Abstract:
Honeymoon tourists, one of the integral market segments, play a vital role in the
tourismindustry, especially in domestic tourism. However, there is a dearth of
literature in the respective study area especially concerning domestic tourism.
Thus, the study attempts to investigate whether the hotel attributes;
accommodation, dining experience, and service staff, impact the satisfaction of
the domestic honeymoon tourists and their loyalty. Moreover, it examines the
mediating effect of tourists’ satisfaction between the hotel attributes and
tourists’ loyalty and whether there are any demographic differences of domestic
honeymoon tourists on satisfaction and loyalty. This empirical study on
quantitative nature has adopted the post-positivism philosophy and employed an
online survey using a structured questionnaire. The sample of 133 domestic
honeymoon touristswho have visited three-to-five-star hotels in Sri Lanka, having
six-months of reminiscenceon their honeymoon trip, were selected through the
convenient sampling technique. Data were analyses implying both descriptive
and inferential statistics through the Statistical Package for Social Science
(SPSS) version 26.0. The demographic differences of the domestic honeymoon
tourists on satisfaction and loyalty were tested through a T-test and ANOVA.
The relationships amongst the variables were tested through Pearson
Correlation while hypotheses were tested through regression analysis. T-test
and ANOVA test results disclose a significant difference amongst the greatest
demographic factors on satisfaction and loyalty. Pearson Correlation results
reveal a significant positiverelationship among the dependent and independent
variables, while satisfaction presence the significant predictor of the tourists’
loyalty. All the hypotheses tested were accepted revealing that hotel attributes
positively impact the satisfaction of the domestic honeymoon tourists and the
overall satisfaction impact loyalty. The Sobel test results prove a partial
mediation of the tourists’ satisfaction amid accommodation, dining experience,
and tourists’ loyalty while a full mediation among service staff and tourists’
loyalty. So, the findings conclude, that the hotel attributes impact on the on
satisfaction, the satisfaction impacts on the loyalty, and finally the satisfaction
mediates the impact caused by the hotel attributes on the loyalty of the domestic
honeymoon tourists. Improving the hotel attributes is profoundly recommended
to intensify the satisfaction and loyalty of the domestic honeymoon tourists.
