TOURISM LANGUAGE E-PROCEEDING

In this module, users can access the tourism attraction places according to district in
Selangor. For example, the district on the map will change colour from yellow to red
when the mouse pointer is over it. This district has been coded to act as button that have
functions to lead the system for the next subpage. When user click on the district button,
it will lead to another map page. The page appear on screen will show the tourist attraction
places according to the selected district. This is different compared to the Tourism Map
module where the map is based on the tourism categories.

The map on the centre of the page is an interactive map or e-atlas where have two ways
user-system interaction. Users can zoom this map for better viewing experience and
dragging the map to find the intended place. The map also has another different function
compared to Tourism Map module where each place where marked by different symbols
that indicating the different in categories of attractions other information. These symbols
on the map are work as buttons that will lead this page to the next page. The left side of
the screen shows the legends information. This legend shows all six different tourism
categories with 14 different symbols that indicates different kind of attractions places. User
can click “NEXT” button to access different categories of legends according to the tourism
categories.

This system is a compatible platform and can be installed in smartphone that operating
with Android Operating System. This can improve the product reachability where users can
use this system on their computers and on their smartphone. It also helps users to use the
system “on-the-go” where users can use this system while there on the move.

4.3 System Testing and Practicality

System testing is the last process in the development of e-tourism Selangor information
system. System testing and evaluation is needed in order to ensure that all three objectives
of this project are achieved successfully. All aspects are been tested including screen
visualization and presentation, GIS elements, e-atlas or maps, tourism information,
interactivity and multimedia elements. Respondents have been chosen randomly at several
occasion. For example, system testing has been done at UiTM Shah Alam where most of
the respondents are students.

Overall, the users are asked to give rating (range from 1 to 5) based on their satisfactory
level towards the overall functionality of this e-atlas tourism information system. 100% of
the respondents are very satisfied with this system by giving the highest rating of five (5).
Respondents also commented and give reasons why they like this system. Most of the
respondents are given highest rating towards GIS and cartographic elements used in this
system in order to deliver the information about the tourism attraction places in Selangor
where provide the value added towards others existing tourism information webs. All the
comments and opinions from the respondents are used to improve this system in order to
create a system that fulfilling the needs of the users.

91

5. CONCLUSION

Malaysia is in progress to improve the tourism industry by making many programmes and
activities to attract people to come visit this state. Tourism Selangor needs to focus on to
development of the tourist attraction centres on each of districts in Selangor by making the
centres more tourist friendly platform. In order to make it is becoming more tourist
friendly, the first step is to provide comprehensive information for tourist in local tourist.
There are some available webs-based systems which are provide the information and
promote the tourism sector in Selangor such as Tourism Malaysia and Tourism Selangor
websites. However, it is found that there are several weaknesses on these existing systems,
particularly lacking spatial information and unintegrated local information system. This
study has developed a web GIS and Apps for Selangor tourism information (e-tourism map)
that can assist users to gain information whether spatial information or non-spatial
information related to the tourist attraction in the state. This digital information can also
provide users to plan their journey in order to experience the best tourism quality that
Selangor can serve in more informative yet interactive ways. Adding information on
another interesting places in Selangor need to be considered in this next study.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Muhammad Nurrahim Ruslan completed his BSc. in Surveying Science
and Geomatics (Hons) in UiTM, Malaysia and he is currently working in a geomatic
company [email protected]. E-Tourism Map: An Interactive Tourism Web
Mapping System and Mobile Apps in Selangor, Malaysia.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT: The authors would like to thank to the Faculty of Architecture,
Planning and Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM), Selangor, Malaysia for
supporting this study.

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94

Proceedings of the 3rd International Language & Tourism Conference 2019
Sustaining Global Development Goals through Language, Education and Tourism
Kulliyyah of Languages and Management, International Islamic University Malaysia,

Pagoh Edu Hub, Malaysia 18th-19th October 2019

EXPLORING POSSIBILITIES OF ISLAMIC TOURISM IN MALAYSIA

Nor Afifin Nadia M Noor Azman*1, Nur Najwa Zulkifle2 & Siti Salwa Md Sawari3
1, 2 Department of Tourism, Kulliyyah of Languages and Management, International Islamic

University Malaysia, Johor, MALAYSIA.
(E-mail: *[email protected], [email protected],

[email protected])
ABSTRACT

Malaysia is one of the country that rich in diversities, heritages and cultures, however,
it is clearly declared that the official religion of the country is Islam. The fact, Islam is the
official religion makes it easier to market Malaysia as an Islamic tourism destination.
This research paper aims to analyses the current trends and opportunities of Islamic
Tourism industry in Malaysia. A document analysis was initially employed to identify
the objectives of this research paper. The results of the study have shown the current
trends of some travel agents and service providers who have creatively came out with
Muslim-friendly packages and tours to attract and gain the attention of Muslim
travellers. Besides that, the results of this study have determined three major
opportunities of Islamic tourism in Malaysia which are halal holidays, halal tourism
smart phone apps and promotions. The futuristic elements of this paper are aimed to
promote Islamic products that can be further developed in terms of its quality of
production, the benefit of decision-making among Islamic countries, and the ability to
raise the dignity of Islam in the eyes of the world.
Keywords: Tourism; Islamic Tourism; OIC

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INTRODUCTION

Tourism is definitely one of the sectors that contributes in economic growth in Malaysia.
It is an important sector in Malaysia because it contributes towards job employment and
increase in foreign exchange gains in the country. Numerous initiatives have been done
by the government to make Malaysia as one of the tourism destination in Asia.

Malaysia is one of the country that is rich in diversities, heritages and cultures. However,
the official religion of the country is Islam. In Malaysia, people live in harmony despite
having different religions and beliefs. Even though Islam is the official religion, people can
freely practice any belief. Often mosques, churches and temples are located at the same
area in the country. The fact that Islam is the official religion makes it easier to market
Malaysia as an Islamic tourism destination.

