The effect of uncertainty avoidance on information search, planning, and purchases of international travel vacations

Academics and marketers know relatively little about how national culture affects the way people plan and spend in the $448 billion international travel and tourism economy. From a matched sample of 1042 German and Japanese visitors to the US, this research explores the relationship between the cultural dimension of uncertainty (or risk) avoidance with information search, trip planning time horizons, travel party characteristics (e.g. size of group) and trip characteristics (e.g. length of stay). Results show that consumers from national cultures characterized by higher levels of uncertainty avoidance use information sources that are related to the channel (e.g., travel agent), instead of personal, destination marketing-related, or mass media sources; they also more frequently purchase prepackaged tours, travel in larger groups, and stay on average a shorter time and visit fewer number of destinations. Contrary to expectations, they do not spend more time making the decision to travel or making their airline reservations. Implications for future research and marketing practice (e.g., segmentation and standardization) are also discussed. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.