Influential Aspects of Family Vacation Decision-making:

Evidence from Indonesia

Henilia Yulita

Universitas Bunda Mulia, Management, Fakultas Ilmu Sosial dan Humaniora,

Jl. Lodan Raya no. 2 Jakarta Utara, Indonesia

Keywords: Indonesia, Family Decision-making Process, Family Member Role Domination, Children as Influencers.

Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to investigate influential aspects of family vacation decision making process.

This is the empirical research about family vacation decision making process that was conducted on families

or at least married couples who had experienced making decisions for family vacation. Data processing and

analysis applied methods of descriptive statistics. The study was based on extensive literature review and

questionnaires; a survey was conducted with all family members. The sample size was 212. The findings

clearly indicate that influential aspects of family vacation decision-making are vacation preference,

frequency of going on a family vacation, time needed to plan a family vacation, average length of family

vacation, motives for going on a family vacation, and domination of members of the family vacation

decision-making process.

1 INTRODUCTION

Today’s tourism industry has become one of the

most important factors in GDP contribution

worldwide. It plays a significant role in socio-

economic development of a country. Most of the

tourists prefer to visit different destinations for

different reasons (e.g. For Business, Study, Attend

international conferences, Vacations and holidays,

Treatment, Meet with family members and friends,

to see events like the world cup, Olympic etc.)

(Sarker, 2013). According to the tourism view of

World Tourism Organization, in 2020, it was

forecast that by 2020 the number of international

tourist arrivals to the Asian world would reach 1.5

billion, with 4% growth in every five year period

between 1995 and 2020 (Chung, 2014).

Travelling for leisure is a psychological

experience. Therefore, recreational leisure activities

involve an individual traveller’s subjective

perception of an actual or imagined activity in which

he or she participates at a given time (Ting, 2014). A

family is a fundamental social unit based on a joint

life of close relatives, which usually includes parents

and their children (Baletić 1995; Srnec, 2016). For

marketing experts, families are specific consumers

who are not rational decision-makers, but rather

driven by rationality and emotion (Williams, 2016).

Due to the fact that roles in the decision making

process are divided among family members (Srnec,

2016). As family members, children have been

acknowledged to play an important role within

purchasing decisions. However, much of the early

research on family decision making only considered

the roles of adult partners about the processes and

complexities of family purchasing, such as how

families arrive at purchase decisions, what influence

behaviour and communication dynamics form part

of the decision process (Ahamad, 2014).

2 MANUSCRIPT PREPARATION

Research of the behavior of families as consumer

units has enticed significant scientific interest since

the 1970’s (Srnec, 2016).

Table 1: Previous Researches.

AUTHORS RESEARCH FOCUS

Sarker, Mohammad

Amzad Hossain (2013)

Marketing strategies for tourism

industry in Bangladesh

Chung, Ki-Han (2014)

The relationship between destination

cues of Asian countries and Korean

tourist image

250

Yulita, H.

Inﬂuential Aspects of Family Vacation Decision-making: Evidence from Indonesia.

DOI: 10.5220/0008491402500256

In Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Entrepreneurship and Business Management (ICEBM Untar 2018), pages 250-256

ISBN: 978-989-758-363-6

Table 1: Previous Researches. (cont.)

AUTHORS RESEARCH FOCUS

Ting, Shang-Chang (2014)

The leisure motivation and

satisfaction in the 2013 Taiwan

Kaohsiung Chengcing Lake Balloon

Festival

Srnec, Tonia (2016)

Family vacation decision-making

process

Williams, Alistair (2016)

Tourism and hospitality marketing:

fantasy, feeling and fun

Ahamad, Shaik (2014)

Family members’ roles in purchase

decision-making

Kozak, Metin and Levent

Karadag (2012)

Who influences in family decision-

making?

