Vitor Gomes Rodrigues

• Master in Tourism Management and Planning
• Researcher at University of Aveiro

Air quality (AQ) is gaining considerable visibility within the tourism sector. However, despite several studies analysing the impact of tourism activities on the AQ of destinations, little is known about the inverse relation. This paper analyses the role of AQ on travel planning and the factors influencing it, specifically the influence of environm...

The world’s economic structure is increasingly moving towards a digital framework, boosted by the fourth industrial revolution. As a versatile sector, tourism is also embedded within this digital transformation process, albeit at a slower pace due to the uncountable challenges and uncertainties surrounding it. Nevertheless, the most recent implicat...

Purpose This paper aims to analyse residents’ perceptions of tourism growth in Porto prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, aiming to determine the most appropriate strategies to mitigate negative tourism impacts. Studies on resident perceptions of tourism impacts are still scarce, particularly the ones addressing the topic in the context of Portuguese ur...

The tourism sector is presently facing new challenges resulting from the increasing digitalization of society. Boosted by industry 4.0, new tourism dynamics are emerging. Nonetheless, the real significance of this revolutionary trend and its implications still lack further development. Aiming to assess the state-of-the-art about the digital transfo...

New digital dynamics are being triggered within the tourism ecosystem with direct consequences on visitors’ experiences, which are gradually becoming mediated by emerging and disruptive technologies. However, little is known about visitors’ positioning towards technologies and their impact. This study aims to explore the existence of groups with di...

Smart specialization strategies emerge as disruptive instruments within territorial cohesion policies aiming to improve regional development. Tourism is seen as a distinctive asset within smart specialization strategies, but the discussion about the sector’s role is still scarce. Simultaneously, a new digitalization era is bringing the 4.0 paradigm...

Call for extended abstracts INVTUR 2024 - Digital Transformation in the Tourism Industry Please submit your extended abstract via email to: vitorrodrigues@ua.pt, marianasantosmartins@ua.pt and a.mariavieira@ua.pt

Air pollution is one of the most challenging environmental issues influencing the lifestyles of the world’s population. Every year millions of respiratory diseases and premature deaths are directly attributed to it. Therefore, people who suffer from respiratory diseases are more vulnerable to varia tions in air quality, as direct exposure leads to...

Due to the growing awareness concerning environmental problems, specifically air pollution, it is crucial to understand the relationship between perceptions of air quality and the pro-environmental behaviors of visitors. This study segments visitors based on self-reported pro-environmental behaviors. A survey was carried out in Portugal (N=602). Th...

The world’s economic structure is increasingly moving towards a digital framework, boosted by the fourth industrial revolution. As a versatile sector, tourism is also embedded within this digital transformation process, although at a smaller pace due to the uncountable challenges and uncertainties surrounding it. Nevertheless, the most recent impli...

It is undeniable the growing significance of technology in today’s society. And tourism is likewise the case. The constraints triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic guided the tourism industry to (s)low levels of activity and compel the authorities to re-think development models and innovative ways to face new and unknown challenges. One way to revital...

The smart and 4.0 paradigms are increasingly dominating the narratives of tourism decision-makers and planners, although being argued that both concepts still lack theoretical background capable of supporting their adoption in development and planning strategies. People travel because they want to get involved in a particular destination through re...

Assessing tourism destination attractiveness is a dynamic procedure influenced by constantly changing factors. Despite the existence of various studies on destination attractiveness, less attention has been devoted to measuring the relevance of air quality. The growing concerns related to the impacts of air pollution worldwide, make it imperative t...

Technology has been accompanying tourism since the sector’s early ages and always took part in its value chain. Nowadays, a new era marked by emerging, digital, and constantly changing technologies regulates the path through which modern society should move, disrupting and influencing everyday life. This revolutionary path within the industrial con...

Environmental sustainability is an increasing concern in the present era, particularly in the tourism field, which is known as an industry with severe environmental impacts. Thus, raising awareness concerning the importance of adopting pro-environmental behaviors is mandatory to achieve truly sustainable development of the tourism sector. This stud...

This chapter aims to fill the knowledge gap regarding the relationship between tourism and air quality, specifically in the Portuguese tourism industry, with a focus on tourist nationality. It examines whether this relationship differs according to tourist origin. This study uses an air pollutant, PM10, with a strong impact on human health that has...

Air quality is a topic with growing interest within the tourism industry, especially for destinations with a high volume of tourism. Several implications on tourism demand are already recognised, such as influence on health and well-being, travel behaviour and trip satisfaction. However, there is a knowledge gap concerning its influence on tourism...

