Investigating the Effect of other Tourists' Misbehavior on Overall Tourist Experience: A Case study of Mashhad restaurants

This study sought to investigate how by-standing tourists evaluate other tourists' misbehavior in a shared service environment and how this evaluation may influence a tourist's overall experience. The required data were obtained through conducting interviews and administering a questionnaire on 411 tourists who visited Mashhad in 2019. Hypothesis testing was performed by structural equation modeling. This study revealed that tourists went through an evaluative process of primary and secondary appraisals that ended in active or passive coping behaviors. It was also found that perceived powerlessness, perceived betrayal, and perceived identity threat were the main cognitive factors in this process. Perceived betrayal exerted a significant effect on passive coping strategies, making the tourists unwilling to solve the problem with the service provider, and thus the customer-to-business relationship was terminated silently. Perceived identity threat positively affected switching intentions. On the other hand, perceived powerlessness discouraged tourists from seeking an immediate solution, while negative emotions led to immediate coping. Tourists' negative emotions were also found to have negatively influenced their evaluation of the overall experience. Therefore, it could be argued that service providers should pay attention to the importance of tourist-to-tourist interaction (TTI) management and take its impact on the overall tourist experience seriously.