Psychological Factors Impacting Travel Decisions From China to the United States

ABSTRACT The expenditures of foreign visitors represent a major source of export income for the US; therefore, the recent declining trend of Chinese travelers to the US is a blow to her budget deficit. To investigate the underlying reasons for the observed decline in the trend, this research examines the effect of psychological factors on Chinese travelers' decision to travel to the US. Using monthly data from 2017 to 2022, the research employs structural VAR models along with spillover analysis to conduct the investigation. The paper discovers that feelings of uncertainty, mood, nationalistic retaliation, and sentiment can significantly influence the volume of Chinese tourist arrivals to the US. Moreover, results show that these psychological factors have no robust effect on the number of Chinese student arrivals to the US. The study concludes that reducing “anti‐Asian hate crimes” and “gun violence” may be conducive to increasing Chinese student enrollment in US universities.