Sociology

Business

Archaeology

Qualitative research

Social science

Performance art

Unit (ring theory)

Advertising

Mathematics education

Marketing

Political science

Tourism

China

Psychology

Geography

Business administration

Destinations

Guanxi

Business practice

Social practice

Social media

Art history

Journal of Travel Research

Chinese tourist shopping reflects the new consumer culture in contemporary China, but remains underexplored in the tourism literature despite its importance to many destinations. The present study applies social practice theory to tourist shopping research with the aim of exploring the key features of Chinese tourist shopping in Australia. Tourist shopping as a social practice is the basic unit of analysis, while tourists are decentralized as carriers of this practice. This study employed a qualitative methodology to analyze shopping-related posts in 40 travel blogs from two Chinese online travel communities. The findings show that tourist shopping practice consists of four interconnected elements: materials, competences, meanings, and settings—with utilitarian products purchased in large quantities and maintaining guanxi emerging as unique features of the Chinese tourist shopping practices. The article concludes with a discussion of the potential of social practice theory to enhance theoretical approaches in this area.

Exploring Chinese Outbound Tourist Shopping: A Social Practice Framework