The Future of Tourism : Substitution of Virtual Reality for Physical Travel during Covid-19 Pandemic in Malaysia

Chai, Jia Qi (2021) The Future of Tourism : Substitution of Virtual Reality for Physical Travel during Covid-19 Pandemic in Malaysia. Masters thesis, Tunku Abdul Rahman University College.

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Abstract

Started in December 2019, the COVID-19 pandemic's devastating effect on world tourism has continued into 2021. The tourism industry is one of the industries that has been hit the hardest by travel restrictions because of the COVID-19 outbreak. Virtual reality (VR) has been utilised in many industries, including the tourism industry. The tourism sector has found VR technology very beneficial as a collaborative and promotional tool for tourists and tourism companies to interact. Therefore, most of the previous studies mainly investigating the uses of VR in tourism marketing and promotional activities. Nevertheless, the substitution of VR as a tourism experience tool is not well addressed by other researchers. Hence, this study investigated the factors for behavioural intention and tourist’s willingness to accept VR as a tourism experience substitute during the COVID-19 pandemic. The presented conceptual framework for this study has integrated the original TAM variables (perceived usefulness, behavioural intention) with other variables (attitude, presence, enjoyment, expected enjoyment). The findings showed that behavioural intention was influenced by perceived usefulness, attitude, presence, and enjoyment. However, expected enjoyment does not have a significant moderating effect on behavioural intention. With the results, this study provides theoretical and practical implications. Overall, VR has great potential as a tourism experience substitute during the COVID-19 pandemic.