The Relation Between Emotional Stability and the Use of Images on Social Media Regarding Holiday Behaviour

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Introduction

Since the invention of the internet more than 50 years ago, it has grown into a necessity of life for some generations. In the age group 18-29 89% of the internet users uses social media sites. (PEW research center, 2014) People talk to their friends continuously and share pictures of their experiences, such as their holiday, on social media. Also for the tourism industry social media has been a growing tool. ‘’Especially in information search and decision-making behaviours, tourism promotion and in focusing on best practices for interacting with consumer’’ (Zeng & Gerritsen, 2014). As Xiang and Gretzel (2009) state: ‘’social media are playing an increasingly important role as information sources for travellers.’’ Cosma et al (2012) add that the internet has also become an essential marketing tool for the tourism industry. Companies couldn’t stay behind and may have complete e-commerce departments. When used right companies can get a lot of profit out of these social media channels.

‘’Behaviour is influenced by stimuli, and by traits that are different from the traits researchers normally try to capture’’ (Borghans et al., 2011). This is relevant since measures of personality predict a substantial portion of the variance in grades and achievement tests and predicts life outcomes. "Although no single definition is acceptable to all personality theorists, we can say that personality is a pattern of relatively permanent traits and unique characteristics that give both consistency and individuality to a person's behaviour." (Feist and Feist, 2009). Not only to everyday behaviour, but also to tourism behaviour. Personality is the basis for people’s decisions like what type of holiday they want to have and how they book their holiday. In Romania the majority of the population is using internet for online communication and for searching information, but not for booking (Cosma et al., 2012). However, this can only be a cultural thing since not every inhabitant of Romania has the same personality. Ho et al. (2012) state that prior knowledge and past searching experiences are positively related to web users’ online searching for travel info. This means that most web users determine the best way to start a new search is by internal information search such as past online search experiences.