Do word-of-mouth-based conversational AI recommendations enhance tourism consumers’ acceptance? The moderating role of transparency

AI agents play a crucial role in providing recommendations during interactions with consumers. This study demonstrates that, in the context of conversational AI recommendation, word of mouth-based recommendations exert a more significant impact on tourism consumers’ trust and acceptance compared to content-based recommendations, with trust also serving a mediating role. This impact is further amplified under higher transparency, but differences in the effects of various recommendation types were reduced. This study advances research on conversational AI recommendations within tourism contexts and suggests that tourism companies and destinations should utilise highly transparent and word of mouth-based AI agent recommendations for enhanced marketing effectiveness.