Improving Sustainability in the Hospitality Industry by Frans Melissen & Sauer Lieke

Author:Frans Melissen & Sauer, Lieke
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Taylor and Francis

Values

Although we might all have similar basic, psychological, social and esteem needs, we all behave differently, even in similar circumstances. The concept of values appears to be crucial in explaining this. Values can be defined as enduring and relatively stable beliefs about which modes of conduct and end-states of existence we prefer (Rokeach, 1973). In other words, values relate to what we find important in life and how we want to behave to realise those things. As such, values ‘serve as guiding principles in people’s lives’ (Schwartz, 1992, p. 21). Typical examples of values that link to what we find important in life are freedom, equality and family safety, whereas honesty and cheerfulness, but also intelligence and ambition, represent examples of values that link to our behaviour. A helpful tool in portraying people’s so-called value system or set of values is the ‘List of Values’ (Kahle et al., 1986), which can be used to differentiate between (groups of) people through clustering them based on how they rank the following values: self-respect, sense of accomplishment, being well-respected, security, warm relationships with others, sense of belonging, excitement/fun and enjoyment in life, and self-fulfilment. Obviously, knowing and understanding the value systems of your (potential) customers is crucial for deciding on the segment(s) of potential customers you will be targeting and fine-tuning the specifics of the ultimate experience you will be staging for them. As Smit and Melissen (2018, p.51) put it: ‘there is really no point in trying to design and stage the ultimate bungee jump experience for people with high scores for security and low scores for excitement’.

This very same logic applies to promoting sustainable decisions and behaviour of your customers. For instance, the previous chapter highlighted the relevance of accounting for the fact that, in many situations, three different and oftentimes-conflicting goals – hedonic, gain and normative goals – seem to play a role in what we decide and do. Promoting sustainability needs to account for these goals by either resolving the conflicts between them or purposely strengthening (the impact of) one of them. In doing so, it is important to realise that the goals that drive people in a particular situation, as well as the strength of the various goals, are not only dependent on the situation but also on people’s values. In fact, Steg et al. (2014) point out that a person’s values ‘affect the way a person perceives a situation: which information is salient, how important different aspects of choice options are to people, and how they evaluate different aspects of the situation so that some actions and potential outcomes are seen as attractive whereas other actions are seen as aversive’ (p. 108). They also indicate that decisions and behaviours that are relevant from a sustainable development perspective are usually influenced by a person’s so-called self-enhancement values, which link to valuing one’s own individual interests, and self-transcendent values, which link to valuing collective interests. Within the first category, you could distinguish between hedonic values, which link to a

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.