Tendai Chikweche, John

Stanton and Richard

Fletcher (2012)

Family purchase decision-making at

the bottom of the pyramid

Ignacio Redondo-Bellón

Marcelo Royo-

VelaJoaquin Aldás-

Manzano (2016)

A family life cycle model

Monica Chaudhary

Aayushi Gupta (2012)

Children's influence in family buying

process in India

Heike A. Schänzel Ian

Yeoman (2015)

Trends in family tourism

Ramanjeet Singh (2012)

Role of children in family purchase

decision-making - A comparative

study among children of different age

groups in Punjab and Chandigarh,

India

Source: research results, 2017

2.1 Family Decision Making Process

Decision making for the purchases of goods and

services is more of a joint activity, making the role

of family in purchase decision making important

(Lackman and Lanasa,1993; Burns, 1992; Su et al.,

2003; Fletcher, 2012).

Ahamad (2014) said that individual members of

families often serve different roles in decisions that

ultimately draw on shared family resources. Some

individuals are information gatherers/holders, who

seek out information about products of relevance.

The decision maker(s) have the power to determine

issues such as:

 Whether to buy;

 Which product to buy (e.g. pick-up or passenger

car);

 Which brand to buy;

 Where to buy it; and

 When to buy.

Therkelsen (2010); in Srnec (2016) found that there

is often a conflict of interest between the husband

and wife and the children who try to gain as much

attention as possible, which is why children are

identified as family members with the most

influential roles in the decision making process. For

tourism and other service businesses, consumer

behavior becomes complicated to study because of

dynamics.

For example, tourists will generally have

expectations that are evaluated in selecting a

destination. Expectations may be modified by

marketing activities. New information at any stage

of destination choice can affect selecting a

destination by casting a destination in a new light

(Kozak, 2012).

Personal and interpersonal limitations and group

cohesion (i.e. level of connection between family

members) also influence vacation plans. In terms of

the roles in the decision making process, the

husband has a dominant role, while women and

children make smaller decisions (Srnec, 2016).

2.2 Family Member Role Domination

Families play an important role for the tourism

industry despite the demise of traditional family

models. Holidays can play an important role in

strengthening family relationships and building of

social and family capital within the immediate and

extended family by overcoming increasing mobility

issues. Family travel and visiting of friends and

relatives (VFR) travel then are more resilient than

other forms of tourism, as people will always travel

to reconnect. There are new family tourism markets

emerging and traditional family markets are

venturing further and becoming more adventurous.

This means that the tourism industry needs to better

cater to this increasing diversity of the family market

in the future (Yeoman, 2015).

The role of children as part of the family

includes an influence on consumer decision making

that is assumed to have grown in importance (Kaur

and Singh, 2006; Caruana and Vassallo, 2003;

Williams and Burns, 2000; Sellers, 1989; Fletcher,

2012).

2.3 Children as Influencers

Children have always had specific consumer needs.

The difference today compared with earlier is

perhaps that more and more products are targeting

these tween needs from an earlier age. Whether we

think this a blameworthy development or whether

children are just evolving faster than before,

something of a shrinking of childhood seems to have

taken place (Yeoman, 2015).

Inﬂuential Aspects of Family Vacation Decision-making: Evidence from Indonesia

251

Children constitute a huge secondary market by

influencing family purchases, which begin as soon

as children have developed the communication skills

to make requests. Children’s are more likely to

influence the purchase decisions that directly affect

them and have more influence over less expensive

products and those for their own use. Children have

been found to have less influence on decision

making for products that are of high cost and used

by the whole family. It is argued that parents will

take responsibility for these higher-risk decisions

(Ahamad, 2014).

The role of children as part of the family

includes an influence on consumer decision making

that is assumed to have grown in importance (Kaur

and Singh, 2006; Caruana and Vassallo, 2003;

Williams and Burns, 2000; Sellers, 1989;

Nancarrow, 2007). Research on the role of children

in family purchase decisions has largely been

confined to their influence on the purchase of

product categories such as toys, snacks, children’s

wear and family holidays (Jensen, 1995; Williams

and Veeck, 1998; Dunne, 1999; Geuens et al., 2002;

Gram, 2007; Nancarrow, 2007).

