Sevil Sonmez

I am a professor of tourism management (Ph.D., Penn State University, 1994). My research has evolved through three intertwined phases: (1) risks and effects of natural disasters, political instability, and terrorism on the tourism sector and travelers; (2) health risks of travel and tourism; and (3) health benefits of tourism and leisure and their link to tourism sustainability.

There are 37 included publications by Sevil Sonmez :

TitleDateViewsBrief Description
Active Living in the Trucking Sector: Environmental Barriers and Health Promotion Strategies. 2012 2986 Background: As one of the most underserved segments of the U.S. labor force, truck drivers have been associated with a series of morbid conditions intimately linked to their occupational milieux, their mostly unhealthful nutritional intake and sede...
Barriers to truck drivers’ healthy eating: Environmental influences and health promotion strategies. 2011 7360 This article presents an assessment of 25 trucking work settings designed to examine whether the environmental attributes of these settings influence eating patterns of truckers who are at risk for excess weight gain. Findings corroborate evidence th...
Binge Drinking and Casual Sex on Spring-Break 2006 6585 College students‘ health-risk behaviors on spring break were examined via pre-and post-surveys. Over one-half reported getting drunk on the previous vacation and stated intentions to do so again. Personal normative beliefs and situational expectation...
Caribbean Tourism and Development 2002 1830 Mass charter tourism is the cornerstone of development plans in the Caribbean. Unparalleled tourism investment in the post-World War II era has boosted a tourist influx of unprecedented dimensions, the world’s largest peacetime population movement, e...
Conflict Resolution through Tourism Cooperation? The Case of the Partitioned Island-State of Cyprus 2000 8023 Hostility and armed conflict can exist most easily in closed societies. Social science literature suggests that increasing contact among individuals from diverse groups creates an opportunity for mutual acquaintances, enhances understanding and accep...
Crisis Management for Event Tourism 1993 4297 Tourism, festivals, and special events are usually not considered in conjunction with disasters or disruptive events. As the notions of tourism, festivals and other special events reflect enjoyment and relaxation, whereas disasters bring to mind ...
Crisis Management in Tourist Destinations 1992 11175 Whether natural or caused by people, disasters have been and continue to be a part of life that communities must deal with. Tourism destinations are especially vulnerable to disaster occurrences due to their economic dependence on visitors and the ne...
Cruising for Truckers on Highways and the Internet: Sexual Networks and Infection Risk 2011 5040 Empirical evidence on the heterosexual partnerships of long-haul truckers suggests connections among occupational stressors, substance misuse, structural factors, and risk for sexually transmitted infections and HIV. Yet the potential risks associ...
Determining Future Travel Behavior from Past Travel Experience and Perceptions of Risk and Safety 1998 21287 This study examined the influences of past international travel experience, types of risk associated with international travel, and the overall degree of safety felt during international travel on individuals' likelihood of travel to various geograph...
A Distorted Destination Image? The Case of Turkey 2002 10083 Despite its Mediterranean location, Turkey has been unable to consistently achieve its tourism goals, as evidenced by fluctuating numbers in tourism earnings and a small share of the international tourism market. This discrepancy might be attributed ...
Do Destination Images Really Matter? Predicting Destination Choices of Student Travelers 2001 5571 The purpose of the study was to identify images that are likely predictors of destination choices of college students considering travelling to Turkey in a probabilistic model when two measurements of the dependent variable were involved. Five hundre...
Environmental Determinants of Obesity-Associated Morbidity Risks for Truckers. 2012 3194 Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine how the transportation environment triggers, exacerbates and sustains truckers’ risks for obesity and associated morbidities. Design/methodology/approach – An extensive literature review of PubMed ...
Examining the Sources of Differential Support for Tourism Industry in Two Ghanaian Cities 2001 2609 The current article examines residents’ support for tourism in the Central Region of Ghana in Africa using social exchange theory as the guiding framework. Using pooled data from the two Ghanaian communities of Cape Coast and Elmina, this article tes...
Exploring the Touristic Image of Jordan 1999 5703 Destination image has received significant attention in recent Western travel literature. However, developing and lesser-developed countries have less research attention devoted to them despite the fact image is a key factor in determining travel dec...
From Farmers and Shepherds to Shopkeepers and Hoteliers: Constituency-Differentiated Experiences of Endogenous Tourism in the Greek Isle of Zakynthos 1999 3250 The effects exerted by endogenous tourism investment on the developing Greek island of Zakynthos are examined, focusing in particular on whether the experiences among residents, tourist enterprises and local government are homogeneous, or whether the...
Gender Images in State Tourism Brochures: An Overlooked Area in Socially Responsible Tourism Marketing 2000 8478 The purpose of this article is to examine photographs (pictorial displays) presented in state tourism promotional materials for gender depictions within Goffman?s framework. Specifically, the study investigated latent (i.e., facial expressions, gestu...
Heritage Tourism in Africa: Residents’ Perceptions of African-American and White Tourists 2011 1373 The growing interest in heritage tourism in Africa is reflected in the Cairo Declaration of 1995, which was adopted under the auspices of the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organizatio...
