Acceptance of Young Travelers to Purchase Travel and Tourism Products Online

The Internet takes an important place in people's daily life and replaces face-to-face communication. Young people are more high-tech oriented and use the Internet more frequent and faster compare to the older generations. One of the reasons for them to use it is to purchase travel and tourism (T&T) products for their travels. However, there are also young travelers who resist to do so due to the lack of trust, self-efficacy and controllability over online T&T products shopping. Therefore, the aim of this thesis is to investigate acceptance of young travelers to purchase travel and tourism products online. The Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) has been applied in this paper, where trust, self-efficacy and controllability (as two components of perceived behavioral control from Theory of Planned Behavior) are considered as external variables. Furthermore, initial constructs of the model as perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, attitude, behavioral intention and actual behavior are followed accordingly. The questionnaires were distributed to the students who are studying in the North Cyprus, Turkish Republic of North Cyprus (n = 545). Two groups of the young people emerge: purchasers and non-purchasers of T&T products online. Reasons regarding their choice will give an understanding for travel and tourism industry professionals, suppliers, and marketers. The results show that behavioral intention and self-efficacy prevent non-purchasers to purchase T&T products online. Trust, according to the findings, is still critical and influential determinant for both groups. Furthermore, the results reveal that all variables of the research model positively affect the investigated behavior. Keywords: Young Travelers, Online Purchase, Travel and Tourism Products, Technology Acceptance Model, Self-Efficacy, Controllability, Trust.