3 EMPIRICAL RESEARCH

3.1 Research Methodology

For this research, a family purchase was defined as

one in which all family members were involved in

the decision-making process or consumption. In this

study the survey method was used. The research

focuses on questions about influential aspects of

family vacation decision making process (Kozak,

2012).

The research was conducted from December

2016 until January 2017. The internet was used to

distribute the questionnaire. The research instrument

was a questionnaire created with the help of Google

Docs, which was accessed by the respondents via

social networking such as Whatsapp, Line,

Blackberry, Facebook (Srnec, 2016).

The population for this research all resident of

Indonesia with family without children or family

with children. In total, 212 respondents filled the

questionnaires from Google Docs. The research

instrument was a structured questionnaire consisting

of five-part-multiple-choice questions which was

developed on the basis of previous research.

The first part consists of eight multiple choice

questions of which the respondents could only

choose one. These questions were collected to gather

basic information about the socio-demographic

profile of respondents related to family vacations

and travel. The second part had aimed to gather

information about the habits and preferences of the

respondents related to family vacations and travel.

The third part of the questionnaire collected the

information about frequency, duration, and

transportation mode. The fourth part gathered

motives for choosing the accommodation and

vacation destination. The fifth questionnaire deals

with assessing the way decisions are made before

going on vacation in order to determine whether the

spouses make the majority of decisions regarding the

family vacation autonomously or together.

3.2 Research Result

Data from respondents was collected from 212

online questionnaires, and each questionnaire was

completed correctly.

Table 2: Profile Respondent (N=212).

ITEMS

RESPONDENTS

FREQUENCY PERCENTAGE

Gende

Female 134 63.2%

Male 78 36.8%

Age

elow 19 5 2.4%

–

25 70 33%

–

35 35 16.5%

–

50 84 39.6%

51 and more 18 8.5%

Level of education

Senior High School

and

elow

53 25.0%

Bachelor Degree 83 39.2%

Master Degree 55 25.9%

Above Master

Degree

21 9.9%

Average monthly expenses

in IDR

<1.000.000 16 7.5%

1.000.001-

5.000.000

94 44.3%

5.000.001-

10.000.000

64 30.2%

>10.000.001 38 17.9%

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252

Table 2: Profile Respondent (N=212). (cont.)

ITEMS

RESPONDENTS

FREQUENCY PERCENTAGE

Number of family members

Two members 24 11.3%

Three members 40 18.9%

Four members 68 32.1%

Five members 55 25.9%

Six members 16 7.5%

Seven members and

9 4.2%

Number of children in the

family

No children 28 13.2%

One child 34 16.0%

Two children 88 41.5%

Three children 53 25.0%

Four children and

9 4.2%

Number of employed family

members

None 12 5.7%

One 50 23.6%

Two 90 42.5%

Three 41 19.3%

More than Three 19 9.0%

Source: research results, 2017

Table 2 presents the Socio-demographic profile

of the 212 respondents, 63,5% were female and

36,5% were male. The majority of them belonged to

the age group from 36 to 50 (39.3%), followed by

the ages of 19-35 (33.2%) with the majority of

respondents having education levels of Bachelor

Degree (28.9%) and Master Degree (26.1%). The

majority of respondents’ average monthly expenses

in IDR were Rp1.000.001-5.000.000 (44.5%) and

Rp5.000.001-10.000.000 (29.9%). Number of family

in Indonesia mostly consists of four members

(32.2%) and five members (25.6%) with mostly two

(41.7%) and three children (24.6%) in the family.

Besides that, the number of employed family

members in Indonesia is mostly two members

(42.2%) usually the father and the mother, followed

by one member (23.7%) usually the father only.

