A study on holistic customer experience in selected resort hotels in China: Supervisors: Associate Professor Dr. Rosmini Binti Omar Institution awarding the Ph. D. Degree: Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, International Business School (Malaysia) Date of defence: 15/04/2015

Goal and objectives of the dissertationGoalOver the past decades, marketing managers of service providers in the hospitality and tourism industry have retained their existing customers by delivering high-quality services. However, they have struggled to maintain long-lasting relationships with their customers because quality services are no longer accepted as a significant competitive advantage in the highly competitive hospitality and tourism industry (Hosany and W itham, 2010). Furthermore, Ismail (2011) also stated that around 65 per cent of satisfied customers did not show positive behavioural intentions. This questions if the role of service quality is only meant for converting satisfaction of customers into positive behavioural intentions. This void leaves managers and researchers alike with insufficient information to identify the factors that truly drive consumers' positive behavioural intentions and loyalty in the hospitality and tourism industry. Therefore, recent scholars have claimed that customer experience may be a strong predictor of their positive behavioural intentions (Walls et al., 2011). In this regard, Ryu et al., (2012) stated that customers have become well-informed and they look for unique experience that can fulfil their multiple desires simultaneously (Ali et al., 2013), particularly an experience that develops positive emotions, perceptions and loyalty behaviours (Ali and Amin, 2014, Olsson et al 2012).Hence, due to its significance, customer experiences have grabbed attention recently. However, most of the studies conducted are conceptual in nature; resulting in limited empirical studies in discussing its true meaning (Walls et al., 2011). A few conceptualisations related to antecedents and consequences of customer experience have been presented. For example, Grove et al., (1998) presented 'Services Theatre Model', which conceptualises customer's experience as a result of interrelationships between three dimensions of service performance, i.e., actors, audience, and setting. Similarly, another conceptualisation was presented by Nelson (1970) in his 'Information Theory'. He theorised that customer experience is comprised of two main parts, i.e., indirect and direct experiences. Indirect experience is developed by external sources such as advertising, whereas direct experience is developed by the performance of service provider. Some of the recent work also used the S-O-R framework to consider customer experience as a stimulus that incites customers' emotions and behaviours (Ali and Amin, 2014). Despite these conceptualisations, a holistic view of customer experience in relation to its antecedents and consequences in the context of resort hotels in general, and specifically in China, is still missing. Klaus and Maklan (2012) and Walls et al. (2011) also pointed out this gap and called for further research to understand the antecedents and the consequences of customer experience. Against these thread of arguments, an inquiry arose: how to further shed light on the concept of customer experience in resort hotel setting within China? This is critical due to the drastic escalation of interest in services from academics and practitioners in today's global economy. To summarise, there had been a gap in understanding the dimensions of customer experience in the context of Chinese resort hotels, its antecedents, and its consequences. Therefore, the overall aim of this research was to investigate the antecedents and the consequences of customer experience in resort hotels. Considering the research aim, the specific research objectives were as follows;* To examine the influence of advertising efforts on customer experiences.* To examine the influence of service performance on customer experiences.* To examine the effect of customer experiences on customers' perceived value, consumption emotions, customer satisfaction, and behavioural intentions.* To examine the relationships between customer's emotions, perceived value, satisfaction, and behavioural intentions. …