Islamic Tourism

Tourism is closely connected with a lot of Islamic aspects. Researchers have emphasised
that Islam reinforces tourism activities to bring enhancement on social functions and more
importantly religious activities. Islamic Tourism definition is closely related with spiritual
and religion which is the push factor of travelling and motivation. Rituals as well as religious
events, buildings and festivals act as tourist attractions (Islam et. al., 2011). Nowadays,
Islamic tourism is a new tourism destination in the world. It has been reported that there
are 54 Muslim countries in the world and Malaysia is one of it. This type of tourism would
help widen the prospect of Islam as a whole.

The connection between travel and Islam has attracted widespread attention, especially
in Islam and tourism attractions (Islam et. al., 2011). Islamic Tourism has different
meaning between the one who travels and the one who works in the tourism industry.
The spiritual nature of Muslim is related with economy-driven aspects of tourism sector.

ISLAMIC TOURISM ATTRIBUTION IN MALAYSIA

Islamic Tourism attributes in Malaysia could be seen through Islamic-tourism destinations
that deliver the value of Islamic-Malay culture and heritage (Battour, Battor & Bhatti,
2013). Moreover, the attributes of Islamic Tourism in Malaysia can also be analysed in
economic region aspect (Tourism Council, 2018).

Culture and Heritage

Built cultural heritage is a big responsibility in tourism industry (Bakri, Ibrahim & Ahmad,
2015). Apart from that, Malaysia is a county that has recorded large Malay population
which reflects Islamic-Malay culture. This can positively impact Islamic tourism attributes
in Malaysia through culture and heritage site. The clear attribute is that Islam is a religion
which has primary influence to legal system, social and culture. Hence, the Islamic-Malay
culture which has its own history can be a cause to improve Islamic tourism in Malaysia.

96

To support the statement, Husin (2013) argued that Malay-Islamic value is one of the
foundation of the Malay community’s culture that can be delivered through culture and
heritage building and it is considered as Islamic tourism attraction in Malaysia. Inaddition,
there are many buildings in Malaysia that have been developed for Islamic tourism through

Islamic-Malay civilisation architecture such as Administration Centre in Putrajaya, Masjid
Jamek in Kuala Lumpur, Zahir Mosque in Kedah, Masjid Al-Hussain in Kuala Perlis, and
Floating Mosque of Tanjung Bungah in Penang. Malaysia government’s effort in developing
Islamic tourism could been seen by combining the Islamic-Malay ethnic regional through
Islamic teaching in many aspects such as attire, halal food culture, soft spoken language
and so on (Norhasniah, Husin, Ong & Liaw, 2013).

Economic Region

The attributes of Islamic tourism in Malaysia can be seen in economic region. The growth
of Islamic tourism industry has positively affected Malaysia economy through Economic
Transformation Program (ETP) and Gross National Income (GNI) (Kamarudin & Ismail,
2016). Besides, the quality of Islamic facilities and infrastructure in Malaysia Could attract
more Muslim and non-Muslim travellers to visit Malaysia. Thus, it can be considered as the
indicator for economic development region in Malaysia, namely Iskandar Malaysia in
Southern Johor (IRDA), Northern Corridor Economic Region (NCER), East Coast Economic
Region (ECER), Sabah Development Corridor (SDC) and Sarawak Corridor of Renewable
Energy (SCORE).

In fact, Malaysia is one of the most active Muslim country in developing and exploring
opportunities for Islamic tourism such as implementing Tourism Development
Corporation (TDC). Besides, as being part of Organization Islamic Corporation (OIC)
countries, Malaysia focuses more on Islamic tourism development like organizing OIC
Global Islamic Tourism Conference and Exhibition. Hence, the implementation of many
alternatives indicate the effective efforts in increasing the number of tourist arrival in
Malaysia such as enhancing Islamic products and services like transportation,
accommodation, tour guide, and place of interest and attraction. (Kamarudin & Ismail,
2016).

TRENDS AND OPPORTUNITIES

Tourism sector acknowledges the increasing interest in Halal Tourism as well as Islamic
Tourism. Hence, tourism experts have planned the initiatives to promote and market Halal
Tourism which follow the Islamic law. The increasing interest might be because of the
growing number of Muslim population in the world. Some travel agents and service
providers have creatively came out with Muslim-friendly packages and tours to attract and
gain the attention from the Muslim travellers. This kind of opportunities and trends made
none other than to promote Islamic values and Halal tourism itself.

Halal Holidays

97

A new travel package in the tourism industry which serves holiday packages align with
Islamic beliefs and practices is called Halal Holiday. The packages provide the halal resorts,
hotels and the most important part is only non-alcohol beverages are provided. Some of
the accommodations might have segregated pools, spas and other health facilities.
Moreover, travel packages include Islamic Heritage tours for the travellers to explore and
discover the morals and values practised by Muslims (Musa & Moghavvemi, 2015).

Halal Tourism Smart Phone Apps

One of the examples of smart phone apps is Halal Navi. It operates as smartphone apps
and digital guidebooks for Muslim tourists and travellers. The website is run and developed
by Muslims to ease the journey of other Muslim travellers. The website has information
regarding halal eateries, Muslim-friendly accommodation and nearby prayer room
available. Thompson said, the global Muslim market is about RM 7.4 trillion which makes
it a hot topic to be discussed. A Malaysian who developed Halal Navi and Have Halal Will
Travel claimed that Halal Navi is completely community based service. It started as an
information provider within Japan, but nowadays, South Korea, Thailand and Germany are
also inclusively included in this apps.

KEY PLAYERS IN PROMOTING ISLAMIC TOURISM IN MALAYSIA

This section will emphasise on the key players in promoting Islamic tourism in Malaysia by
focusing on two approaches which are organising tourism fair, festival and exhibition, and
facilitating visa among the OIC countries.

