Purpose: This paper aims to investigate the perception of risk by international travellers. There are multiple risks facing tourism that contribute to the formation of perception of risk. It is necessary to identify the different types of risks that are perceived in tourist destinations. This paper suggests policies and techniques to mitigate the risk perceptions in tourism.Design/methodology/approach: A preliminary questionnaire survey was conducted to test the types of risks that are perceived in international destinations. The data were further analysed with factor analysis to measure the dimension of risk perceptions.Findings: The main results point to the existence of five types of risk affecting tourists during international travel: health risk, risk of suffering from crime and delinquency, accident risk, environmental risk and risk from disasters. Result shows that uncontrollable risks are perceived as more important than those which are more controllable.Originality/value: As the existing literature on perception of risk in tourism does not contain a substantially detailed discussion relating to types of risk in international destinations and its contribution to the formation of risk perceptions, this paper may contribute to a better understanding of risk perception. The results could assist in decision-making and have implications for the management of risks.

Can distinctive natural assets in tourist destinations be artistically recreated and used to improve destination image and attract more visitors? This paper analyses the formation of the tourist image based on artistically recreated local nature icons, and shows how those images can enhance the overall destination image. It focuses on the island of Lanzarote, a destination with its development based on promoting an environmental image founded on the creation of a network of multifunctional, high-quality art, culture and tourism centres exhibiting artistic recreation of its unique environmental assets. The methodology utilizes a questionnaire (n = 453) structural equations modelling approach in which the overall image of the destination is directly dependent on the image of the environmental conditions and indirectly influenced by the image of the artistically recreated centres. Results show that the destination's image is significantly grounded on the image of the art, culture and tourism centres using art based on Lanzarote's natural assets. They suggest that destinations have relevant opportunities to artistically enhance natural assets to improve their tourist image and marketing, that quality multi-functional visitor centres can be important within a sustainable tourism policy, and part of the emerging breadth of approaches taken by sustainable tourism marketing.

El propósito de este estudio es examinar como contribuyen los distintos tipos de riesgos (terrorismo, accidente, delincuencia, salud, catástrofes) a los que se enfrenta los turistas a la percepción de riesgo final sobre los destinos. Asimismo, el trabajo analiza el efecto moderador del destino en las relaciones causales establecidas entre los tipos de riesgos y el riesgo percibido. Para ello se comparan dos grupos de destinos: Europa (Islas Canarias, España) y Latinoamérica, con los destinos de Brasil y Colombia. El trabajo se realizó mediante encuestas online a través de una empresa especializada en los mercados potenciales de Alemania y Reino Unido. El análisis se llevó a cabo mediante un modelo de ecuaciones estructurales (SEM) para probar las relaciones causales planteadas. Aunque la percepción de seguridad y protección y su influencia en el comportamiento del turismo es importante para la promoción y gestión de las actividades turísticas, su análisis empírico ha recibido una atención limitada entre los investigadores. Los resultados de este trabajo muestran interesantes conclusiones prácticas y académicas para las organizaciones empresariales y la promoción de los destinos turísticos. The purpose of this study is to examine how the different types of risks (terrorism, accident, crime, health, catastrophes) that tourists face contributes to the perception of final risk on destinations. Likewise, the paper analyzes the moderating effect of destination in the causal relationships established between the types of risks and the perceived risk. For this, two groups of destinations are compared: Europe (Canary Islands, Spain) and Latin America, with the destinations of Brazil and Colombia. The work was carried out through online surveys through a company specialized in the potential markets of Germany and the United Kingdom. The analysis was carried out using a model of structural equations (SEM) to prove the causal relationships raised. Although the perception of safety and protection and its influence on the behavior of tourism is important for the promotion and management of tourism activities, its empirical analysis has received limited attention among researchers. The results of this work show interesting practical and academic conclusions for business organizations and the promotion of tourist destinations.

This paper studies the factors that influence tourists’ risk perceptions of various destinations with different attributes and sociocultural profiles. Factor analysis is utilised to investigate the determinants of risk perceptions, finding that they are influenced both by the type of risk (delinquency, health, accident, environment and catastrophe) and by the characteristics of the destination regarding the management of risk. Structural equations modelling is conducted to study the relationships between risk perceptions, destination image and visiting intentions across destinations. Multi-group analysis across different destinations proves that tourists’ risk perceptions have different influences on destination image and visiting intentions. The results show that there are significant differences according to the predominant religion at the destinations, i.e., Muslin and Christian. The implication is that different dimensions of perceived risks and destination socio-culture contexts have different influences on the behaviour of tourists.