Against the backdrop of mental health becoming an increasingly interdisciplinary research focus, how leisure satisfaction influences individual mental health has not yet received sufficient attention. This study employed a mixed-methods approach in the context of peri-urban forest parks. First, semi-structured interviews were conducted to identify key psychological constructs and their structural relationships. Subsequently, a structural equation model was developed and empirically tested using survey data. The results reveal that leisure satisfaction does not directly predict the mental health of visitors to peri-urban forest parks. Instead, its influence was mediated by two distinct mediating pathways: nature connectedness and meaning in life. By integrating these four variables into a unified analytical framework, this research not only advanced the theoretical understanding of the mechanisms influencing mental health in nature-based leisure contexts but also offered practical implications for enhancing the mental restorative benefits of peri-urban forest parks.

Mounting evidence suggests that incorporating emotional aspects into nature sensory experiences can enhance individuals' involvement in pro-environmental behaviors. However, investigating the contribution of diverse types to these sensory experiences remains a significant challenge. Based on the involvement theory and Stimulus-Organism-Response theory, this study extends the nature sensory experiences to five modes, and constructs a structural equation model to test the mediating effect of tourists' involvement and place attachment, as well as the moderating effect of awe. Results reveal that, rather than directly influencing pro-environmental behaviors, natural sensory experiences, specifically sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch, require emotional elements such as tourist involvement and place attachment to fully mediate between the two, with awe having a significant moderating effect. The data suggests a hierarchical pattern in how different dimensions of nature sensory experiences influence pro-environmental behaviors, with varying degrees of impact. This implies that nature sensory experiences can enhance tourists' environmentally friendly attitudes and subsequently foster proenvironmental actions. A unique aspect of this study is its consideration of the mediating roles played by tourists' involvement and place attachment, alongside the moderating role of awe. Based on these findings, we propose strategies for enhancing pro-environmental behaviors through a combination of multi-sensory design stimuli and single dynamic stimuli, offering valuable insights for the environmental management of nature tourism destinations.

In response to the scarcity of research on the psychological factors and formation mechanism of tourists’ pro-environmental behavior in plateau ecotourism destinations, this study takes the Shangri-la in Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau as a case, developed an integrated model and tested with structural equation model to obtain accurate and unbiased path coefficients, and jointly exploring the formation mechanism of tourists’ pro-environmental behavior in plateau ecotourism destination. Based on the stimulus-body-response theory and rational behavior theory, this study conducted field investigations and acquired 516 questionnaires. Through analysis, it was discovered that the pro-environment behavior of tourists in plateau ecotourism destinations is influenced by external contextual factors and internal psychological factors. The natural environment and the cultural atmosphere can evoke tourists’ awe, and then awe can directly and positively influence pro-environment behavior, and indirectly influence pro-environment behavior through the dual paths of self-attitude and subjective norms. The conclusion explains the internal logic and action mechanism of tourists’ pro-environment behavior in plateau ecotourism destination, and provides a reference for decision-making in plateau ecotourism destination’s construction and the cracking of tourists’ negative environmental impacts.

Forest leisure experience is a recognized source of psychological well-being (PWB). However, as an essential aspect of the leisure experience, the specific influence of perceived freedom in leisure on PWB in forest parks remains understudied. Guided by Basic Psychological Needs Theory (BPNT), we surveyed 404 forest park visitors and used PLS-SEM to analyze the data. The relationship between perceived freedom in leisure and PWB was explored, along with the moderating roles of self-restoration and education in that relationship. Findings indicated that all four dimensions of perceived freedom in leisure (perceived competence, perceived control, perceived needs, and perceived depth of involvement) were positively associated with forest park visitors’ PWB. Self-restoration strengthened the effects of perceived control and depth of involvement, yet education weakened the impact of perceived control. These findings offered new insights into the possible mechanisms through which forest park visit affects people's PWB and further provided some managerial implications for practitioners and policymakers.

Tourist payment is one of the effective ways to solve the shortage of environmental protection and development funds in ecotourism areas. Prior research has predominantly examined the factors influencing tourists' Willingness-To-Pay (WTP) for environmental protection from the tourists' own perspective, yet there remains a gap in exploring how destinations can effectively motivate tourists' willingness to contribute financially to environmental conservation efforts. Based on Reasonable Person Model (RPM), with the famous ecotourism site of Hulunbuir Grassland in China as the research site, this study tested the relationship between Perceived destination restorative qualities (PDRQs), Eudaimonic well-being(EWB), Ecotourism destination image(EDI), and WTP for environmental protection, based on questionnaire survey and structural equation model. According to the results, PDRQs did not significantly affect WTP, however, RDRQs made a positive impact on EWB and EDI, Furthermore, EWB and EDI fully mediated the correlation between RDRQs and WTP. These findings confirm that the RPM is applicable to account for the mechanism of RDRQs on WTP for environmental protection, expand its research scope, and help us to comprehend the relationship between human and environment and the inducing mechanism of WTP for environmental protection from the aspect of environmental psychology.

