Generation Z Perspective on Destination Image Restoration Through Dark Tourism

This chapter develops a qualitative model to explain strategies that can ignite the positive attitudes of Generation Z towards Wuhan City with an unsafe image. Employing a constructivist grounded theory approach, the empirical findings point to strategies to develop dark tourism attractions that reflect embodied views of China’s Generation Z. It provides a conceptual framework that highlights that China’s Generation Z is influenced by the COVID-19 pandemic environment, which subconsciously affects their cognition, emotion, and behavior (Fig. 10.1). Given such findings, dark tourism strategies could be categorized into cognitive, affective and conative image dimensions for Wuhan’s destination restoration. Notably, the proposed strategies are not only Generation Z’s responses to the impact of the COVID-19 environment but are also influenced by their unique characteristics. As digital natives, China’s Generation Z are also cautious and distrustful, light-hearted, patriotic, innovative, and creative (Fig. 10.2).