This study aims to examine a comprehensive model for the concurrent effects of tourists’ sustainability concerns, social norms, frugality and awareness of the UN’s sustainable development goals (SDGs) on sustainable travel behavior (STB), with sustainability in this case extending beyond the environmental to include economic and socio-cultural aspects as well.
The model is tested using a structural equation modeling technique based on data collected from 200 US respondents who traveled internationally in the past year.
Results reveal that all aforementioned variables, namely, sustainability concerns, social norms, frugality and SDG awareness, when considered together each positively influenced STB. However, SDG awareness did not accentuate tourists’ sustainability concerns associated with travel and tourism, as initially hypothesized.
Unlike previous studies that have mainly focused on the pro-environmental aspects of sustainability and failed to consider the aforementioned variables concurrently, the results from this study advance our understanding of the determinants of STB (more generally) while accounting specifically for the expected role of the UN SDG agenda.
