Demographics (Age, Gender)
The largest age group on social media, in general and in crises, has been young adults (American Red Cross 2012;DeLollis 2010; Pew Research Center Global Attitudes Project 2010). Thus, it was surprising that 41- to 50-year-old international tourists indicated that they were the most likely to use social media to seek information in the event of a crisis during travel compared to all other age groups (Schroeder 2012). In contradiction, Pennington-Gray, Kaplanidou, and Schroeder (2012) found young African American tourists were the most likely to use social media to seek information in the event of a crisis during travel. Accordingly, the relationship between age and the likeli- hood of social media use to seek information in the event of a crisis during travel may vary depending on the subpopula- tion of tourists; however, further investigation is needed to explain these age differences.
The literature has, thus far, suggested that gender does not significantly affect social media use to seek information dur- ing hurricane evacuations (Cahyanto and Pennington-Gray 2012) or crises in general (Schroeder 2012). This could be due to the fairly even gender distribution of social media users across the globe (Pew Research Center Global Attitudes Project 2010).