A cross-cultural study of perceptions of medical tourism among Chinese.pdfVIP

Tourism Management 33 2012 80e88 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Tourism Management journal home A cross-cultural study of perceptions of medical tourism among Chinese, Japanese and Korean tourists in Korea Ji Yun Yu a, Tae Gyou Ko b, * a Korea Culture and Tourism Institute, Kang Seo Gu, Seoul, South Korea b Department of Convention and Tourism Management, Hallym University, Chun Cheon, Gang Won Do, South Korea a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t Article history: The purpose of this study is to observe factors related to perceptions of and possible participation in Received 6 October 2010 medical tourism by Chinese, Japanese, and Korean visitors to Jeju Island in Korea. It aims to identify Accepted 4 February 2011 cultural differences among them, and how those differences affect their pursuit of medical tourism in the future. The research results illustrate that signi?cant differences exist in how Chinese, Japanese and Keywords: Korean visitors view factors of choice, discomfort and preferred product items. The study establishes four Medical tourism factor groups regarding medical tourism with exploratory factor analysis. Based on these ?ndings, Health tourism differences of participation intention and behaviors among the three groups are explained. From this, the Perception Participation intention study describes distinct characteristics of medical tourism among the three cultural groups. The differ- Cross-cultural study ences among Chinese, Japanese, and Korean tourists with regard to the selection of destination, incon- veniences, and preferred products were found to be all signi?cant. Korean tourists placed most signi?cance on selection factors, followed by Chinese tourists, and, lastly, the Japanese. On the other hand, inconveniences related to medical and care services, stay and cost, and information and insuran