How to travel ethically

Dr Charlotte Russell, Clinical Psychologist & Founder

This year has been a year of anti-tourism sentiment. In cities across Spain anti-tourism demonstrations erupted early this year and have continued into Autumn. Outside of Spain many other cities and destinations are rolling out new rules to manage the impact of tourism including fees and fines to manage tourist numbers.

If you are a travel enthusiast who tries to travel sustainably and consciously, this may have left you feeling a little uncomfortable. In this guide I’m going to talk you through some of the concerns that locals have about tourism and the reasons why tourists may behave badly and compound these issues. I’ll also provide advice on how to travel ethically.

What is behind anti-tourism sentiment?

The main concerns of those protesting in Spain are related to how tourism impacts on affordability, day to day living, and culture in their cities. Firstly the impact of tourism on housing prices is a huge issue and is pricing people out of their own towns and cities. Secondly, areas popular with tourists can become increasingly tourist centred and cater for the needs of tourists rather than local residents. As an example, think about what it would be like if your local high street became full of souvenir shops and ice cream counters rather than the shops and services you actually need to live.

When it comes to issues related to housing there is little we can do as tourists, as these issues require governments to take action (Goodwina, 2023).  However we can think about how we can travel ethically and consciously in order to avoid adding to the problems. This includes behaving responsibly.

What kinds of behaviour gives tourists a bad reputation?

Aside from issues relating to culture and housing, anti-social behaviour from tourists can understandably increase anti-tourism sentiment. Pearce (2019) introduces four categories of tourists’ negative behaviour:

• Destructive – causing damage
• Unsafe – putting others at risk
• Intrusive – behaviours that negatively effect other stakeholders including taking photos without permission, queue jumping, noise pollution and disrespecting cultural or religious customs.
• Unsustainable – this includes behaviours that are not environmentally sustainable

I’ll talk more about each of these below:

Destructive and unsafe behaviours

Destructive tourist behaviour frequently involves people Carving their names into ancient buildings such as the Colosseum. There hasn’t been specific research into why people do this, however there has been research into the psychological predictors of vandalism more generally. As you might expect, impulsivity has been found to be a contributing factor to vandalism (Nordmarker et al., 2016). Impulsivity tends to be a fairly stable trait and is usually a characteristic of someone’s personality (Huang et al., 2024). So if someone behaves in an impulsive manner is likely that this has been a pattern of behaviour in the past.

So coming back to the name-carving, it may be that people with a tendency towards impulsive and anti-social behaviour see an opportunity to carve their name and take it, without thinking too much about it.

Similarly with dangerous behaviour, I would suspect that people who behave in this way whilst travelling have a history of impulsive behaviour and/or getting into trouble. I would also suspect that they are not the ones reading this article right now!

Intrusive behaviours

Intrusive behaviour isn’t necessarily anti-social but is inconsiderate.

This might include tourists doing anything possible to get that perfect selfie in a specific location. Concerns around this selfie-tourism include tourists visiting famous locations superficially for a quick photo without any genuine interest in the history or culture of a place. This article describes how this selfie culture promotes self-focus and involvement rather than social responsibility.

I’m sure no one is bothered about people taking selfies in a theme park as it is designed to be a place of fun and entertainment. However if your residential street becomes the next new place to visit, and you have no control over this, then it is understandable to be feeling upset!

Unsustainable behaviours

High visitor numbers can have a significant effect on the local culture and nature. The most notable example of this is Maya Bay in Thailand, made famous by the movie The Beach. At it’s highest levels around 6000 visitors per day were descending on this small bay, which had hugely detrimental consequences for the ecosystem. Tourists damaged the coral, sunscreen chemicals polluted the water and rubbish piled up.  To save the area authorities took drastic action. The bay was closed to tourists in 2018 and reopened  to visitors in 2022 after four-year closure. New rules and regulations exist to limit numbers and preserve the ecosystem.

This is a stark example of how unsustainable tourism can have a negative impact, and thankfully it is a success story. However, there are many examples of how tourism continues to have a negative impact because of the sheer volume of people visiting certain destinations.

Why do people behave badly when travelling?

In my article about dark tourism I wrote about research by Dr Nitasha Sharma which explored the reasons that tourists ‘morally disengaged’ and behaved badly when visiting dark tourism sites. These reasons would appear to be equally valid to tourists behaving badly in other circumstances. Dr Sharma (2020) explained that tourists may disengage from their usual values through the following processes:

• Reconstruing the conduct so that it is not considered immoral (e.g. “it’s not that bad”)
• Minimising personal involvement (e.g. “I wasn’t that involved”or “others were doing worse”)
• Misrepresenting or discounting the negative consequences (e.g. “It didn’t hurt anyone”)
• Blaming or devaluing the recipients of the unethical act (e.g. “they’re just too sensitive”)

This process of moral disengagement has also been found to occur in people participating in film tourism (Jørgensen & Reichenberger, 2022). This is where fans of popular films and TV programmes visit set locations. It seems that people can get caught up in seeing a place from their favourite film or show and treat the location as if it is not a real place where real people live. This can be very upsetting and frustrating for those who live nearby.

How to travel ethically

If you have searched this article or decided to click on it, you are probably the kind of person who wants to travel ethically and values behaving respectfully. Here are some tips to help you live in line with these values.

