This study aims to deepen our understanding of the relationship between social media themes and hotel financial performance. Specifically, we explore the themes of place, promotion, expectation, quality, intent, availability and convenience , evaluating their underlying positive or negative tones to gain deeper insights into their impact on financial performance. To achieve this, we sourced data from the Infegy Atlas social media database and the Thomson Reuters Asset4 database, encompassing hotel firms worldwide from 2007 to 2021. Our findings reveal that among the seven themes analysed, the positive tones associated with four themes ( place , expectation , intent and convenience ) are positively associated with luxury hotels’ return on assets ( ROA ). In contrast, negative themes do not exhibit a significant association with financial performance in the full sample. However, further analysis focusing on these four themes during the COVID-19 period indicates that negative tones exert a detrimental effect on ROA under conditions of heightened uncertainty. Importantly, this adverse association is attenuated in firms with high capital expenditure and goodwill, indicating that sustained investment and reputational standing buffer the financial impact of negative social media discourse. Conversely, the positive themes do not exhibit significant interaction effects with the COVID-19 period, capital expenditure, or goodwill. Overall, the results offer important insights into how the tone of social media conversations shapes financial outcomes in the luxury hotel industry.
This study analyzes the connection between destination popularity and traveler expectations of accommodation prices at hotels and vacation rentals. Guided by prospect theory, its primary goal is to assess whether the principles of loss aversion and diminishing sensitivity explain the influence of accommodation prices on destination popularity. The study extends prospect theory by proposing a competitive framework to identify cross-effects between hotels and vacation rentals in influencing destination popularity. An empirical analysis of 3,142 U.S. destinations shows that hotels display reverse loss aversion, whereas vacation rentals follow a pattern predicted by prospect theory. Reverse cross-loss aversion emerges in the effect of vacation rental prices on hotel-induced destination popularity, whereas prospect theory explains the effects of hotel prices on vacation rental-induced destination popularity. The finding that cross-loss aversion and cross-diminishing sensitivity influence the relationship between hotel prices and vacation rental-induced destination popularity extends prospect theory to a competitive framework.
Past research often merges environmental (E), social (S), and governance (G) factors into a single metric and presents mixed findings. Drawing on literature of reputation building and legitimacy theory, this study examines the independent effects of E, S, and G ratings on hospitality firms' current operating performance and market valuation of future profitability. Deploying a mixed-method approach, this study unpacks the E, S, and G effects by analysing Bloomberg Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) data and a survey from a panel of expert institutional investors. Our analysis of Bloomberg ESG data reveals that E and S ratings align with reputation-building processes, demonstrating positive correlations with both current operating performance and market valuation of future profitability. In contrast, G ratings align with legitimacy theory, exhibiting a positive correlation with current operating performance but a negative correlation with market valuation of future profitability. The results from the study with institutional investors further support the proposed linkages with legitimacy and reputation building. Overall, these findings highlight the importance of a detailed ESG evaluation approach, revealing the unique ways each ESG component affects the financial performance of hospitality firms.
Service robots in hospitality face increasing abuse, yet employee responses to such incidents remain underexamined. Using an experimental design approach, this study explores how abuse type (verbal vs. physical) and perpetrator type (child vs. adult) jointly affect intervention and retaliation intentions of employees. The results revealed that verbal abuse by children elicited stronger intervention and retaliation intentions in hospitality employees, with their sympathy toward the robot mediating this effect. This study contributes to deontic justice theory by extending its application from human victims to non-human agents (e.g., service robots), and by demonstrating that justice-related responses are jointly shaped by both the severity of the abusive act and the social identity of the perpetrator. Practically, this research yields practical guidance for hospitality workplaces on service robot abuse incidents, including training employees to work alongside service robots, the design of robot responses, and organizational policy.
This study investigates how capital expenditure (CAPEX) intensity and leverage jointly relate to performance and risk in publicly listed U.S. hotel and restaurant firms. Using panel data for 67 corporations (23 hotels, 44 restaurants) from 2013 to 2023, the analysis models lagged CAPEX intensity and leverage alongside firm size, sales growth, and operating cash flow in firm-level regressions and portfolio-level time-series analyses. The sample consists predominantly (78%) of asset-heavy property owners rather than asset-light franchisors, with important implications for interpretation. Results reveal that higher CAPEX intensity is positively associated with subsequent accounting performance (return on assets, earnings before interest and taxes [EBIT]/total assets, liquidity ratios, and market-to-book), with associations substantially stronger for asset-heavy hotel corporations than restaurant corporations or asset-light franchisors. Leverage exhibits a negative relationship with accounting performance, particularly pronounced in the capital-intensive asset-heavy hotel sector. Portfolio-level autoregressive models demonstrate strong persistence in operating performance, indicating that firms sustaining higher investment intensity tend to remain in favorable performance regimes across years. Simultaneously, Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroskedasticity models reveal pronounced and persistent volatility clustering in risk-adjusted equity returns, suggesting that intensive CAPEX programs are accompanied by extended periods of heightened uncertainty for investors. The findings underscore fundamental tensions in hospitality finance: while sustained investment is associated with long-term value creation, it must be balanced against leverage constraints and managed investor expectations around short-term volatility during turbulent periods such as the COVID-19 shock. These results should be interpreted as conditional associations rather than causal effects, given inherent endogeneity concerns in observational investment data.