It is well accepted that active leisure activities can enhance participants' mental health, yet a research gap remains on how leisure involvement associates with mental health. This study is based on a self-administrated survey of 557 hikers who had hiked on the North Hills' Trail in Ningbo, China. The results indicated that hikers’ mental health is positively determined by attraction, centrality, and self-expression. Both self-efficacy and social support moderate the relationship between self-expression and mental health, and self-efficacy moderates the relationship between attraction and mental health. This study confirms the impacts of leisure involvement on mental health and provides evidence for considering both personal and social factors when designing leisure activities.

Based on social exchange theory and value–belief–norm theory, this study examines the effects of perceived benefits on tourists’ willingness to pay more (WTPM) in a national forest park in China, and the moderation roles of ecocentrism, collectivism, and power distance in these effects. The analyses on a sample of 556 tourists visiting Qiandao Lake National Forest Park showed that relaxation benefits and health benefits had a positive effect on tourists’ WTPM. In addition, collectivism and power distance positively moderated the effect of relaxation benefits on tourists’ WTPM; collectivism moderated the effect of health benefits on tourists’ WTPM. The research contributes to an enriched understanding of tourists’ WTPM in nature-based tourist attractions. Insightful management implications are provided for forest park destinations to better understand and manage tourist perceptions and behaviors.

This study examines holiday self-drive tourists' perceptions of expressway congestion and explores the underlying mechanisms through which these perceptions influence their intention to take future holiday self-drive trips. A mixed-methods design was employed. In the qualitative phase, in-depth interviews and grounded theory analysis identified a four-dimensional structure and corresponding measurement items of tourists perceived expressway congestion. In the quantitative phase, data collected from 414 self-drive tourists were analyzed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) via SmartPLS. The results indicate that while expressway congestion provokes negative emotions and subsequently leads to negative word-of-mouth, it does not diminish the intention for additional holiday self-drive trips. Furthermore, optimism and frequency of self-drive trips serve as moderators between perceived environmental impact and negative emotions, and between negative emotions and negative word-of-mouth, respectively. This study makes the first systematic attempt to develop a measurement scale for perceived expressway congestion, thereby advancing the understanding of intention for holiday self-drive trips from a novel perspective. It also extends the application of Affective Events Theory (AET) and offers actionable insights for managing expressway congestion during peak holiday travel periods.

This study introduces a dynamic optimization model. It explores the roles of both explicit (medical) and implicit (health tourism) investments in health capital accumulation. The analysis covers three health states: healthy, sub-healthy, and diseased. Numerical simulations are used to examine the interaction between these investments. The results reveal their complementary and substitutive effects. Specifically, health tourism acts as a supplementary investment in healthy states. In contrast, it serves as a substitute in sub-healthy states. The model provides valuable insights for integrating health tourism into public health strategies. Such integration could enhance overall well-being and reduce healthcare costs.

The impact of leisure on quality of life (QOL) has garnered increasing scholarly attention from the public health perspective. However, as a key concept within leisure studies, leisure constraint's impact on QOL remained unstudied, especially from the perspective of hiking in non-Western developed countries. Although past qualitative studies indicated that leisure constraints might lead to poorer QOL, empirical evidence is lacking. Thus, to fill in this research gap, we collected 606 useable questionnaires from hikers on the North Hills' Trail in Ningbo, Zhejiang province, China. We empirically examined the relationship between leisure constraint, plus hiker's demographic variables and QOL. The results revealed that: (1) Intrapersonal constraint significantly predicted physical health; Environmental and facilities constraint significantly predicted environmental health; Interpersonal constraint significantly predicted all QOL dimensions (e.g., psychological health, environmental health, social relationship health, and physical health); Accessibility constraint significantly predicted psychological health; Time constraint significantly predicted social relationships health; (2) Among demographic variables, income significantly predicted psychological health, environmental health, social relationships health, and physical health. Both age and number of children are significant predictors of physical health. We offered new insight into hikers' constraint factors from the perspective of non-Western developed countries, provided empirical evidence to fill the research gap about leisure constraint and QOL, and further enriched existing research about leisure, QOL and hiking.