Despite the growing influence of air pollution on people’s behaviour, little attention has been given to visitors’ behavioural intentions towards air pollution episodes. Understanding visitors’ behaviours is crucial in developing effective marketing strategies and preventing damaging consequences for both visitors and destinations. This paper prese...

The pandemic caused by coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 (associated to the disease named COVID-19) is having a global impact that affects health, the economy and the environment. These impacts are negative in most of the sectors but benefits also occurred in specific fields. Tourism was one of the most negatively affected economic sectors, and in terms of be...

Governance is a recurring issue in current tourism research. However, there are still few studies focused on autochthonous governance perspectives. In this sense, and considering the Douro region (Portugal), we analyse the experiences and understandings expressed by local agents about the tourism organisation and their projections on alternative pa...

Douro is a tourism destination increasingly sought after by its natural and cultural landscapes, where the wineries and wine production act as central attractions. As a world-renowned tourism product, wine draws most of the interest in this sub-region. Nonetheless, many other gastronomic attractions can be found, including local products such as ho...

Purpose Tourism may have important positive and negative economic, socio-cultural and environmental impacts. However, cultural and natural resources are also the base to the development of competitive destinations and changes in these resources can have an important impact on tourism development. Despite the considerable literature regarding the im...

The European Directive 2011/24/EU establishes the rules for the access to cross-border healthcare to ensure the mobility of patients and promote cooperation between the different Member States. This study aims to understand its impact and the role that medical tourism can play in the healthcare context in Portugal. On the one hand, it makes a refle...

Book Review Baldacchino, G. (2015) [Eds.] Archipelago tourism: policies and practices, Tourism Planning & Development, 13(3), London, Routledge

A gastronomia tem vindo a desempenhar um papel cada vez mais preponderante na experiência turística global de um visitante. Se por um lado existem aqueles que descuram esta componente, outros há que orientam as suas escolhas e actividades em função dos bens gastronómicos de um determinado destino. Neste campo, os espaços de restauração actuam como...

Neste trabalho procede-se a uma reflexão sobre as relações entre alimentação e turismo, tendo os restaurantes por pano de fundo. Com base num estudo de caso realizado na pequena cidade de Vila Real (Norte interior de Portugal), capital do distrito de Vila Real, aprofundam-se incidências dessa relação numa perspetiva de desenvolvimento territorial c...

Para um enfoque territorial do turismo no Douro é um contributo para o sempre presente debate em torno dos problemas de defi nição do território enquanto conceito, prática, política e representação, mas também um exemplo de como essa indefi nição permite uma perspetiva multidimensional, fl uída e em constante reconstrução. Este livro é fruto de uma...

As a member state of the European Union (EU) that sought to converge to the macroeconomic and social development standards of the member states, Portugal took advantage of the existing EU funding and guidelines to improve its tourism infrastructure and service quality. At the time of Portugal's entry into the EU a movement of reflection and reform...

As tourism presents one of Portugal's most valuable economy sectors, as well as an emerging sector in Serbian economy, the objective of this research is to provide an insight in Portuguese and Serbian tourism markets. In order to accomplish the main objective, a statistical overview of the two mentioned tourism markets is conducted, as well as a co...

The European Directive 2011/24/EU establishes the rules for the access to cross-border health care in order to ensure the mobility of patients and promote cooperation in this field between the different Member States. This study aims to understand the impact of this Directive and the role that medical tourism can play in the health care context in...

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) is today one of the world’s largest economies, placing itself in the world scene’s spotlight. In the late 1970s, the government of the PRC implemented new policies to promote the country’s development, leading to political changes and introducing important economic reforms. These changes prompted a major growth...

Business tourism is one of the most important tourist products at the international level. Representing more than 14% of international arrivals and more than 23% of the total tourist expenditure, this product is experiencing an incredible dynamics and has potential to create wealth at national and local levels. Being business tourism one of the ten...

The outbound tourism from the People’s Republic of China, although showing with a considerable delay comparing to the post 2nd World War tourist ‘boom’, has experienced an exponential growth since 1983, establishing itself as the largest outbound tourism market in the world in 2012, with more than 83 million Chinese citizens travelling internationa...

The liberalization policy of outbound tourism in the People’s Republic of China, although late, has been continuous and has followed the country’s political and economic opening up to the outside world. This strategy resulted, in less than two decades, in an exponential growth in the number of Chinese citizens travelling internationally, having alr...

The liberalization policy of outbound tourism in the People’s Republic of China, although late, has been continuous and has followed the country’s political and economic opening up to the outside world. This strategy resulted, in less than two decades, in an exponential growth in the number of Chinese citizens travelling internationally, having alr...