Organising Tourism Fair, Festival and Exhibition

Islamic tourism in Malaysia is an industry that contributes the most in international trade.
It is proven that the diversification of Islamic tourism products could be seen through
increasing competition in international markets by producing Halal hotels, Halal transports
(Airlines), Halal tour packages, Halal food premises and Halal finance. Thus, it is important
to organise tourism fair, festival and exhibition in promoting Islamic tourism among OIC
countries including Malaysia.

Organising tourism fair, festival and exhibition is an alternative way to grab huge
opportunities in order to promote Islamic tourism products among locals. The regional fair
and exhibition activities encourage local communities to promote and market their
touristic destination and heritage site that will positively affect tourism activity in their
region. Regarding to this matter, Islamic culture festival provides chances for people living
in the neighbour cities or countries to know more about each other. Therefore, these
effective approaches could be used by all Islamic countries to explore possible Islamic
tourism products in the future (Islamic Cooperation, 2017).
Visa Facilitation among the OIC Countries

To explore the possibilities of Islamic tourism in Malaysia, it is important to know the
current laws and regulations that give benefits towards Islamic tourism industry in Malaysia

98

which is visa facilitation among OIC countries. It plays important roles in attracting more
tourists to visit Malaysia which deals with the ability of tourists to enter the destination and
those seek employment in the tourism sector.
According to the Statistical, Economic and Social Research and Training Centre for Islamic
Countries, restrictive visa policy will give negative impacts towards tourist arrival where it
discourages potential tourists to visit the countries in their respective region. Hence, by
creating a universal tourist visa, it can facilitate the member of the country to join the
scheme. For instance, Malaysia is an OIC member that gets benefits from visa facilitation
among OIC countries. OIC countries have various geographical regions that could easily
develop visa regimes to promote and market intraregional tourism and enhance Islamic
regional integration (Islamic Cooperation, 2017).

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, Islamic tourism in Malaysia has its own uniqueness that provides
opportunities to a new dimension of tourism in Malaysia industry. Exploring the
possibilities of Islamic tourism in Malaysia is one of the challenges for Malaysia government
to improve the tourism sector in many aspects of social, cultural and heritage, economy,
technology and so on. However, this is not a barrier to make Malaysia as a developing
nation that applies Islamic principles in tourism industry. In a nutshell, this paper aims to
promote Islamic products that could be further developed in terms of its production
quality, the benefit of decision-making among Islamic countries, and the ability to nurture
the dignity of Islam in the eyes of the world.

REFERENCES

Bakri, A. F., Ibrahim, N., & Ahmad, S. S. (2015). Valuing Built Cultural Heritage in a
Malaysian Urban Context Valuing Built Cultural Heritage in a Malaysian Urban
Context, 2018(November). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2015.01.048

Battour, M., Battor, M., & Bhatti, M. A. (2013). Islamic Attributes of Destination :
Construct Development and Measurement Validation , and Their Impact on Tourist
Satisfaction. https://doi.org/10.1002/jtr

Islamic Cooperation, O. S. (2017). INTERNATIONAL TOURISM IN THE OIC COUNTRIES : IN
THE OIC COUNTRIES :

Kamarudin, L. M., & Ismail, H. N. (2016). Islamic Tourism : The Impacts to Malaysia ’ s
Tourism Industry Islamic Tourism : The Impacts to Malaysia ’ s Tourism Industry,
(June).

Norhasniah, W., Husin, W., Ong, J., & Liaw, H. (2013). The Malay-Islamic Values as the
Foundation of Nation-Building in Malaysia : A Study on the National Cultural Policy,
(May).

Thimm, V. (2017). Commercialising Islam in Malaysia : ‘ Ziarah ’ at the intersection of
Muslim pilgrimage and the market-driven tourism industry (Vol. 2017).

Tourism Council, W. T. (2018). ECONOMIC.
The Star Malaysia, (2018, February 18) Happy Trails with halal travel apps. Retrieved

from https://www.straitstimes.com.

99

Proceedings of the 3rd International Language & Tourism Conference 2019
Sustaining Global Development Goals through Language, Education and Tourism
Kulliyyah of Languages and Management, International Islamic University Malaysia,

Pagoh Edu Hub, Malaysia 18th-19th October 2019

FACTORS INFLUENCING IIUM STUDENTS’ INTENTION
TO CHOOSE SHARIAH COMPLIANT HOTEL

Amirul Asyraf Laila Satria*1, Siti Salwa Md Sawari*2
1, 2 Department of Tourism, Kulliyyah of Languages and Management, International Islamic

University Malaysia, Johor, MALAYSIA.
(E-mail: *[email protected], *[email protected])

ABSTRACT
Islamic tourism is growing rapidly in Malaysia due to the majority Muslim population in this
country. Malaysia aims to become a leading global Halal hub through the provision of good
trade facilities and infrastructures. To achieve this target, it is vital to have Shariah compliant
hotels to fulfil the needs and demand of Muslim travellers. However, very limited research
has been done on the potential of Shariah compliant hotel (SCH) from Muslim travellers’
views. Thus, the purpose of this study is to analyse the factors influencing IIUM students to
choose Shariah compliant hotel. The study used questionnaire survey to determine the
sources of preferences in using Shariah compliant hotel. The data was analysed using SPSS
software by employing descriptive analysis, correlation and multiple linear regression. The
findings of this study were determined by the factors influencing IIUM students to choose
Shariah compliant hotel. The results showed that subjective norm and perceive behavioural
control have influenced students’ intention significantly.
Keywords: Shariah Compliant Hotel; Tourism; Hotel

100

1. INTRODUCTION

Islamic Tourism Centre (2016) stated that Malaysia is a developing country which is moving
towards becoming the world’s Halal hub leader in products and services recognized
globally. It showed that Muslim consumers have a great potential in growing market
especially in the Shariah compliant hotel industry.