The burgeoning tension between anthropogenic pressures and ecological conservation in rapidly developing nations underscores the critical need for innovative frameworks to assess recreational ecological risk (RER) within national park systems. This study pioneers an analytical framework that synthesizes multi-source data streams, encompassing statistical analyses, remote sensing imagery, questionnaires, and interviews to advance ecological risk assessment theory beyond conventional methodologies. Through a novel hybrid model operationalizing the source, receptor and response, we systematically evaluate RER in Qianjiangyuan National Park (QJYNP). The results show that high-risk areas for recreational utilization zones are closely tied to human activities and are mainly located along transportation routes, residential areas, and designated recreational sites, accounting for 11.61% of the total area. Low-risk areas appear as strips or patches surrounding both the core protected zones and medium-to-high-risk regions. This indicates that even in densely populated settings, RER in national parks have strong spatial correlations with human activities. While large-scale conservation efforts are ongoing, it is essential to anticipate potential impacts from residents’ lifestyles and recreation pursuits effectively, such foresight will not hinder achieving ecological protection objectives for these parks. The proposed framework offers transformative potential for adaptive governance in Global South protected areas, providing a scalable methodology to reconcile biodiversity conservation with sustainable human use under escalating anthropogenic pressures.

This study aimed to measure the service quality of China's high-speed electric multiple unit (EMU) trains and examine empirically the correlations among service quality, passenger satisfaction, and loyalty. Using a service quality scale developed based on passenger ticket, inbound, waiting, boarding, and outbound data, a survey was conducted in southeast China with 615 respondents. Using exploratory factor analysis, mean value, and correlation analysis, the authors constructed a multiple regression analysis model of high-speed EMU train service quality, passenger satisfaction, and loyalty. The results indicate that passengers were most satisfied with inbound service, followed by outbound and boarding services. They registered lower satisfaction with ticket and waiting services. The average mean values showed that passengers were most satisfied with the ID card swiping service and least satisfied with the free Wi-Fi service in waiting rooms. In addition, ticket, inbound, boarding, and outbound services exerted a valid positive impact on passenger satisfaction and loyalty. These discoveries demonstrate that passenger satisfaction partially mediates the influence of the service quality of high-speed EMU trains on loyalty. Recommendations are made to improve the service quality of China's high-speed EMU trains to enhance tourism in China, particularly in the four surveyed cities.

The study aimed to explore the relationship and interaction between humans and nature in specific areas. Latent Dirichlet allocation topic recognition and SnowNLP sentiment analysis were used to extract the topics and analyze the sentiments from visitors’ online reviews of Wuyishan National Park. The conclusions were as follows: (1) The tourists mainly expressed positive emotions toward Wuyishan National Park, and the tourists acknowledged its ecological environment and natural and cultural heritage value. (2) The tourists’ comments focused on four themes: tourism activities and facilities, natural and cultural heritage value, characteristic tourism products, and tourism management and services. Natural experience was the main tourism activity in Wuyishan National Park, while cultural activities were related to the tea culture. (3) The tourist facilities, ticket and reservation mechanism, and management and services of Wuyishan National Park were the main concerns of the tourists. The study suggested that Wuyishan National Park could be transformed from a tourist destination into a comprehensive national park that provides recreational experiences and environmental education. This should be conducted by (1) developing detailed natural and cultural education and experience products and (2) improving public service functions and enhancing the public welfare of the national park.

This study aims to develop a scale to measure marathon tourists' personal development (MTPD) by employing a rigorous scale development methodology. A qualitative study involving 21 in-depth interviews was conducted to generate a pool of items. These items were then validated through two extensive surveys with 504 and 452 participants, respectively. Results show a six-dimension 23-item scale for measuring tourists’ personal development in marathon tourism. These dimensions are self-perception, personal willpower, physical quality, emotion, skills, and ability. This study not only facilitates further empirical research in sport tourism but also provides actionable insights for marathon destination managers to enhance precision marketing strategies. Moreover, by applying the serious leisure framework to marathon tourism, this study offers significant theoretical contributions, paving the way for future interdisciplinary research in sports and leisure.

Scientifically mitigating the ecological risks in tourist destinations is an important foundation for the healthy and sustainable development of tourist destinations.In this study,we summarize the progress of ecological risk research in tourist destinations at home and abroad and the internal logic of ecological risk research in tourist destinations.Current research adhered to an internal framework encompassing the following stages:formation and analysis of ecological risks in tourism destinations,exposure characterization,effect exploration,risk assessment,and risk management.Specific research results were summarized in four aspects:the analysis of ecological risk sources,assessment of acceptors and endpoints,ecological risk assessment,perceptions of ecological risk,pre-dictions and management of ecological risks within tourism destinations.Future research should prioritize fostering a harmonious relationship between humanity and natural environment,which necessitates strengthening the foundation of a multidisciplinary theory.Future research should focus on the formation mechanisms of ecological risks in tourist destinations,the mechanisms of interaction among ecological risk sources,receptors,and endpoints,ecological risk assessments of tourist destinations based on multiple risk sources,ecological risk assessments of typical tourism destinations and their key exposures,enhancing the ecological risk assessment index system for tourist destinations by incorporating data from various sources,conducting simulation studies to develop ecological risk warning systems for tourist destinations,exploring the spatiotemporal scale coupling relationships of ecological risks in tourist destinations,examining the perceptions and attitudes of different stakeholders towards ecological risks in tourist destinations,evaluating the cost-benefit of ecological risk adaptation,and performing prevention measures in tourist destinations.

