Operationalization of Tourist Satisfaction
Visitor satisfaction is a central concept in tourism but definition of the term remains varied. One of the more cited definition is that satisfaction is the degree to which one believes that an experience evokes positive feelings. But in tourism research,Hunt argues that "satisfaction is not the reasonableness of the experience, it is the evaluation rendered that the experience was at least as good as it was supposed to be". Hence, the central tenet of visitor satisfaction measurement in tourism research has been the dis-confirmation theory, whereby satisfaction arises when consumer compare their perceptions with their initial expectation. If perceived performance is greater than expectations, the consumer is satisfied.
This conceptualization of satisfaction has been the subject of intense academic debate in the marketing literature due to its its limitations. For example, some authors argue that if expectation decreases, the probability of satisfaction increases. Another limitation relates to the fact that expectation are dynamic in nature and that the service experience might vary across encounters, as is often the case in tourism and hospitality services. There is also the fact that the tourist is an actor in the service delivery process and can engage in cognitive dissonance by downgrading bad experiences and upgrading good ones.