Extended TAM to Explain Intention to Join Virtual Tour in an Emerging Country during the Pandemic Era.

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, government and tourism operators offer virtual tours to promote the destination as an alternative income source. Unlike people in developed countries, those in emerging countries are not familiar with virtual technology for tourism purposes. However, there are not many studies about virtual tours in developing countries. This paper aims to extend TAM by integrating perceived presence and enjoyment to understand tourists' intention to join virtual tours in an emerging nation. This study employs a quantitative research design by conducting an online survey to 182 respondents to investigate the stated hypotheses. The virtual tours' perceived presence and ease of use remained exposed to a substantial beneficial stimulus on perceived enjoyment and usefulness. The most significant finding was that perceived enjoyment had a higher impact on perceived usefulness than perceived ease of use. It had a higher impact on intention to use virtual tours than perceived usefulness. This research is one of the few studies extending TAM by integrating perceived presence and enjoyment in the tourism context, particularly in emerging economies. The findings are expected to give insights to tourism operators about the most significant elements to attract tourists to join virtual tours. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]