Investigating the Factors Involved in Tourism Intercultural Communication among Tourists: A Case Study of Hamadan City, Iran

In today’s modern world, tourism has turned into an effective way to access the environment and culture through intercultural communication. However, despite its significance in long-term economic development, intercultural communication is neglected in the planning stages of tourism development projects. Therefore, this study sought to investigate the factors that influence intercultural communication in tourism using a grounded theory approach. To this end, the required data were collected through detailed semi-structured interviews with fifteen experts and professionals in the tourism industry of Hamedan City who were selected via snowball sampling. The collected data were then analyzed, and the results were organized under six main categories with twenty-six sub-categories. Finally, the theoretical model of the study was developed using the Atlas-Ti software. Accordingly, the main six categories of the model included personal characteristics, socio-cultural characteristics, education, producing materials and creating knowledge on intercultural issues in tourism, management and planning, the health and safety of the environment, and media and information technology in intercultural tourism communication. The results of this study propose an integrated approach for tourism managers and entrepreneurs so that they can develop a high level of intercultural communication and competence for tourists.