One of the objectives of this research is to

determine the habits and preferences of tourists who

spend their vacation with their family. Table 3

displays the results of the research.

In Indonesia, most families (53.3%) go on

vacation several times a year and 25.5% go on

vacation once a year. They preferred to have

adventure tourism (38.2%), visiting friends and

relatives (23.6%) or foods traveling (13,7%). There

are also some families who prefer to go to have fun

in the sun and sea (7.5%) or go to the mountains

(7.1%). From this information, tourism marketers

can divide and offer their programs from several

packages per year as well as offer the tour packages

of adventure travelling or food travelling.

Table 3: Vacation Preferences (N=212).

Frequency of going on a

family vacation

FREQUENCY PERCENTAGE

Once a month 11 5.0%

Several times a yea

113 53.3%

Once a year 54 25.5%

Once every two years 11 5.2%

Other 23 11.0%

Preferred forms of tourism FREQUENCY PERCENTAGE

Adventure tourism 81 38.2%

Sun and sea 16 7.5%

Mountain touris

15 7.1%

Visiting friends and relatives 50 23.6%

Foods travelling 29 13.7%

Other 21 9.9%

Time needed to plan a family

vacation

FREQUENCY PERCENTAGE

–

3 weeks 46 21.7%

–

3 months 54 25.5%

–

6 months 25 11.8%

Longer than 6 months 9 4.2%

I do not plan ahead 78 36.8%

Average length of family

vacation

FREQUENCY PERCENTAGE

–

5 days 159 75.0%

–

10 days 41 19.3%

–

15 days 11 5.2%

–

20 days 1 0.5%

More than 20 days 0 0.0%

Mode of transportation on

family vacation

FREQUENCY PERCENTAGE

Car 120 56.6%

Bus 2 1.0%

Train 16 7.5%

Plane 68 32.1%

Othe

6 2.8%

About the time needed to plan a family vacation,

most Indonesian families do not plan ahead (36.8%)

to prepare their vacation, followed by 1-3 months

(25.5%), and by 2-3 weeks (21.7%). They spend the

vacation mostly for about 1-5 days (75%), followed

by 6-10 days (19.3%) or 11-15 days (5.2%). Most

Indonesian families preferred to use cars (56.6%),

Inﬂuential Aspects of Family Vacation Decision-making: Evidence from Indonesia

253

plane (32.1%) and train (7.5%). From this

information, tourism marketers still have a chance to

offer their package in the last minutes, because most

of the Indonesian families do not plan their vacation

ahead. The length of tourism packages days offered,

better around 1-5 days or 6-10 days. The car

marketers also have a chance to offer the multi-

purpose vehicle versions because most Indonesian

families prefer to use cars to go on vacation.

The following results showed the motives for

going on a family vacation. Respondents were asked

to choose their preferred motives. Table 4 showed

the results.

Table 4: Preferred Motives for Going on a Family

Vacation (N=212).

MOTIVES FOR

GOING ON A

FAMILY

VACATION

FREQUENCY PERCENTAGE

Trying something new 12 5.7%

Escaping stress 19 9.0%

Escaping the everyday

routine

22 10.4%

Bonding with the

family

76 35.7%

Spending quality time

with the family

63 29.8%

Visiting family and

relatives celebration

11 5.2%

As a present of

achievements

5 2.4%

Othe

4 1.8%

Source: research results, 2017

The table clearly showed that most Indonesian

families motive for going on a family vacation are to

have bonding with the family (35.7%), followed by

spending quality time with family (29.8%), and

escaping the everyday routines. Marketers are able

to offer some packages of family tours.

Table 5: Elements That Influence the Choice of Family

Vacation Destinations (N=212).

