational message generated higher purchase intention in the credence service condition. Study 3 showed the moderating role of individual difference in affect intensity. High affect intensity individuals reported higher levels of brand favorability than did their low affect intensity counterparts when exposed to ads using emotional appeal. Conversely, subjects showed no significant differences in the intensity of their emotional responses when exposed to rational appeals.Practical implications: – Our results suggest a strong need to tailor ads to fit different service categories. An emotional appeal would be more effective for experience services, and a rational appeal would be more effective for credence services. Besides, individual traits may also need to be considered when matching the appeal to the service type.Originality/value: – This study makes an important contribution to the limited existing research by providing a more comprehensive understanding of the relationship between advertising appeal and the type of service across different sub-categories, themes, individual trait and effectiveness measures. Specifically, the present research seeks to illuminate the relative effectiveness of emotional vs rational appeals in services advertising. In addition, the current research reveals new knowledge about the role that affect intensity plays in determining consumer responses to advertising.

Understanding relations between travel motivations and intentions is important, yet these relations may be complicated by the existence of destination-related factors, such as perceived image. The current study attempts to understand motivation–intention relations from an image formation perspective, in the context of Australian potential and repeat visitors to Indonesia. Structural equation modeling (SEM) results show that, for potential visitors, travel motivations influence travel intentions only indirectly through destination image and visitor image congruity, while for repeat visitors, travel motivations influence revisit intentions both directly and indirectly. Comparisons of motivation–image–intention relations between potential and repeat visitors show that the direct influence of interaction-seeking motivation, destination image, and visitor image congruity on intentions were stronger for repeat than potential visitors, whereas, the influence of novelty- and assurance-seeking motivations on destination image were stronger for potential than repeat visitors. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Purpose: This study aims to understand the influence of negative publicity on brand image, brand attitude and brand purchase intention. Specifically, the study examines the role of attribution (or brand blame) and information characteristics in Chinese consumers’ responses to negative publicity. Design/methodology/approach: The study used a quasi-experimental approach involving two negative publicity scenarios (mild and high severity) and a sample of 203 young and educated Chinese consumers. Partial least squares was used to test the hypotheses. Findings: A common assumption is that negative brand information has a negative influence on all aspects of a brand. However, this study finds that brand blame and information severity have differential effects on consumer evaluations of the affected brand. Specifically, brand blame negatively impacted attitudes and purchase intentions, but not brand image. In contrast, information severity negatively impacted brand image, but not attitudes or intentions. Further, the relations between brand image and brand attitudes and intentions depended on the level of information severity. In the mild-severity condition, brand image positively influenced attitudes and intentions, but not in the high-severity condition. Research limitations/implications: Future research should examine consumer responses to negative publicity across different media and product categories. Cross-cultural studies should also be explored in the future. Practical implications: When a brand encounters negative publicity, its marketer or brand manager should assess to what extent various brand equity components are influenced by negative publicity before adopting any cognitive-based or imagery-based communication strategies. Originality/value: This paper contributes to the limited and fragmented literature on consumer response to negative publicity by examining the impact of consumer’s attributions of blame to the brand under conditions of mild and severe negative information on a range of important brand-related outcomes. Specifically, the authors find that negative publicity has a different impact on brand image, brand attitudes and intentions to purchase. The authors suggest that brand managers use this information to guide their marketing communications.