Nevertheless, many tourists believed that Halal Tourism is only related with Halal food
and non-alcoholic beverages due to lack of awareness among themselves. Halal tourism
essentially covers Halal activities, Halal hotels as well as the facilities provided by the
hotels for Muslim travellers (Musa et al., 2017).

The positive growth of the arrival of Muslim tourists in Malaysia has led to the increasing
requests in hotels that comply with Sharia rules (SCH). According to Crescent Rating
(2017), Muslim tourists prefer to choose accommodation that provides all basic
necessities for Muslims such as Halal food, as well as clean and Muslim friendly. Despite
favourable statistics on the demand of Shariah compliant hotel, there is still lack of self-
awareness regarding Halal concept (Yusoff & Adzharuddin, 2017). Moreover, Yusoff and
Adzharuddin (2017) stated that the products made by Muslim manufacturers are still
unable to convince Muslim tourists in Malaysia. Therefore, this research analysed the
intention of Muslim tourists to choose Shariah compliant hotels using the Theory of
Planned Behaviour.

There were variety of research from different field that had used the Theory of Planned
Behaviour as a method to analyse the behaviour of the target respondents. However,
there were only few research made on Halal tourism specifically Shariah compliant hotel.
By applying this theoretical perspective to understand the behaviour of IIUM students to
choose Shariah Compliant Hotel, it could benefit the development of the Theory of
Planned Behaviour.

Hence, the objective of this study is to analyse the factors that have influenced the
intention of IIUM students to choose Shariah Compliant hotels.

2. LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 HALAL TOURISM

Nowadays, Halal tourism is a rapid growing industry for many developing countries
around the world. According to Zamani-farahani and Henderson (2010), Islamic tourism
or Halal tourism of hospitality and tourism studies has become one of the growing area of
interests to be studied by many scholars. Muslim Travel Index Europe (2014), reported
that Muslim Tourists market is an emerging, growing and dominating industry across all
states and countries (Kasak, 2014).

Due to the growing number of Muslim tourists around the world, it will surely bring a big
impact towards the whole tourism receipt of a destination. According to Razak (2018),

101

there are ten main tourist destinations that concentrated the whole tourism receipt such
as Turkey, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Morocco, Indonesia, Kuwait, Tunisia, Jordan and
Iran. However, many non-Muslim countries are currently taking advantages of this
potential growth of Halal tourism industry such as Singapore, Japan, Korea and Thailand
(Halimah et al., 2018)

Therefore, Malaysia should focus towards developing the infrastructure and policy to lead
other OIC countries in tourism industry. Tourism Malaysia (2018) reported that there was
an increasing number of Muslim tourist’s arrival in 2018 with 33.1 million tourists
compared to 25.9 million tourist’s arrival in 2017. Halimah et al. ( 2018) also said that
Malaysia was currently being recognised as the top Halal-friendly tourism destination. To
be a top Halal-friendly tourism destination, Malaysia must provide appropriate and high-
level Muslim-friendly facilities.

2.2 SHARIAH LAW RELATED TO HALAL TOURISM

The following conceptual framework displays four significant form of Shariah law sources
(Hashim & Mizerski, 2010). This conceptual framework can be applied for this study which
focuses on Halal tourism even though it primarily focuses on Shariah law.

What is Halal can be determined by Shariah, which refers to the guidelines and rules that
the followers need to follow regarding daily issues. These rules rely upon the Holy Quran,
Hadith and by Muslim scholars.

These researchers experienced different events and confronted distinctive conditions,
and their decisions can balance the issues related to religion and some of them are
stricter than the others (Battour, Ismail & Battor, 2010). Therefore, we believe that
travel industry is not an exclusion and Muslims will grasp Halal concept for the rapid
growth in their business.

2.3 SHARIAH COMPLIANT HOTEL

Hotel is an accommodation that provides convenience such as food and beverage to
the visitors or the transitory guests who plan to stay at the hotel (Medlik and Ingram,
2000). At any rate, with respect to hotels that have Islamic attributes, it could be
difficult to choose how Islamic the hotel is.

There are different opinions out there regarding this issue such as ‘dry’ hotels that do
not serve alcohol in their premises, rooms that give some progressively ‘Islamic
amenities’ to the travellers (Halal food, prayer rooms, Qurans and prayer carpets in
each room) as well as hotels that are seen as completely Shariah compliant and have
Shariah system in all their activities from the arrangement and inner parts of the hotels
to the hotels’ records (Okasha, 2010.

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3. METHODOLOGY

This research was a quantitative study that used descriptive analysis method where the
researcher described all the data collected through survey. The researcher started the
research by stating the problem statements and the research objectives to express the
main idea of the research clearly, followed by the literature review. The literature review
is to ensure that the ideas of this research are clear and understandable.

Next, the researcher designed the questionnaires related to the topic and conducted the
survey to the target respondents. After collecting the data, the data was examined using
IBM SPSS.

3.1 SAMPLE

The population of this study was IIUM students. According to QS Top universities (2019),
there were 25711 students in IIUM from 14 Kuliyyah. The respondents were not merely
limited to Bachelor’s Degree. It covered all education levels such as PhD, Masters and
Foundation Studies. Considering the motivation of the students to travel in this
millennial era, accommodation surely plays an important role in making them staying
at particular destination.

The sampling technique for this study was adopted from Morgan and Krejcie (1970).
This is because, according to Morgan and Krejcie, the consistently expanding interest
for research has made a requirement for a productive technique for deciding the
example measure that should illustrate the given populace. This study required 377
respondents since the total number of IIUM students was 25711. However, this study
only managed to get 328 respondents due some limitations especially time constraint
and limited financial liability.