ELEMENTS THAT

INFLUENCE THE

CHOICE OF

FAMILY

VACATION

DESTINATION

FREQUENCY PERCENTAGE

Accessible prices 75 35.4%

Adequate

accommodation

facilities

54 25.5%

Cleanliness and

maintenance of the

destination

15 7.1%

Good value of offers

and services

14 6.6%

Safety of the 15 7.0%

destination

Additional services

adapted to children

27 12.7%

Other 12 5.7%

Source: research results, 2017

The research showed clearly that the most

influential elements for choosing a family vacation

destination are accessible prices (35.4% of

respondents), and the accommodation facilities

which was selected by 25.5% of respondents;

followed by additional services adapted to children

(12.7%).

Table 6: Domination of Family Members During the

Various Stages of the Family Vacation Decision-Making

Process (N=212).

Dominant

Influence of

The Wife

Dominant

Influence of

The Husband

Dominant

Influence of

The Children

Total % Total % Total %

Expressing

the need

and desire

to go on a

family

vacation

87 41.0% 46 21.7% 79 37.3%

Gathering

informatio

n about the

family

vacation

destination

81 38.2% 39 18.4% 92 43.3%

Assessing

various

possibilitie

s and

alternatives

of the

vacation

83 39.1% 64 30.2% 65 30.7%

Choosing

one of the

provided

alternatives

88 41.7% 62 29.3% 61 28.9%

Reaching a

final

decision

62 29.4% 114 53.6% 36 17%

Source: research results, 2017

In Indonesia, in most stages of the family

decision making process, the wife is the dominant

family member, such as: expressing the need and

desire to go on a family vacation (41.0%), assessing

various possibilities and alternatives of the vacation

(39.1%), and choosing one of the provided

alternatives (41.7%). However, for gathering

information about the family vacation destination,

the children are the most dominant family member

(43.3%). The only dominance of the husband is

reaching a final decision which is 53.6% of total

respondents.

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4 DISCUSSION AND

CONCLUSION

The primary motive for going on a family vacation

is to bond with the family. This finding is consistent

with Yeoman’s (2015) research, which also

determined that the primary motive for going on a

family vacation is to spend quality time with family;

it also found that holidays can play an important role

in strengthening family relationships.

From this research, the most influential elements

for choosing a family vacation destination are

accessible prices for example how good the value of

the accommodation facilities or additional services

adapted to children. This is in line with the findings

of Srnec’s (2016) who emphasized that price plays a

significant role in the process of choosing a vacation

destination.

In Indonesia, the wife is the dominant family

member in most stages of the family decision

making process. Wife mostly plays her role as the

initiator in planning the family vacation such as:

expressing the need and desire to go on a family

vacation, assessing various possibilities and

alternatives of the vacation, and choosing one of the

provided alternatives.

This finding is consistent with the previous

research of Zafar et al., (2006) which confirmed that

the wife’s influence is dominant and the influence of

children and husband are weaker.

This research also found that for gathering

information about the family vacation destination,

the children are the dominant family member,

especially when the children’s ages are teenager or

above. The only dominant husband’s influence is

reaching the final decision.

Tourism marketers also should prepare some

extras facilities besides the main ones, for example:

the accommodation facilities or additional services

adapted to children. By providing these extras, wives

will prefer to satisfy their children rather than

themselves. However, all the extras must be

affordable for family to pay. Since price plays a very

important role when choosing destination, tourism

marketers should provide some packages with

interesting discounts, such as: flight and hotel

bundling, hotel and tourism attraction bundling, etc.

Children, especially in the age group of teenagers

and above, play a very significant role for gathering

information about the family vacation destination.

Tourism marketers should provide their packages in

internet. It will be easier for teenagers to compare

some destination areas or facilities.

4.1 Research Limitation

This research was designed to replicate the Srnec’s

(2016) study to determine if changes in the

Indonesian family have resulted in changes in the

family decision-making process as well. Similar to

the previous study, the sample for this research was

based on a specific geographical area of families and

is limited to 212 respondents. Additional research

might include a greater number of respondents and

could also investigate a larger respondent area.

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