The impact of the uses and gratifications of tourist attraction fan page

Purpose: The fan page of social network site can be used as a platform for the tourist attractions to interact with their consumers. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how entertainment, informativeness, and socializing gratifications affect a user’s attitude toward a tourist attraction fan page in the context of smart tourism, on which scant research has been conducted so far. Design/methodology/approach: The authors investigate how entertainment, information, and socialization gratifications affect a user’s attitude toward a tourist attraction fan page of Hong Kong youth in the context of smart tourism using structural equation modeling. Findings: The authors show that three aspects of gratifications, i.e., entertainment, informativeness, and socializing, have significant impacts on a user’s attitude toward a tourist attraction fan page, which subsequently has an impact on intention to visit the attraction through a user’s attitude toward a tourist attraction developed through his/her attitude toward a fan page. Originality/value: Scant research has been conducted to study how uses and gratifications affect a user’s attitude toward a tourist attraction fan page in the context of smart tourism. This research fills this research gap.