Human Rights and Health Disparities for Migrant Workers in the UAE. 2011 9846 Systematic violations of migrant workers’ human rights and striking health disparities among these populations in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) are the norm in member countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Migrant laborers comprise abou...
The Impact of Gender and Religion on College Students Spring-Break Behavior 2001 7705 The authors investigated the influence of gender and religion on health-risk behavior potentials and destination-related expectations of college students on spring break vacation using a random sample of 534 students from two U.S. universities. Resul...
Infection Risk Along U.S. Highways? The Case of a ‘Truckchaser’ Cruising for Truckers. 2010 5049 This article explores potential infection risks linked with trucker cruising along U.S. highways. Specifically, the article delineates the settings and social organization of trucker cruising, examines the structure of sex partnerships of truckers an...
Influence of Terrorism Risk on Foreign Tourism Decisions 1998 41445 This study explored relationships between selected factors and several key stages of the international vacation tourism decision-making process. A theoretical framework of vacation decisions involving terrorism risk served as the foundation for the a...
A Learning Theory Framework for Sustainability Education in Tourism. 2012 7452 As efforts abound across tourism educator networks to craft plans for guiding educational responses to the threats of tourism to people and the planet, it is worth exploring areas in which such labors might be made more efficient, and thus more timel...
Leisure corrupted: an artist's portrait of leisure in a changing society 1993 3942 Theoretical arguments that leisure is the basis of any culture are available. Yet, scarcity in the literature of serious consideration of leisure in non-Western societies demonstrates that the topic has been neglected. One possible explanation for th...
Make No Enemies: The Tourist Contending With The Terrorist 1997 1879 This article examines the relationship between terrorism and tourism. Although the travel and tourism industry and government have done much to control it, terrorism remains a powerful form of communication which utilizes the tourist to convey mes...
New Directions in Mediterranean Tourism: Restructuring and Cooperative Marketing in the Era of Globalization 2000 5309 At a time when tourism is the preeminent global industry, the Mediterranean is one of the most important tourist regions in the world, accounting for approximately a third of total tourism revenues and half of international arrivals. Because the trad...
Occupational Stressors and the Mental Health of Truckers. 2010 5716 Trucking has been classified as one of the highest-risk occupations in the United States. Occupational stress is even greater for long-haul truckers who are away from home, family, friends, and other support networks for several days or weeks at a ti...
Redefining Ecotourism: The Need for a Supply Side View 1999 10291 This article reviews the existing literature on ecotourism definitions and provides a supply-side view of ecotourism based on the findings of a nationwide survey of 282 U.S.- based ecotour operators. A content analysis of ecotourism definitions revea...
Resident Attitudes toward Tourism Development 2002 21841 In recent years, tourism has been playing a more significant role in the economies of several African countries, including Ghana. The purpose of the paper is to examine attitudes of residents of two of its towns toward tourism development. Factor ana...
Sexwork in Trucking Milieux: ‘Lot Lizards,’ Truckers, and Risk. 2013 4323 Background: Long-haul truckers often engage in risk-laden sexual mixing and drug exchanges with female sex workers while on the road, which increase their vulnerability to sexually transmitted infections/blood borne infections (STI/BBI). Objective:...
STI/HIV Risks for Mexican Migrant Laborers: Exploratory Ethnographies 2006 2819 The influx of Latino laborers into the U.S. and the confluence of migration-driven factors in an environment ripe for risk-taking have the potential to exacerbate already rising STI/HIV rates among migrants and their social networks at both the home ...
Study of Visitors to North Carolina Wineries 2012 1579 The wine and grape industry generates a significant economic impact in North Carolina’s rural communities. In 2009 the wine and grape industry generated 7,600 jobs and $1.2 billion in total annual economic impact in the state. Particularly notewort...
Tourism in Crisis: Managing the Effects of Terrorism 1999 43925 While tourists are free to avoid destinations associated with risk, the consequences of disastrous events on tourist destinations are inescapable and can be profound. Terrorism that targets tourism can be viewed as a disaster for a destination and en...
Tourism, Terrorism and Political Instability 1998 74760 Concepts of terrorism, political turmoil, and war appear unrelated to tourism. Closer examination of their points of convergence and impacts on tourism reveals otherwise. This paper examines literature focusing on the relationships between these phen...
Trucking Organization and Mental Health Disorders of Truck Drivers. 2012 6193 There are over 3 million truck drivers employed in the commercial transportation and material moving occupations, one of the largest occupational groups in the United States. Workers in this large and growing occupational segment are at risk for a ra...
Understanding Residents' Support for Tourism Development in the Central Region of Ghana 2002 10902 The purpose of this study was twofold: (1) to assess the determinants of support for tourism development in two adjacent communities, Cape Coast and Elmina, in the Central Region of Ghana, which stand to benefit the most from tourism development proj...
Worksite-Induced Morbidities Among Truck Drivers in the United States 2010 5069 A critical review was conducted of social, psychological, and health science literature on the array of health risks and morbidities of truckers. Multilevel worksite-induced strains (e.g., long work hours and fatigue, shift work and sleep deprivation...
World at work: Hotel cleaners 2013 6456 With tourism and hospitality representing the largest economic sector in the world1 and over 4.8 million rooms in accommodation establishments in the U.S. alone2, hotel cleaners comprise a significant occupational segment. Regardless of geographic va...