Senior travelers’ experience and usage in adopting ICTs The travel among three jurisdictions of Guangdong, Hong Kong, and Macau

Resumo

This study contributes to understanding the experience and usage of ICTs by senior travelers within or to the Guangdong–Hong Kong–Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA), China. Applying the Stimulus–Organism–Response (S–O–R) model, this study examined what sorts of stimuli had triggered senior travelers’ ICT adoption before, during, and after the trip; and how the stimuli evoked their experiences and emotions, and led to their utilization of ICTs in their future GBA trips. Twenty-one qualitative face-to-face interviews with senior travelers who had experiences in using ICTs in their GBA trips were conducted. The findings indicated that perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use were the primary extrinsic stimuli that evoked positive experiences and emotions and led to the high adoption of ICTs in the seniors’ future GBA trips. However, ease of use perceptions associated with negative experiences and emotions had little impact on the matter. Managerial implications were given to policymakers and industry practitioners to be aware of senior travelers’ specific perceptions of usage and to design policies and ICTs products that better suit their needs. This study also contributes to the limited studies on senior travelers’ usage and experience of ICTs and provides a basis for similar research in other contexts.