Examining affection-based travel: Development and validation of a measurement scale for honeymooners' motivation

Honeymoons have attracted growing attention in recent tourism research. Although this tourist segment is fast expanding and lucrative, the literature lacks a conceptually valid and psychometrically sound measurement scale to capture honeymooners' motivation. This study aims to bridge this knowledge gap by developing and validating such a scale. Following a multi-stage scale development procedure recommended in previous research, two samples (Sample 1, n = 210; Sample 2, n = 213) are used to establish the psychometric properties of the proposed Honeymooner Motivation Scale (HMS). The initial scale comprised six underlying dimensions including marital relationship, prestige, novelty, romance, escape, and relaxation, which were further refined to produce a final scale consisting of 22 items. This study contributes to the honeymoon tourism literature by identifying the dimensionality of honeymooners' motivation, as well as further developing and validating a measurement scale to explore the phenomenon.