4. MAIN RESULTS

TOURIST PROFILE

The study sample consisted of 328 students at IIUM. Frequency analysis was used to
analyze the demographic characteristics of samples. The demographic characteristics of
sample are shown below:

Table 1: Profile based on gender

Type Frequency Percentage
Male
Female 105 32.0

223 68.0

The table shows the total respondents that were able to obtain throughout IIUM
students. As the table shows that out of 328 respondents, majority of the respondents are
female with a total of 68.0% (n = 223) while 32.0% (n = 105) is male.

103

Table 2: Profile based on age

Type Frequency Percentage
20
21 28 8.5
22
23 30 9.1
24
25 59 18.0
26
27 128 39.0
29
41 12.5

24 7.3

11 3.4

6 1.8

1 0.3

Factor Influence Intention of IIUM Student To Choose Shariah Compliant Hotel

Table 3: A Model Summary of TPB factors with Intention.

Model df Mean Square F sig R Square
Regression .000 .510
Residual 3 27.489 112.318
Total
324 .245

327

Table 5: The multiple linear regression of TPB factors with Intention.

Model Understanding Standardized t Sig
Coefficients Coefficients
(Constant) B Std. Error Beta .651 .516
Subjective norms .258 .397 7.358 .000
Perceive behavioral control .434 .059 .383 7.270 .000
.361 .050 .381

A multiple linear regression was calculated to predict participants' intention based on
their subjective norms, perceive behavior control and religiosity. A significant regression
equation was found (F (3,324) = 112.318, p < .05), with an R2 of .510.

The regression coefficients are also tested that they differ significantly from zero. The
result of table 4.8 shows that except for variable of religiosity does not achieved zero
significant of the study while, the other independent variables contributed significantly to
the influence intention of IIUM students to choose Shariah compliant hotel. The subjective
norms has the highest contribution on factor influence intention to choose Shariah
compliant hotel.

Participants' predicted intention is equal to 0.258 + 0.434(subjective norms) +
0.361(perceive behavioral control) + 0.150 (religiosity). Therefore, the subjective norms

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and the control of perceived behavior have a significant influence on the intention.
A multiple linear regression was calculated to predict the participants' intention based on
their subjective norm, perceived behaviour control and religiosity. A significant regression
equation was found (F (3,324) = 112.318, p < .05), with an R2 of .510.

The regression coefficients were also tested and they differed significantly from zero. The
result in Table 4.8 shows that with the exception of religiosity variable which did not
achieve zero significant, other independent variables contributed significantly to IIUM
students’ intention to choose Shariah compliant hotel. The subjective norm has the highest
value for the factors influencing the intention to choose Shariah compliant hotel.

Participants' predicted intention was equal to 0.258 + 0.434(subjective norm) +
0.361(perceived behavioural control) + 0.150 (religiosity). Therefore, the subjective norm
and the perceived behaviour control have a significant influence on the intention.

5. CONCLUSION

The demographic data used in this study are gender, age, level of education and religion.
Most of the respondents were female. Considering the survey was primarily conducted
through social media, the respondents were mostly students aged between 18 to 26 years
old as this group had higher purchasing power especially in travelling. The factors that
influenced IIUM students’ intention to choose hotels that comply with Shariah law was
analysed using multiple linear regression (MLP). Among the factors in the Theory of
Planned Behaviour, the researcher found that subjective norm was the most significant
variable to predict the IIUM students’ intention to choose Shariah compliant hotels. In this
study, subjective norm was considered as IIUM students’ social pressure and motivation to
comply certain behaviour. Thus, subjective norm in this study could be assumed as
students’ participation in Shariah compliant hotel based on their own referent groups.
From this study it can be concluded that IIUM students’ intention could be improved if their
friends and family support the students to choose Shariah compliant hotel. However, this
study contradicted with Hussin and Rahman (2016) which revealed that subjective norm
was not an important factor in explaining Muslims’ intention to purchase Islamic insurance
and volunteerism. In other research, the positive results were aligned with Magdelene et
al. (2015).

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Amirul Asyraf Laila Satria currently is final year student at Kulliyyah Languages and
Managment, International Islamic University Malaysia, Pagoh Edu Hub Malaysia. Majoring
in Tourism Planning Hospitality and Managment. He can be contacted through email
address [email protected]. Title of paper factor influencing intention of IIUM
students to choose shariah compliant hotel.

105

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Battour, M., Ismail, M. N., & Battor, M. (2011). The impact of destination attributes on

Muslim tourist‘s choice. International Journal of Tourism Research, 13(6), 527-540.
Halimah, S., Hamid, A., Aziz, Y. A., Rahman, A. A., Halimah, S., Hamid, A., Ali, M. H. (2018).

Implementing Big Scale Halal Tourism in Malaysia Implementing Big Scale Halal
Tourism in Malaysia, 8(16), 304–318.
Hashim, N. M., & Mizerski, D. (2010). Exploring Muslim consumers' information sources for
fatwa rulings on products and behaviors. Journal of Islamic Marketing, 1(1), 37-50.
Husin, M. M., & Rahman, A. A. (2016). Do Muslims intend to participate in Islamic
insurance? Analysis from theory of planned behaviour. Journal of Islamic Accounting
and Business Research, 7(1), 42-58.
Islamic Tourism Centre (2016) Muslim Friendly Hospitality Services Standard Retrieved
from http://www.itc.gov.my/industry/islamic-tourism-standards/muslim-friendly-
hospitality-services Jabatan Wakaf, Zakat dan Haji Website. www.jawhar.gov.my .
Kasak, A. (2014). Muslim Travel Index Europe 2014. McCann Reach. Birmingham.
Magdalene C.H. A., T. Ramayah, Amin H., (2015),"A theory of planned behavior perspective
on hiring Malaysians with disabilities", Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: An
International Journal, 34 (3), 186 - 200.
Medlik, S., & Ingram, H. (2004). The business of hotels. Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann.
Okasha, Q. (2010). Sharia Compliance Hotel: A Framework for Destination Selection Applied
on Kuwait and UK. Masters of Business Administration (MBA) of the Maastricht School
of Management (MSM), Maastricht, the Netherlands.
Razak, N. H. (2018). Malaysian Accommodation Providers’ Understanding of Halal
Hospitality, 1–290.
Tourism Malaysia. (2018). Tourists arrivals. Retrieved from http://mytourismdata.tourism.
gov.my/?page_id=14#!from=2012&to=2018
Yusoff, S. Z., & Adzharuddin, N. A. (2017). Factor of Awareness in Searching and Sharing of
Halal Food Product among Muslim Families in Malaysia. In SHS Web of Conferences
(Vol. 33, p. 00075). EDP Sciences.

