Travel, tourism and hospitality

Technology in travel, tourism and hospitality research

Artificial intelligence

Professor Iis Tussyadiah is curating the collection on artificial intelligence and robotics in tourism, which contains articles on AI, robotics, and automation published in Annals of Tourism Research, a top-ranked journal in the field.

Audio memories

What if we captured and shared our memories and experiences through the recording of sounds rather than photographs? Digital World Research Centre has researched sentimental audio memories. This project aims to design and test a novel audio system to answer this question.

Covid-19

A study adopted a mixed method approach to explore how Finnish high-profile restaurants used Instagram as a means for service innovation and diffusion during nine weeks of government-mandated lockdown. Mark Ashton, Aarni Tuomi and Iis Tussyadiah are researching Covid-19 and Instagram: digital service innovation in top restaurants. Governments across the world have imposed strict rules on social distancing to curb the spread of Covid-19, with restaurants impacted by government-mandated lockdowns.

Hakseung Shin is researching reducing perceived health risk to attract hotel customers in the Covid-19 pandemic era: Focused on technology innovation for social distancing and cleanliness. As an essential risk-reduction strategy, technology innovation is likely to play a key role in the hotel industry’s recovery from the 2020 coronavirus pandemic. However, its impact on customer decision-making behaviour is unknown. Focusing on technology innovation for reducing guest interaction with employees and enhancing cleanliness, the purpose of this research was to examine the impact of expected interaction and expected cleanliness on perceived health risk and hotel booking intention.

Hack hospitality: Digital solutions for post-Covid-19 recovery, researched by Yoo Ri Kim, looks at hospitality, tourism and retail sectors. It draws on research on digital solutions, including for the adaptation to social distancing, data and social influence in building trust and contact-free digital service innovation in hotels and restaurants.

Digital economy

Development Implications of Digital Economies (DIODE) is a strategic research network which focuses particularly on digital enterprise and digital labour in the Global South. It is funded by the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and worked upon by Carla Bonina. It researches the digital economy – that part of economic output derived solely or primarily from digital technologies – and its role in developing countries and touches on issues including digital platforms, digital trade, digital fabrication, digital currency and digital production networks.

Future of paper

Digital World Research Centre has conducted research on next generation paper. This multidisciplinary project aims to explore the future of paper and its connection to the web. It will do so in the domain of travel and tourism where paper and screen-based information are already used together in the tourist experience.

Multimedia and travel

Husna Zainal Abidin is researching digital collaboration: a solution for destinations. Technological advancements and innovation are on the rise and are disrupting the traditional ecosystem of the tourism industry.

How the a-book, an augmented travel guide with complementary multimedia could enrich travel experiences is the subject of a paper by Caroline Scarles, Emily Corrigan-Kavanagh and George Revill in augmenting travel guides for enriching travel experiences.

Privacy

Dr Athina Ioannou is working with Professor Iis Tussyadiah in the EPSRC-funded project on privacy-aware personal data management and value enhancement for leisure travellers (PriVELT). The project is focusing on privacy concerns and data disclosure in travel, in collaboration with Universities of Kent, Warwick, and Durham.