Destination Emotion Scale

What it measures

Measures the three core positive emotions tourists experience at a destination: Joy (happiness and elation during the visit), Love (warmth and affection toward the place and its people), and Positive Surprise (pleasant astonishment at unexpected destination features). Grounded in Izard's discrete emotions framework. Emotional experience is a stronger predictor of destination loyalty than cognitive evaluation or satisfaction alone, and the DES outperforms general affect scales (PANAS) for destination-specific emotional responses.

Representative items

• I felt a sense of joy while visiting this destination. (Joy)
• I felt happy to be in this place. (Joy)
• I felt warmth and affection for this destination. (Love)
• I felt emotionally close to this place. (Love)
• This destination pleasantly surprised me. (Positive Surprise)

Citation

Hosany, S., & Prayag, G. (2013). Measuring tourists' emotional experiences: Further validation of the destination emotion scale. Journal of Travel Research, 52(6), 645–657.