106

Proceedings of the 3rd International Language & Tourism Conference 2019,
Sustaining Global Development Goals through
Language, Education and Tourism

Kulliyyah of Languages and Management, International Islamic University
Malaysia, Pagoh Edu Hub, Malaysia 18th-19th October 2019

FOODHUNTER.APPS: A GEOSPATIAL MOBILE AND SOCIAL MEDIA
APPLICATION FOR FOOD TOURISM

Noraqila Aiman Abu*1 and Abdul Rauf Abdul Rasam2

1Centre of Studies for Surveying Science and Geomatics, Faculty of Architecture
Planning and Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA Shah Alam, Selangor, Malaysia.

(E-mail: *[email protected], [email protected])

ABSTRACT
Food tourism is one of the popular sectors that connecting people around the world.
Nowadays, due to the emerging technology era, people tend to rely on using their smart
phones as a guide to do something or go somewhere. Some of existing Malaysian tourism
websites are limited choices in terms of useful geographic information and interesting
interfaces, and therefore FoodHunter.Apps is developed to be more accessible, user friendly
and flexible platform to users in Johor. The main aim of the study is to design and develop
a geospatial mobile application that can guide users to find the best restaurant around
Johor Bahru in a geo-interesting tourism. Three main objectives are set in the study:
i) to conduct user assessment for getting public respondents the proposed apps, ii) to
design and develop the apps and iii) to assess the apps performance from selected
respondents. System Development Life Cycle (SDLC) and Android Studio used to develop
the apps. The results of this FoodHunterApps are fascinating where 82.9% of the
respondents agreed to develop a geospatial mobile platform for a user-friendly Johor
tourism information system. FoodHunterApps could be used in deciding which restaurant is
the best by looking at the rating, price, reviews and other features that related. The apps
also demonstrated its functional practicality in searching food information in the study area.
Keywords: FoodHunterApps; Food Tourism; Geospatial; GIS; Mobile Apps

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1. INTRODUCTION

Tourism is one of largest, dynamic and attractive tool for economic development
specifically in the developing countries. Malaysia has countless popular area to experience
variety of amazing holiday destination. There are numerous of wonderful places in this
country such as highest mountain, fascinating islands and marine park, incredible tropical
rainforest, National Parks, caves and other places that capable to catch billions of tourists
eye every single year. Furthermore, multicultural and races in Malaysia also offers many
festivals and events to make Malaysia vacations remain exciting throughout the year.
Therefore, Malaysia has become the centre of tourist attraction and citizen should take the
opportunity to explore and visit every state in Malaysia.

This is where a perfect apps is so significant for the user to experience travelling without
using or tied to any travel agencies. To create an apps is easy nowadays, but the question
is how it really helps to solve users desire. The original word for abbreviation "Apps" is an
"application." It is a piece of software that can be use online or even offline through a
computer, phone, tablet or any other devices. Apps may or may not have a connection to
the internet. The apps is a modern take on the word software or application. Therefore, you
probably only hear it in reference to a mobile apps or a small piece of software that's
running on a website. It is typically used to describe anything that is not a full-fledged
software program (Marziah, 2017).

Several new trends and technology factors will shape the future of tourism mobile
application. The tourism industry is using apps to reach the next level of user engagement
and market penetration. Hence, with big data and machine learning, tourism applications
are bound to be smarter and cleverer. More sophisticated travel application will now be
custom-made based on user travel routes, time, budget and means of transport.

From travel history, preferences, and feedback, these apps will be able to recommend and
plan better trips for users. Travel application can enhance the user experience by offering
localized suggestions and deals or offers to travellers based on their location and
preferences.

Nowadays, tourism is one of the biggest sectors and fastest development growth in most
country. Tourism industries become one of main contributor to Malaysia’s incomes. Based
Department Statistics Malaysia, in 2016, 26.76 Million arrivals were recorded which
represented over RM 82.1 Billion worth of receipts. the Tourism Malaysia's survey also
showed that Johor had remained as one of the top three states having the highest number
of overnight tourists in Malaysia last year".

Since there are too many choices to get to know the places, travel agencies come out with
the solution where they offer an affordable price to attract the traveller. Unfortunately,
there are some irresponsible parties that took advantage of this situation by tricking them
while promoting the offer. Therefore, a traveller nowadays prefers to go travel by
themselves rather than take a travel agent. This study demonstrates the capabilities of GIS
mobile application to design and develop a food tourism information system in Johor

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Bharu. The following objectives need to be achieved to develop the application that can
guide user to find the best restaurant around Johor Bahru.

a. to conduct user assessment of the proposed mobile application of Johor’s Restaurant
Information System.

b. to design and develop the proposed application using Android Studio and GIS
cartography.

c. to assess the proposed application performance according to selected respondents.

