How tourists see other tourists: analysis of online travelogues

Abstract

The study, based on the content analysis of 120 samples of online travelogues written by Japanese and Americans, investigates how tourist-tourist encounters are reported. Eight hundred and thirty eight episodes were extracted from the sample travelogues and coded according to the types of encounter (absence, direct presence or indirect presence of others), attitude of the writer (positive, negative or neutral) and also the types of tourist(s) encountered (same or different nationality). Overall results show that Japanese and Americans see other tourists differently. For example, when Japanese describe other tourists, they tend to make clear distinctions between Japanese and non-Japanese and to have more direct contacts with Japanese tourists than with tourists from other countries. Americans, on the other hand, seem quite the opposite: they are willing to make personal contact with non-American tourists. Some of the factors that lead to these differences are discussed and include differences in cultural characteristics and home environment.