A Comparison of Student Spring Break and Their “Normal” Behaviors: Is the Hype Justified?
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Tourism Review International, Vol. 13, pp. 000–000 1544-2721/09 $60.00 + .00 Printed in the USA. All rights reserved. DOI: 10.3727/154427210X12684119879567 Copyright 2009 Cognizant Comm. Corp. www.cognizantcommunication.com A COMPARISON OF STUDENT SPRING BREAK AND THEIR “NORMAL” BEHAVIORS: IS THE HYPE JUSTIFIED? STEPHEN W. LITVIN Hospitality and Tourism Management, School of Business and Economics, College of Charleston, Charleston, SC, USA Student spring break behaviors have been a topic that has received a fair amount of scrutiny in the academic literature. This research takes another look at the topic, with the main focus of the current study a comparison of student spring break behaviors with benchmarked student behaviors exhibited during the balance of the school year. The psychographic concept of sensation seeking is applied to help better understand these behaviors. The research suggests that student spring break behavior is substantially unchanged from their “normal” behavior, and that those who engage in risky spring break behaviors are the students the sensation-seeking literature would indicate are most likely to do so, regardless of their vacation setting. Key words: Spring break; Sensation seeking; Student travel behavior Introduction follows provides a brief review of spring break literature, followed by an empirical study that ex- The dollar amount spent by students in the US plores, based upon a sample of students from a annually for travel seems an elusive number, with public southern US university, these students’ estimates noted that ranged from Harris Inter- spring break behaviors. active’s (2002) “over $4 billion” to StudentUni Review of the Literature verse.com’s (2007) estimate of $20 billion. Re- gardless of the number, student travel is a signifi- Spring break travel beginnings are generally cant and important sector of the North American traced to the Fort Lauderdale College Swim Fo- travel industry. No aspect of student travel has re- rums of the 1930s, as northern US college swim ceived more attention than has spring break, teams descended upon the destination for spring which, per Josiam, Clements, and Hobson (1994), vacation week swim meets (Hobson & Josiam, encompasses approximately 1 million students an- 1992). From these beginnings, the following nually and, per Weinbach (2000), accounts for $1 spring break history is recounted by Bai, Hu, Els- billion in travel expenditures. The research that worth, and Countryman (2004): Address correspondence to Professor Stephen W. Litvin, School of Business & Economics, Department of Hospitality and Tourism Management, College of Charleston, 66 George Street, Charleston, SC 29424, USA. Tel: 843-953-7317; Fax: 843-953-5697; E-mail: [email protected] 1 2 LITVIN During World War II spring break travel grew Similarly, Mattila, Apostolopoulos, So¨nmez, Yu, further with Ivy Leaguers going to Fort Lauder- and Sasidharan (2001) noted that spring break dale, Florida instead of Bermuda due to the fear of German submarine attacks. Over the next three finds students “having fun and engaging in hedo- decades, Fort Lauderdale became known as the nistic behavior in a non-routine, break-loose envi- top destination for spring break. Daytona Beach, ronment...with a sense of freedom that unfortu- Florida, became prominent in 1981 by attracting nately might lead to potentially risky behaviors” 300,000 students....In 1982, South Padre Is- (p. 193). A study by Williams and Burns (1994) land, Texas, became a destination for spring break travelers from Midwestern states. Fort Lau- reported, “49% of the informants felt that Spring derdale reached a record in April of 1985 with Break was a way to escape and discover new and 350,000 students and $140 million in spending. exciting things, and 40% felt that Spring Break (p. 80) was a deserving reward for their work and sacri- fices leading up to it. Informants overwhelmingly Perhaps the first media glorification of spring indicated that their trip included self indulgent ac- break was Frankie Avalon’s 1963 motion picture, tivities (91%)” (p. 99). Beach Party, tagged “The perfect summer when The above behavioral comments relate specifi- the urge meets the surge!” (Internet Movie Data- cally to those students who had visited traditional base, 2006). Twenty years later, the movie Spring spring break destinations. A further review of the Break (Cunningham, 1983) reflected spring break’s literature, however, reveals that generalizing such continued trend toward a racier image: “Two col- behaviors across the broader student population lege kids on spring break travel to Fort Lauderdale may not necessarily hold true. For example, Jos- in search of fun. After