Don’t ‘let your hair down’

Concerning tourist behaviour can reflect people behaving as if the usual societal norms and rules somehow don’t apply when they’re on holiday. This is absolutely not the case and we should avoid buying into these narratives if we want to travel ethically.

Yes we can have fun when we travel, but travelling does not mean we are in some alternate universe where we can be inconsiderate or disrespectful. Look out for phrases like “It didn’t hurt anyone”, “other people are doing it” or “don’t be uptight” as these can be used to justify all kinds of bad behaviour.

If you have noticed yourself acting without thinking in the past, notice this. I’m sure we have all done this at some point as we are human beings, so there is no judgement here. The important thing is that we take the time to reflect and learn, and then to behave differently next time.

Be mindful when taking photos and selfies

When you want to take a selfie, or any photo for that matter, just take a moment to check in and remind yourself where you are. If it is a residential area be very mindful, as none of us would want people standing outside our house taking photographs. Be wary of thoughts like “I’ll just take one” or “other people are doing it” as these are part of the slippery slope of moral disengagement.

Avoid busy destinations where you can

In order to travel ethically it is important to consider avoiding the most busy places, especially in peak season.

That said, if there is somewhere that feels very important for you to visit, that’s not to say you should stay away. It’s just that it is not sustainable for every person to visit every popular destination. I’ll include myself in this by saying that I’m not planning to visit Venice. It’s one of the busiest places in the world and yes I’d like to see it However I personally don’t consider it a special place and I feel that the downsides would outweigh the benefits.

I visited Positano a couple of years ago, and although it was beautiful, the crowds could be overwhelming. This was in late September so I can’t even imagine what it is like in August!

The good news is that there are plenty of countries that are actively welcoming travellers. Going off the beaten track a little bit can help us to travel more ethically and sustainably. It can also make our travel adventures more interesting and imaginative.

Contribute to the local economy

Professor Richard Butler, an Emeritus Professor in Hospitality and Tourism Management explains how using local options can be part of travelling ethically:

“It need not be more expensive to behave responsibly, in many aspects it should be cheaper, if you eat at local restaurants, engage directly with local people, guides, taxi drivers, tour operators, for example. I am always horrified at seeing the prices cruise lines charge, for example, for land excursions, when in many places it would be much cheaper, and probably more fun and a better experience to go with a local option. Using local options generally means any expenditure is going directly into the local economy, not to external suppliers.”

Consider ‘giving back’

Increasingly ethical travellers are finding ways to contribute positively to the places they visit. To support people to do this, Husband and Wife Team Jade and Matt developed a platform called Give Back. This allows travellers to find experiences to contribute positively when travelling. As well as being an ethical traveller, Dr Jade is a psychologist working in the NHS. They explain more about the project below:

“Give Back is an online directory of community and conservation projects, all of which you can get involved with during your upcoming trips or even in your local neighbourhood. Everything listed has a positive impact on people, places and the planet.

There are currently over 200 projects in 50+ countries listed in the database with more being added every week. Each project is tagged with categories like animal sanctuaries, beach cleans, cultural exchanges, social impact projects, tours, tree planting, wellbeing experiences etc.

We created Giveback as a result of our own travel style changing. Increasingly, we sought to leave destinations in a slightly better state than when we arrived, but finding ways to do this proved quite difficult. Giveback is the solution to this problem and we hope it will encourage other travellers to give back to the places they visit.”

Travelling sustainably

As well as being conscious of our behaviour, there are small changes that we can all make to travel more sustainably. These can include:

• Avoiding flying and opting for eco-friendly transportation methods, such as trains, buses and ferries.
• Choosing eco-friendly accommodation and being aware of the possibility of ‘greenwashing’ in the travel industry
• Eating local and plant-based foods
• Avoiding single-use plastics such as by carrying a reusable water bottle
• You can minimise the effects of suncream on the environment by choosing reef-safe brand, avoiding sprays and covering up with clothing where possible. Read more here about sunscreen’s impact on oceans and how to mitigate it

Conclusion

While issues around housing affordability are beyond the control of individual travellers, there are choices and changes that we can all make in order to travel ethically. This includes being conscious of our own behaviour, avoiding busy destinations, traveling sustainably and considering how we can contribute to the local area in a positive way.

References

Goodwina, H. (2023). Responsible Travel and Ethical Tourism: Trends and Issues. J. Responsible Tour. Manag, 3, 1-14.

Huang, Y., Luan, S., Wu, B., Li, Y., Wu, J., Chen, W., & Hertwig, R. (2024). Impulsivity is a stable, measurable, and predictive psychological trait. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 121(24), e2321758121.

Jørgensen, T. & Reichenberger, I. (2022). Breaking Bad Behaviour: Understanding Negative Film Tourist Behaviour through Moral Disengagement. Current Issues in Tourism, online pre-publication. https://doi.org/10.1080/13683500.2022.2051447

Nordmarker, A., Hjärthag, F., Perrin‐Wallqvist, R., & Archer, T. (2016). The roles of gender and personality factors in vandalism and scrawl‐graffiti among S wedish adolescents. PsyCh journal, 5(3), 180-190.

Pearce, P. L. (2019). Behaving badly. In P. L. Pearce (Ed.), Tourist Behaviour (pp. 283-303). Edward Elgar Publishing.

Sharma, N. (2020). Dark tourism and moral disengagement in liminal spaces. Tourism Geographies, 22(2), 273-297.

If you liked this article check out What is overtourism and how can I navigate visiting busy places?