Testing a Brand Personality Scale for Quick Service and Casual Dining Establishments

Managers have long recognized the value of establishing and maintaining a desired identity for their brands. The Brand Personality Scale has been recognized as a valid and reliable tool to help managers assess brand perceptions. The forty-two item scale, developed by Aaker, identifies five dimensions of brand personality. While considered generalizable, it has been suggested that the scale, and delineated personality dimensions, may not represent an ideal fit for all industries. The current study sought to propose and test a modified version of the brand personality scale that may be appropriate for the restaurant industry. As part of the research an eighteen item brand personality scale for the restaurant industry was developed. The scale was tested by asking study participants to evaluate restaurants representing the quick service and casual dining market segments. The results suggest that the proposed scale may be considered a reasonable measure of brand personality for these dining markets

A Study of the Relationship Between a Character Education Program and Self-Esteem

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Exploring Hotel Website Effectiveness by Hotel Class

The internet is an increasingly important communication and distribution channel for hotels. More than ever before consumers are making reservation decisions strictly on their experience with the hotel website. Given this, it is critical for hotels pay close attention to the effectiveness of their online presentation. This premise would seemingly hold true for lodging facilities at all price point levels. The purpose of the study was to examine website effectiveness for hotels of various class levels. In the study, hotels were segmented based on level of accommodation using the “Star Rating” system. Each hotel website was evaluated on a number of attributes and content items of interest. Aggregate attribute ratings for each hotel category were then compared for significant differences. In general, it was found that with each step up in hotel class overall presentation and website attribute effectiveness increased. The findings are presented and discussed

Perceived Costs and Benefits of Being a Resident in a Tourism Destination Location

Destination marketing is a form of tourism marketing that promotes a region or an event in order to increase the number of visitors. The underlying goal behind the efforts is the prospect of economic gains for the region. Destination marketing organizations such as tourism boards are taking on a more prominent role as they seek to promote a region as a vacation area, or more narrowly, promote a festival or special event. While new guests to a region can result in increased employment opportunities and generate revenues for businesses, the influx of visitors can also lead to negative consequences. Within a tourism ecosystem there are many stakeholders. This includes the residents of these regions that increasingly find themselves in position where their home area has become a destination for visitors. While some embrace such tourism activity, there are others that view the costs as outweighing the prospective benefits. Using both qualitative and quantitative methods, the study explored tourism destination resident attitudes on a number of critical areas including economic benefits, socio-cultural impact, and ecological concerns

Individuation as an Adolescent Developmental Task: Associations with Adoptee Adjustment

This study evaluated the associations between adolescent individuation and concurrent and long term adjustment in adoptive families. Individuation was assessed using an observational measure examining behaviors and communications demonstrative of individuality and connectedness between each parent and the adolescent. Findings did not support the hypothesized connection between adolescent individuation and concurrent and long term adjustment in adoptive families. However, further analyses revealed particular importance of connectedness between adolescent and parent for adolescent adjustment, which was found to vary by adolescent gender. Specifically, analyses revealed that gender interacts with both adolescent-father connectedness and mother-adolescent connectedness in predicting adolescent internalizing symptoms; for adolescent males, internalizing symptoms were found to decrease as mother-adolescent connectedness increases. These findings suggest a shift in the understanding of individuated parent-adolescent relationships from comprising co-existing individuality and connectedness to connected relationships which allow for, support, and foster adolescent individuality and autonomy. These results also highlight the particular value of the mother-adolescent relationship for adolescent adjustment in adoptive families. Additionally, cross-informant ratings of adolescent and young adult adjustment were examined within and across time in this adoptive family sample. These findings are compared to relevant literature in adolescence and extend the literature by examining cross-informant ratings in emerging adulthood in adoptive families