This study is rooted in the Social Amplification of Risk Framework (SARF) and the Risk Perception Attitude Framework (RPAF). Utilizing longitudinal data from the early stages and aftermath of the COVID-19, the research empirically investigates how media exposure influences tourists’ travel intentions, mediated by risk perception and tourist concerns, and moderated by media trust and self-efficacy. The purpose of this study is to measure the impact mechanisms of media exposure on travel intentions during a public health crisis. Structured survey questionnaires were administered twice in China during two distinct phases of the pandemic, resulting in the collection of 634 and 450 sets of raw data, respectively. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was employed to examine relationships between variables. During the initial outbreak, increased media exposure heightened tourists’ awareness and concerns about public health crisis risks, resulting in decreased travel intentions. However, in the later stages of the crisis, media exposure positively influenced travel intentions. Both risk perception and tourist concerns significantly influenced travel intentions, acting as mediators. In the later stages of the crisis, the impact of risk perception on travel plans diminished, with only concerns mediating the influence of media exposure on travel intentions. Despite significant moderating roles of media trust and self-efficacy during the pandemic, crisis evolution altered the moderating effect of media trust between exposure and tourist perception. This study pioneers the application of a combined SARF and RPAF model in investigating travel intentions during public health crisis. It introduces a novel longitudinal research approach to explore the impact mechanisms of tourist behavioral intentions during a public health crisis, revealing the evolving relationships between information exposure, tourist psychology, and behavioral intentions in the context of a public health crisis.

This study develops a theoretical framework based on the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) model to examine the formation and determinants of tourists' satisfaction with online car-hailing. Self-administered questionnaires were used to survey 486 tourists in Hangzhou, China. The results show that the perceived quality and value of online car-hailing have a significant positive impact on tourist satisfaction. Perceived value partially mediated the relationship between perceived quality and tourist satisfaction. Further, perceived quality and perceived value played a chain mediating effect on the relationship between tourist expectation and tourist satisfaction. In addition, this study verified that satisfaction negatively impacts complaints and positively impacts loyalty, and complaints negatively impact loyalty. Management implications and recommendations for future research are also discussed.

This study reports the results of an examination of the effects of celebrity involvement on tourist loyalty, with destination image and place attachment as mediators. Survey data from 413 tourists in Hengdian World Studio, the most prominent film tourist destination in China, indicated that fandom or celebrity involvement (measured using attraction, centrality, and self-expression) significantly improved destination image and place attachment, both of which also enhanced tourist loyalty. Moreover, although the direct relationship between celebrity involvement and tourist loyalty was not significant, it supported the full mediation of both destination image and place attachment. The findings carry theoretical and managerial implications.

Tourism ecological safety (TES) warning is of great significance for eco-environmental protection and low-carbon development. We constructed a early warning index system of TES for the Yangtze River Delta Urban Agglomeration (YRDUA), building on the pressure-state-response social-economic-environment framework model and used the entropy-based technique for order of preference (TOPSIS) method. The spatiotemporal grid of tourism eco-security warning in YRDUA from 2007 to 2020 were analyzed, using the entropy-based TOPSIS method and spatial Markov chain. The results indicated that from 2007 to 2019, the average value of TES posting progress, Ci, of YRDUA increased from 0.3869 to 0.5649, portraying an overall upward trend. The corresponding TES warning level of “heavy warning”-level cities continued to decrease, whereas that of the “light warning” and “medium warning”-level cities dominated gradually. Further, the spatial spillover effect of the evolutionary of the level of TES in YRDUA portrayed a continuous increase, and we also observed a “club convergence” phenomenon in the spatiotemporal transfer of the alarm situation. Moreover, the TES of YRDUA during 2021–2028 portrayed a “light” warning state, and the warning level of the Suzhou-Shanghai area was not as optimistic. This paper can serve as a guide for the regulation of potential risks related to TES for tourism destinations not just in China but also other countries.

Guided by attention restoration theory and stimulus-organism-response (S-O-R) theory, we developed an integrated model to investigate the impact of perceived environmental restoration on forest park visitors' pro-environmental behavior through the mediation of place attachment. We further tested the moderating role of eco-centrism to provide theoretical and practical implications for the sustainability of tourism destinations and positive human-nature interactions. Using a sample of 504 visitors to a national forest park in China, our study indicated all three dimensions of environmental restorative perception (compatibility, extent, and away) positively influenced place attachment. Place attachment promoted pro-environmental behavior. Place attachment was an important mediator of the relationship between environmental restorative perceptions (compatibility, extent, and away) and pro-environmental behavior. Eco-centrism has no moderating effect.