Domestic Honeymoon Tourists’ Satisfaction and Loyalty towards HotelAttributes in Sri Lanka

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.