With the rise of self-media platforms, self-media bloggers have become an important source of information for users when

making decisions. However, bloggers’ tourism promotion and its impact on users’
trip plans remain to be studied. Therefore, this study integrates users’ attitudes and intentions to refer to Xiaohongshu notes for trip planning and its subsequent impact from five perspectives: congruity,
involvement, source credibility, content quality, and advertising recognition. This study collected data from Xiaohongshu users through a questionnaire survey. The following conclusions were drawn from the
analysis of the survey results: (1) involvement is positively related to users’ attitude; (2) source credibility is positively related to users’ attitude; (3) content quality is positively related to users’ attitude; (4)
accurate advertisement recognition is positively related to users’ attitude; (5) users’ attitude is positive related to intention.

Overview Demographic information of respondents. (N=305) Theoretical Implications

The development of today's The results of this study indicate that involvement (internal
information technology and the factor), source credibility, and content quality (external factors)
popularization of the internet have Male are influencing factors in Xiaohongshu users’ attitude towards
increased the frequency of people's the Xiaohongshu posts and their intention to follow the posts to
use of network client products. make trip plans, which generally confirmed the S-O-R model.
People no longer only rely on This paper provides insights for studying the users’ intention to
traditional media such as TV and follow the bloggers’ posts to make trip plan in a tourism context.
newspapers, but prefer to use social
media. The constant maturity of
social media has catalyzed the
emergence and development of self-
media.

Self-media in tourism Age

Self-media has the following positive
effects on tourism development:
First, the information from self- Male
media influences the user’s
impression of the tourist destination.
Second, self-media can broaden the
time and space in which tourist
destinations’ images are
disseminated. Furthermore,
travelers may use self-media to
exchange both public and private
individual trip information.
Female
Significance of the study Once a
Gender
Few articles studied users’ intention month
Once
to follow bloggers’ posts on social
every half
media to make their trip plans.
month
At least
Once a once
Purpose of the study week everyday
To bridge these research gaps, the
objective of this study is to examine
the factors exerting influence on the
travelers’ intention to refer to the
notes generated by bloggers on self- Less than Practical Implications
media platforms for their trip plans. once a  Recommendation for bloggers: (1) Ensuring high quality,
month accurate advertising positioning and paying attention to users’
intentions and psychology. (2) Posts should be based on what a
leisure traveler might feel, rather than convey the impression that
Frequency of Once "traveling" is their job.
using Xiaohongshu every 3
Several concepts and variables are reviewed in this part, which  Recommendation for self-media platforms: (1) Improve
to 5 days
includes: information supervision and reduce false information. (2) Check
the content and filter out outdated information prior to showing it
The S-O-R model to users.
According to Mehrabian and Russell (1974), the S-O-R  Recommendation for the tourism industry: (1) Media data
model is composed of three parts: stimulation, impact, and can provide first-hand, real-time data and feedback for the strict
response. It is claimed that stimulus (S) is present in the market surveillance system. (2) Collaborate with self-media
external environment and induces changes in people’s internal platforms to support tourism projects when necessary.
organisms (O), influencing their behavioral reactions (R).
Internal factors
Congruity
Involvement
External factors Mehrabian, A., & Russell, J. A. (1974). An approach to
Source credibility environmental psychology. M.I.T. Press.
Content quality Litvin, S. W., & Goh, H. K. (2002). Self-image congruity: a valid
Advertisement recognition tourism theory?. Tourism Management, 23(1), 81-83.
Hoch, S., & Deighton, J. (1989). Managing What Consumers
Learn from Experience. Journal of Marketing, 53(2), 1.
Fig. 2.
https://doi.org/10.2307/1251410
Figure 1
Fisher, C. D., Ilgen, D. R., & Hoyer, W. D. (1979). Source
credibility, information favorability, and job offer
acceptance. Academy of Management Journal, 22(1), 94-
103.
Wang, C. L., Zhang, Y., Ye, L. R., & Nguyen, D. D. (2005).
Subscription to fee-based online services: What makes
consumer pay for online content?. Journal of electronic
commerce research, 6(4), 304.
The WarpPLS 8.0 program was used to ensure that the constructs were Wojdynski, B. W., & Evans, N. J. (2020). The covert advertising
reliable and had convergent and discriminant validity. As a result, all recognition and effects (CARE) model: Processes of
constructs have good reliability and validity and can be employed persuasion in native advertising and other masked formats.
confidently in the following analyses. International Journal of Advertising, 39(1), 4-31.
The WarpPLS approach was also utilized to analyze the structural model
The study setting by checking the R2 coefficients to determine the significance of the path
Since there are abundant trip planning posts on Xiaohongshu, coefficients. Figure 1 displays the strong R2 coefficients for attitude (0.80)
which meet the needs of the study purpose, it was chosen to be and intention (0.70). H2, H3, H4, and H6 were supported, but H1 and H5
t h e o b j e c t o f t h e r e se a r ch . T h e r e s e a r c h s t u d y a b o u t were not supported. The successful completion of this paper should be sincerely
Xiaohongshu users’ behavior patterns on trip planning with attributed to our supervisor, Dr. Ting (Tina) Li, who is an erudite
reference to Xiaohongshu posts. and genial teacher. We would also like to express gratitude to
each of our team members for the efforts we have made. We
Sampling would also like to thank all those who contributed to our paper,
An online questionnaire was distributed. The study focused on including the respondents who answered the questionnaire
individuals over 18-year-old and who are Xiaohongshu users accurately, the families and friends who encouraged us in tough
within China. A total of 415 respondents were invited to time, the classmates who shared experience and inspiration with
complete the survey, of which 305 were valid questionnaires. us, and the former researchers who grounded basis for this
Data analysis study. Eventually, we frankly thank all HAITC professors for their
cultivation on us. And thanks to both Hainan University and
Excel, SPSS, and WarpPLS 8.0 programs were used to
Arizona States University, of which all the courses imparted us
conduct the data analysis.
with shrewd and rational vision.