Tourists’ perceptions towards and satisfaction with service quality in the cross‐cultural service encounter: implications for hospitality and tourism management

This article develops a comprehensive cultural construct to explain and forecast tourists’ behaviour and quality judgements. A destination value chain is depicted to capture the possible influence of culture and cultural values on tourism behaviour. Cultural norms have an impact on both tourists’ expectations and their perceptions of received service quality for any of the six service elements frequently employed in tourism analyses. Tourism service encounters take place in the context of a tourism culture which is formed by four components: the national/regional settings of the tourist and the host region, the tourists’ various subcultures and the organisational culture of tourism enterprises in the tourism receiving region. A differentiated approach is developed which distinguishes between global, national and sub‐national cultural constructs.