The COVID-19 pandemic has profoundly disrupted global tourism, yet the cognitive mechanisms underlying tourists’ behavioral responses during health crises remain insufficiently understood. Drawing on an extended Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) framework, this study investigates how epidemic perception, non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs), and moral norms shape tourists’ decision-making processes. Survey data were collected from 360 respondents with pre-existing travel plans in China during the early pandemic phase. Structural equation modeling (Amos and Smart-PLS) reveals that epidemic perception functions as a foundational cognitive anchor, significantly influencing NPIs, moral norms, subjective norms, and attitudes. Moral norms emerge as a pivotal mediator, directly shaping attitudes, perceived behavioral control, and behavioral intentions. Counterintuitively, NPIs exhibit a negative relationship with intention to cancel travel, suggesting that protective measures effectively mitigate perceived risks and enable tourists to reconcile travel desires with health concerns. Subjective norms exert both direct and indirect effects through moral pathways, underscoring the amplified role of social expectations during crises. Notably, perceived behavioral control does not significantly influence attitudes or intentions, indicating that moral and social imperatives temporarily overshadow resource-based considerations during public health emergencies. These findings advance theoretical understanding of pandemic-era travel behavior. Practically, they suggest that destinations should leverage epidemic perception through authoritative communication to activate moral and social norms, promote NPIs to rebuild traveler confidence, cultivate collective responsibility via social endorsement, and address practical barriers at the implementation stage to transform intentions into actual travel behavior.
Zong et al. (Fri,) studied this question.