2. REVIEW ON GEOMOBILE APPLICATIONS IN FOOD TOURISM AND TRAVEL

Tourism is an important activity that shaping our world trend in mobilization. Tourism
offers social, cultural and environmental benefits that add to its attraction. Tourism is
argued to contribute to the well-being of tourists by giving them restorative holidays that
fulfil many human needs (World Tourism Organization WTO, 1999). Travel and tourism
have developed as one of the most significant sectors which incorporates many features
of information society such as globalization, mobility and information richness. Tourist can
be come from all nations, social rank, and professions. Tourism links a worldwide supplier
community with consumers, equally distributed worldwide. It is also a physical and virtual
network that enable worldwide travelling which bringing together very distant cultures and
habits (Sevrani & Elmazi, 2008).

Food also a fundamental element of the tourist experience. Yet it is such a critical part of
the experience that become a recent year subject of study. "Food Tourism" is includes
the food carts and street vendors as much as the locals-only (gastro) pubs, dramatic
wineries, or one of a kind restaurant (What Is Food Tourism, 2018). The tourism is being
used more effectively to brand national and regional foods. This may create further
demand when they return to their home countries. Promotion of the interrelationships
between food and tourism should continue to be a vital component of the place
marketing and development. This may develop the mix rural places in countries as around
the world as well to thrive the global food and tourism environment of the twenty-first
century.

The fast growth of information technology (IT) has had huge impact on travelling and the
tourism sector in general. The uses of IT to market tourism is making it happen seamlessly
when there are no issues on transmitting the information in time or the links breaking
down and not working correctly. This is where e–tourism start to introduce to the world.
As part of improving its competitiveness, the tourism industry needs to create the ideal
tourist service which should act as a one-to-one service, in the preferred language, be
available 24 hours per day and every single day for the entire year, with customized,
constantly up-to-date information and flexible services.

Nowadays mobile devices are more present in our daily lives than ever before. It is a

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must and become an important factor in modern travel behaviour. The popularity of
mobile devices is getting higher and higher. The number of mobile applications growing
rapidly as much as the mobile device. This bring up the IT companies to put more effort
on developing mobile applications for people to enjoy the convenience that could be
bring. In addition, the existing of internet facilitate the uses of mobile device in accessing
browser from anywhere and anytime. These conveniences greatly improve the quality of
our life (Zhiming, 2016)

Mobile computing systems and hardware are changing the way mobile mapping
technology is being used by moving GIS from the desktop into the user’s hands, providing
flexibility in data acquisition, data accuracy and integrity which validation in real-time
reducing errors and process costs. Then, more information with much less time and
effort, faster communication protocols, and high productivity, making the mobility an
enticing aspect of GIS. GIS mobile is also a handheld device that connected with internet
that shows the direction of heading to. To make it more accurate, the user’s location
information receives through GIS, ICT and GPS system to get the position and help to
navigate to the destination (Hu & Weng, 2016; Hammery & Wasson, 2015; Freire & Painho,
2014; Kato et al., 2013; Sabuka, 2012; Liu, 2002). It will download the map information and
trace the movement of the user (Eriksson, 2013).

3. METHODOLOGY

Several stages have been conducted as explained in System Development Life Cycle
(SDLC) in order to achieve the objectives and expected outcomes of the study. The overall
methodology of developing the application using Android studio is portray in Figure 1.
There are 7 major steps that need to be taken in order to achieve the results. First is
discovery or also known as research which involving need assessment. Second is finalize
the concept after the first step is done. Third step is sketching the wireframe where the
decision and the idea is organized. Next is selection of the theme and ensuring the
suitability and overall User Interface (UI) is in order and good appearance. This step also
requires the planning on how the entire button does is function and the back-end of the
coding is connected to the server. The fifth step is ensuring the coding is organize and
corelated to the front-end. This step also involves the Application Programming Interface
(API) integration base setup, which is Java, Android SDK and Gredle.

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Figure 1: Android apps development (Wodehouse, 2017).

As to measure the achievement of the application, thorough quality assurance (QA)
testing is up next. Run the apps on the phone to testing screen by screen to ensure that
there are no bugs, and everything works smoothly. Debug the application with the
Android Device Monitor and tools available in the SDK. Lastly, the final phase which is an
apps release by assemble a release-ready Application package (APK). However, a Google
Play Publisher Account is required before a Developer Account can be register. Publishing
is the process that makes this apps available to end users which in the Google Play Store.
But this is an optional phase it depends on the apps either ready to be published or not.

Since the back-end need to be connected to the database to save all the data, the server
can be from the open source. For this application, Firebase is selected to be the storage
which all the database related to the application are stored. However, there are limitation
using this open source which the storage available up to 1GB only. So, the application has
to be minimalized. This is one of the challenges for this application.

3.1 User Need Assessment

Need assessment is the most imperative thing in the development of GIS application. A
need assessment is a systematic look at how the mapping and spatial data of the tourism
area needed to make the application become more systematic. By conducting
questionnaire, which is involving 42 respondents, all the information needed is collected in
order to aid the development of the application. The decision making of narrowing the
scope and knowing the limitation can be identified after getting the results. The
questionnaire was created using google form. (https://docs.google.com/forms/)

111

This method is the simplest way to conduct questionnaire because it does not have to meet
target user face to face. Just send the link via text massage or WhatsApp to get them to
response. Next is Information extract that is the most crucial part where the data collection
or information about the restaurant is retrieve from the reliable sources. Other steps are
Selection of Software and Hardware, Setting Up Software and Hardware.

3.2 Apps Design and Development

For this design phase, it is a process to initiate a design that could satisfies the application
requirements. The concepts and design are clarified here where it also related to the next
step which is development phase. In addition, the structure system is deliberated before
the next phase is continued. The main steps include creating storyboard design, user
interface, system structure, logo and others.

In this phase, the application that chosen from analysis phase is constructed and codified.
Then, the application that being develop from the logical design phase are transformed into
digital coding version which technology details is implemented with the aid of specified
tools to form a physical design phase. The application needs to be a prototype or output
from the system. The specific tasks in this stage are Programming Java and XML, and
Database Construction.

