Fostering responsible travel behavior at natural heritage destinations through the lens of destination social responsibility and value-belief-norm theory

This research aims to extend the value-belief-norm theory to understand the responsible travel behavioral intention of tourists at natural heritage destinations, focusing on the relationships among environmental sustainability value, destination social responsibility (DSR), tourism destination preference, personal norms, and behavioral intention. A total of 565 responses from visitors to Jeju Island were collected through an online survey and analyzed using partial least squares-structural equation modeling, fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), and deep learning to test hypotheses. All hypotheses are supported by the PLS-SEM results. Findings reveal that environmental sustainability value has a considerable influence on DSR, followed by tourism destination preference and personal norms, which in turn influence responsible travel behavioral intention. The use of fsQCA provides more complete knowledge of the impact of each predictor, indicating a few causal configurations for responsible travel behavioral intention. The findings reveal that the extension of the VBN well explains tourists’ responsible behavioral intention at a natural heritage destination, demonstrating the substantial effects of DSR and preference in the research model and offering theoretical and practical implications for natural heritage tourism destinations.