While other disciplinary approaches such as sociology and anthropology are important, this chapter introduces a cognitivist psychology approach to experience research. Such theoretical discussion may seem of little practical use, but the chapter argues that it is fundamental to understanding how and why experiences are created. The chapter applies theory and concepts from cognitive science (cognitive psychology and neuroscience) in the study of tourism experiences. This provides a different psychological paradigm to the behavioural approach currently in use in much research. The chapter describes the scope of cognitive psychology and neuroscience, its main concepts of cognitive psychology (perception, attention, emotion, memory, consciousness, learning), and their neuronal basis (neuroscience). These concepts are then applied in three topic areas related to tourism experiences: decision making, emotion, and attention. Several applications to tourism experience research are noted. Finally, the chapter discusses the way cognitive psychology concepts can be used in tourism research.
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The study of experiences is a popular topic in the tourism literature and has been a central theme in research (E. Cohen, 1979; Larsen, 2007; Mannell & Iso-Ahola, 1987; O’Dell & Billing, 2005; Ooi, 2003; Otto & Brent Ritchie, 1996; Prentice, Witt, & Hamer, 1998; Ryan, 1997; Uriely, 2005). An experience is considered the principal ‘product’ of travel. Tourism marketing and travel agents provide a “marketplace” and tourists with the “mental places” where experiences occur (Volo, 2009, p. 119). Prior investigations into tourism experiences have adopted two main approaches: those seeking to understand the meaning of an experience and those trying to understand how an experience is “produced” in the human mind (Skavronskaya et al., 2017). This distinction is analogous to the distinction between the content of a television program and how the content is created, transmitted, and displayed on a television, the television process. In this chapter, we focus on the mental processes that support “having an experience” rather than discussing what the experience “means”.
A tourism business operator may consider that, from a practical perspective, understanding the mental processes involved in “having an experience” is not particularly important. After all, the operator may say, I understand my customers and can observe that they are satisfied with their experiences. I do not need to know how they are thinking and why they are satisfied. The authors argue that understanding the cognitive psychology of “having an experience” is useful in understanding a visitor’s decision-making process, their emotional responses and what they notice and pay attention to. This knowledge can then be used to improve or change the experience to improve the outcomes from customer experiences and increase profitability. Further, this chapter discusses some of the problems with ‘folk psychology’ or our everyday understanding of how we think that is incorrect. Thus, an understanding of cognitive psychology can inform the management of experiences. Cognitive science (cognitive psychology, neuroscience, and related fields) is the discipline that studies the mental processes that support “having an experience”.