**3. Research methodology**

**H7.** The affective evaluation of a tourist destination has a direct positive effect on the func-

A good affective evaluation of the place will be an antecedent that will allow the tourist to attain the hedonic benefit expected. It has been argued that the affective evaluation has a direct influence on the possible hedonic benefit attained by the consumer in the process of choosing a product or service [64]. In this regard, emotions are the main mechanisms through which hedonic value for the customer is created [65]. The affective origin of consumption experiences is key in order to attain the hedonic benefit [32] expected by the tourist when visiting a destination. So, a positive affective evaluation of a place will be helpful in order to attain the hedonic benefit desired by the tourist. From this perspective, the following hypoth-

**H8.** The affective evaluation of a tourist destination has a direct positive effect on the hedonic

According to literature, the affective evaluation is quite relevant, being an antecedent to the symbolic benefit [66]. It has been argued that a close link exists with the affective evaluation as antecedent to the symbolic benefit perceived by the individual [61]. The affective evaluation is key for the consumer to attain the symbolic benefit perceived [67]. From this perspective, the

**H9.** The affective evaluation of a tourist destination has a direct positive effect on the symbolic

Functional Benefit

H1

H2

H3

Hedonic Benefit

Symbolic Benefit

Satisfaction

*2.2.8. Affective evaluation of the tourist destination: hedonic benefit perceived*

*2.2.9. Affective evaluation of the tourist destination: symbolic benefit perceived*

following hypothesis is presented within the context of tourist destinations:

H4

H7

H8

H9

H5

H6

esis is suggested within the context of tourist destinations:

tional benefit perceived by the tourist.

40 Mobilities, Tourism and Travel Behavior - Contexts and Boundaries

benefit perceived by the tourist.

benefit perceived by the tourist.

This can be depicted schematically (**Figure 1**).

Cognitive Evaluation

Affective Evaluation

**Figure 1.** Hypothesis.

In order to identify the most appropriate scales to measure relationships in which satisfaction is a consequence of the functional, hedonic and symbolic benefits perceived by the tourist and this triad of benefits is a consequence of the cognitive and affective evaluation of the place by the tourist, with an appropriate level of reliability, validity and dimensionality, a process with different stages was developed [68].

#### **3.1. Scales development**

The first stage consisted in creating scales with a level of validity in terms of content. With this in mind, a deep analysis of literature was conducted, considering the scales created in many previous studies; regarding satisfaction, for instance, [69, 70] were used as reference, [56, 71] were used for the functional benefit, [56, 72–74] for the hedonic benefit, [75, 76] for the symbolic benefit, [42, 44] for cognitive perception and [65, 77] for affective evaluation. Consecutively, a critical incident analysis was conducted, in which people had to describe the factors that were part of the constructs analyzed. 40 people from a non-probability sample (for convenience) took part in the study, and the previous scales of satisfaction, functional benefit, hedonic benefit, symbolic benefit, cognitive perception and affective evaluation were obtained. Then a second clearing process of this scales recommended by [78] took place. Immediately after, a series of focus groups were conducted, with regular tourists from different parts of Chile, as well as several interviews with experts on tourism and sales executives from travel agencies. These analyses added indicators that reflected each dimension more accurately within the context of the study, and allowed to adjust and/or eliminate those found to be conflicting or redundant. A variation of [79] was applied to do this. Each expert had to rate each item in terms of its dimension, considering three choices: clearly, partially or not representative. Conclusively, items with a high level of consensus were kept [80]. Through these analyses, the scales were obtained, which were used to write the draft questionnaire. In the second stage, the final questionnaire was created. The draft questionnaire was used for a quantitative pre-test applied to a random sample of 40 people; then the data was used for an exploratory factor analysis and a Cronbach's alpha was estimated for each resulting dimension. This preliminary analysis confirmed the existence of each of the dimensions from previous analyses. The items were written as assertions that were answered through a 7-point Likert scale (see **Table 1**). All of them were written so they could be understood and answered by every respondent.
