Heritage interpretation and destination loyalty: Cognitive enrichment in historic urban destinations

Heritage interpretation is central to destination marketing, yet little is known about the cognitive-reflective process through which it becomes loyalty. Drawing on a Stimulus-Organism-Response (S-O-R) framework, this study conceptualizes Heritage Cognitive Enrichment (HCE) and tests a mediation model linking interpretation quality with revisit intention through existential authenticity, restorative experience, and place attachment. Survey data from 909 visitors to Cáceres, Spain, were analyzed using factor analyses and structural equation modeling. Results validate HCE as a two-dimensional construct comprising Cognitive Heritage Engagement and Reflective Cultural Meaning-Making. Indirect and sequential effects show that interpretation contributes to loyalty through connected cognitive-reflective, experiential, and relational processes. Component paths are asymmetric: interpretation primarily activates reflective cultural meaning-making, cognitive engagement is especially important for restoration, and existential authenticity is the main experiential route to attachment. The study extends S-O-R research in heritage tourism and provides a process-based managerial framework for aligning interpretation design with meaning, restoration, and destination loyalty.