Using Instagram Hashtags to Recruit Asian Youth Travellers

Authors

  • Yirang Im Keio Research Institute at SFC
  • Hayato Nagai Wakayama University

Keywords:

Instagram, sampling, social media, youth travellers

Abstract

Social media has attracted a growing number of users over the past two decades. In response to this trend, academics have become interested in using social media as a sampling tool in their empirical research. This paper explores the use of Instagram as a sampling tool, given its increasing popularity among young people in particular. To investigate the practicality as well as the advantages and the challenges of adopting this tool, a qualitative study recruited Japanese and Korean youth travellers was used as an example. This paper makes a methodological contribution to tourism research and is expected to encourage discussions on the use of Instagram and other emerging social media tools for sampling in the field. Due to the diversity of social media usage for different generations and cultural settings and its continuous development, future studies are also suggested to extend the current discussion.

Author Biographies

Yirang Im, Keio Research Institute at SFC

Yirang Im is Senior Researcher at Keio Research Institute at SFC in Japan. She completed her PhD in Media and Governance at Keio University in 2017. She was Project Research Associate in the Graduate School of Media and Governance at Keio University from April 2016 to February 2019 and Analyst at KDDI Research, Inc. from March 2019 to March 2021. Her current research interests include tourism policy and local policy-making process, and social network analysis.

Hayato Nagai, Wakayama University

Hayato Nagai is Associate Professor in the Faculty of Tourism at Wakayama University in Japan. He is also a member of the Center for Tourism Research at the same university. He completed his PhD at the University of Queensland in 2016. His current research interests include tourism risk management, destination marketing and management, and youth tourism market especially in the Asia-Pacific region.

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Published

2022-05-04

How to Cite

Im, Y. and Nagai, H. (2022) “Using Instagram Hashtags to Recruit Asian Youth Travellers”, e-Review of Tourism Research, 18(5), pp. 764–778. Available at: https://ertr-ojs-tamu.tdl.org/ertr/article/view/593 (Accessed: 16 April 2024).

Issue

Vol. 18 No. 5 (2021)

Section

Articles

License

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