Loyalty And Behavioural Loyalty

2.3. Conative loyalty/ Behavioral Intentions

According to Lovelock (2011), customer loyalty was defined as consumer's “willingness to continue patronizing a business over a long term, purchasing and using its goods and services on a repeated and preferably exclusive basis, and voluntarily recommending the firm's products to friends and associates” (Lee et al., 2011, pp. 3- 4). In other words, it represents irrational behavior as a result of “a deeply held commitment to repatronize a preferred product/ service consistently (Oliver, 1997, p. 392).

Behavioral loyalty measures in tourism contexts are the determination of an appropriate time frame during which customers may or may not return to a destination (Lee et al., 2011, p. 4). According to

Attitudinal indicators provide insight on why people patronize a product or service. They focus on understanding consumers’ preference, liking, and positive attitudes that are relatively stable over time. Attitudinal loyalty has also been used synonymously with psychological commitment (Lee et al., 2011, p. 4). Some have also proposed that an understanding of the strength of consumers' commitment provides insight on the distinction between truly loyal customers and those whose brand or place choice is more strongly influenced by situational factors such as the scarcity of alternatives, availability of other options, and involuntary choice (e.g., Pritchard et al., 1999). Accordingly, commitment involves some degree of affective attachment and is viewed as “a process through which individual's interests become attached to carrying out of socially organized patterns of behavior which express the needs of the individuals” (Lee et al., 2011, p. 4). It can also play a mediating role in the relationship between satisfaction and loyalty (e.g., Pritchard et al., 1999; Bloemer and Odekerken- Schröder, 2002). That is, positive evaluations of products and services foster commitment to a brand (i.e., resistance to change), which ultimately leads to consumer patronage (e.g., Pritchard et al.,