they meet a Penthouse Pet, iam, Clements, and Hobson (1994), in a spring they have more fun than they ever thought possi- break travel study, found that their upper midwest ble” (Yahoo, 2006). Fast-forward to the 21st cen- US undergraduate sample had visited a variety of tury and the trend continues, with a stream of destinations including metropolitan cities, national movies, television shows, and Internet sites depict- parks, and small towns, and that less than 10% of ing increasingly higher levels of debauchery, their sample had visited what would be classified brought into the living room via MTV’s cable tele- a spring break party destination. An earlier Hob- vision program Spring Break, which depicts thou- son and Josiam (1992) study reported that less sands of college-age students at the “hottest” spring than half of their university student respondents break locations—Cancun, Panama City, San Padre even qualified as tourists during their spring break Island, etc.—partying the day away to hip-hop and rap while clad in skimpy bikinis and colorful low- week. Thus, despite the stereotyped image, at least hung swim trunks. in these two studies, it was the minority of stu- This risque´ side of spring break has received a dents that had visited MTV-type destinations, and good deal of attention by tourism academics. Stud- would therefore be among those described in the ies have considered such issues as spring break behavioral work that dominates the literature. casual sexual behaviors (e.g., Apostolopoulos, So¨n- As has much of the previous work, the current mez, & Yu, 2002; Maticka-Tyndale & Herold, research followed-up on the question as to how 1999; Maticka-Tyndale, Herold, & Mewhinney, many students visited typical spring break destina- 1998), binge drinking (e.g., Lee, Maggs, & Ran- tions and then explored their behaviors. Building kin, 2006; Smeaton, Josiam, & Dietrich, 1998), upon the previous spring break research, the la- and dating infidelity (Drigotas, Safstrom, & Gen- cuna addressed herein is the differentiation be- tilia, 1999). These studies generally portray a view tween spring break week and “normal” student be- of an environment consistent with that character- havior. Is student behavior, as is often classified in ized by Maticka-Tyndale et al. (1998), that is, one the literature, significantly different during spring providing students with a time and place to in- break than throughout the balance of the school dulge in “unusual” activities, in which personal year? With the significant amount of research and rules and normal codes of conduct either “do not concern related to student risk-taking behaviors apply” or are “temporarily suspended” (p. 262). and sexually transmitted diseases, understanding COMPARISON OF SPRING BREAK AND “NORMAL” BEHAVIORS 3 these findings should help focus attention where it tourism research, readers are referred to Pizam et is of most importance. al. (2004, p. 252), which lists a wide range of stud- Incorporated in the analyses is the application ies that have incorporated the construct. Among of the psychological and marketing concept of these are “evergreens” by Plog (1974), Smith “sensation seeking,” which helps explain and (1990), and Um and Crompton (1990), each of allows us to better understand the behavioral deci- which considered sensation seeking an influence sions made by students during their spring break. of travel psychographics. Litvin (2008), in an arti- cle geared to the tourism research community, has Sensation Seeking recently validated a scale originally crafted by Hoyle, Stephenson, Palmgreen, Lorch, and Dono- Sensation seeking is a personality trait that has hew (2002) that allows for parsimonious applica- been defined as one’s need for varied, novel, com- tion of the construct. plex, and intense sensory stimulation; and the level of willingness to take physical, legal, and fi- Research Method nancial risks to satisfy the desire for such stimula- tion (Zuckerman, 1994). Sensation seekers have Data for this research were collected by two higher optimal levels of arousal and simply feel undergraduate psychology majors supervised dur- better when taking risks. ing the course of a for-credit tourism-related inde- Various studies have linked sensation-seeking pendent study project. Having students collect the desire with participation in a variety of stimulating data eliminated much of the discomfort that the events. These have included viewing horror mov- sensitive nature of the questions may have other- ies, breaking the law, unsafe sexual behavior, wise created. The sample population was comprised reckless automobile driving, as well as such recre- of undergraduate students at a midsize public south- ation/tourism activities as parachuting, hang glid- ern US university. Students were surveyed in the ing, and whitewater