Factors affecting pandemic biosecurity behaviors of international travelers: Moderating roles of gender, age, and travel frequency

Abstract

Research undertaken during the COVID‐19 pandemic has identified a number of significant factors that affect international travelers’ biosecurity behavior. Tourists’ age and gender as well as travel frequency have been found to have significant impacts on consumers’ non‐pharmaceutical intervention practices. However, despite the importance of age, gender, and travel frequency, such studies have overlooked international tourists’ values, attitudes, interventions, and behaviors relevant to biosecurity during a pandemic. In order to bridge this gap, the purposes of this study are to build and test a conceptually comprehensive framework on the relationships between values, attitudes, interventions, and behaviors, along with the moderating effects of age, gender, and travel frequency. To meet the study objectives, a digital survey was administered during 1–5 September 2020, which generated n = 386 total useable responses. Data were analyzed using the partial least squares approach. The results revealed that tourists’ values have the greatest effect on their attitudes toward COVID‐19 biosecurity for travel, which in turn positively influences interventions and behaviors. Interventions also have a significant impact on travelers’ COVID‐19 biosecurity behavior. This study expands the theoretical understanding of biosecurity and pandemic behavior. The findings of this research also provide significant insights to the literature as well as stakeholders, such as governments, health organizations, international health and tourism agencies, and destinations, with respect to managing international travel biosecurity measures.