Will Ecotourists Pay Premium Prices? An Explanatory Study on Motivations, Ecotourism Intention and Willingness to Pay Premium for Ecotourism

Purpose: Recent literature emphasizes that there is an ambiguity on ecotourism consumption as actual environmentally friendly behaviors deviate from the intentions. Further, it is identified that ecotourism offerings are higher in price and discourage consumption. Hence, this study examined ecotourism consumer behaviors focusing on motivation, ecotourism intention, and willingness to pay premium for ecotourism. It also aims to investigate the mediating effect of ecotourism intention between motivations and willingness to pay premium. Design/methodology/approach: The study undertook a quantitative approach with a cross-sectional design. Self-administrated questionnaires (online) were distributed employing purposive sampling technique to young domestic travelers who had purchased green travel products in the last six months in Sri Lanka. A total of 212 responses were analyzed by PLS-SEM approach using SmartPLS 4.0 software. Findings: The findings revealed that intrinsic motivation significantly influenced the willingness to pay premium whereas the impact of extrinsic motivation on willingness to pay premium was insignificant. Additionally, this study proved that ecotourism intention partially mediated the relationship between intrinsic motivation and willingness to pay premium while ecotourism intention fully mediated the relationship between extrinsic motivation and willingness to pay premium. Originality: This research contributes to extending knowledge of tourism consumer behaviour in the context of ecotourism. Moreover, this study examined how an individual is motivated towards ecotourism consumption and their willingness to pay premium for such consumptions. Thus, the present study integrates the actual behavior, willingness to pay premium to further explain the self-determination theory. Thus, it empirically contributes to broadening the understanding of comprehensive ecotourism consumer behaviour that has been paid little attention. Implications: The findings offer important practical implications for ecotourism providers, marketers, policymakers, and other decision-makers for planning and developing ecotourism offerings, effective marketing and promotion to encourage and ensure sustainable tourism consumption. Keywords: Ecotourism, Ecotourism Intention, Extrinsic Motivation, Intrinsic Motivation, Willingness to Pay Premiu