3.3 Apps Testing and Deployment

Right after system development have been done, system testing is ready to take place. For
assessing the performance of the application, system testing is performed to analyse the
efficiency of the application. This phase is a crucial process in the development of this
project. This phase is very important because this process able to detect errors that
unintended to be in the programming. The error generated sometime because of human
error such as lack of experience, carless and misunderstood about the program. This system
testing will be focused on few operations that have been considered to carry out such as:

a. The clear information display for the restaurant.
b. The functionality of review box for the restaurant.
c. The functionality of the rating star given for the restaurant.
d. The Google Maps connection by clicking just one button.

System development is the last phase that need to be performed as mentioned in SDLC’s
figure. This is where the application is ready to be distributed to the target respondent to
get their feedback on how does this application function and how does the respondent
react to this application. The method used to get the feedback is the same as the first
questionnaire.

4. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

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This section describes the results of the study and analysis in every part start from the
questionnaire until the end of the system testing. The goal of this study is to build a mobile
application that can guide the user to find the best restaurant around Johor Bahru. The
element of this apps was depending on the demand of the respondent.
4.1 User Requirement on the Proposed System
User assessment is conducted to know what their interest, so that the apps can be
developed by considering all the respondent need in their preferred apps. In general, from
42 respondents of all states in Malaysia, most of the respondents come from Sarawak and
Selangor, they are totally agreed that they like to travel. Thus, Figure 2 shows the
respondent voting for interesting activity that they like. The highest voting 71.4% is food
hunting, this is where the decision of making apps for food tourism is make. This also part
of the limitation of this project, only focusing on restaurant or food centre in Johor Bahru.
Interestingly, 82.9% of the respondents agreed that, they use a mobile apps to go to travel.
Therefore, this study suggests that the best medium need to be introduced and developed
(FoodHunterApps) to introduce Johor tourism in more effectively platform.

Figure 2: Respondent activities and preferences.

While in Figure 3 illustrates the element need to be considered in adding the features to
display in the apps. Top three of the element chosen by the respondent are map, entrance
fee and reviews and rating. There some element that have been cross out
because of irrelevant to put in this study such as entrance fee, accommodation, promotion
and discount. Since the apps is about food of the restaurant, so the entrance fee is
considered as an average cost of the food. 38.1% of the respondent are strongly suggested
to share they experience through social media and 31% said maybe which also have some
possibilities that they want to share. Therefore, a share link button to the social media
would be an addition features in the apps.

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Figure 3: Proposed elements in the mobile apps.
4.2 Design and Application of the FoodHuntersApps
This section describes the story board, system structure and main interface design of the
apps. The storyboard is used as a guideline for the .xml design in the Android Studio. The
storyboard is sketch and drawn using AI and PowerPoint. Figure 4 shows the design of login
and registration page, three main activity in the tab of the application. This page will display
right after credential is successful login. While the sidebar or navigation drawer is just a
miscellaneous or added feature to this application that can be found by sliding the screen
from left to the right.

Figure 4: General story board of the apps: login, registration page and contents.
System structure and data storage is using cloud – based server is important in this mobile
apps. All information about the user is stored in the Firebase database such as user
authentication, restaurant information, and location sharing. The credential that have been
used in login is based on unique email and password. Figure 5 shows the simple structure
of this mobile application.

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Figure 5: Structural application of the proposed apps.

Creating a database need to be in structured to ensure that the database created in a proper
way and follow the rules in saving data in Firebase. Figure 6 shows the sample of the
database that have been created for List of Restaurant. The data are saved in a correct way
when there is a unique id in each of the list of restaurants. The unique ID that display is
called as a parent. Next after parent is call as children. The other database is attached in
the appendices.

Figure 6: Firebase database structure in the apps.
Another detailed function of the apps is its possible applications in food tourism. In this

115

phase, the application that chosen from analysis phase is constructed and codified. Then,
the application that being develop from the logical design phase are transformed into
digital coding version which technology details is implemented with the aid of specified tools
to form a physical design phase.

The application needs to be a prototype or output from the system. The requirement
to develop the application need to be specify with the correct coding and techniques.
Java is selected language for this application. Thus, it requires knowledge to integrate the
coding to manage the application. On top of that, the design of realistic storyboard is
generated through Extensible Markup Language (XML) which is a markup language that
defines a set of rules for encoding documents that both human and machine readable in
format file. Android Studio aids the users by creating an official website which is
https://developer.android.com/studio. For Login and Registration Page, the
application’s name is FoodHunter and the logo can be seen in the very top of the screen in
the figure. It is clearly showing the simple login page for the user and registration page.
This apps has shown a little identity by showing the Johor’s flag in the design as a
promotion of the state. The theme of the design is using two colour combination which is
red and sky blue. The background was design by combining several vectors from the
internet and the results. In Homapge, there are two different layouts in the homepage.
First is navigation drawer or sidebar layout and secondly is tab layout. On the sidebar, there
will be another page that relate with the user’s activity. The sidebar is just a miscellaneous
or added feature to this apps.

While in the tab layout, it will interact with the database and also Google Location to check
on the restaurant. The homepage contains tab layout as shown in Figure 7. There are 3 sub-
activity in this page. The first tab is call as Recommended fragment, which listing the highest
rating of restaurants to the user. All uploaded picture, details and reviews of the restaurant
is display. The next tab is call as Category fragment where to find food by category. Last but
not least, Points fragment, that it shows the user’s collection of point.

Figure 7: Recommended fragment and points fragment 116
in the apps.

4.3 Application Testing and Deployment of the FoodHuntersApps
In this part, the application has been running through the testing and deployment. The
questionnaire has been distributed to get the feedback from the respondent. The Figure 8
until Figure 10 show the result of the feedback. Based on the feedback, 66.7% agree that
they quite impressed with the User Interface. While the registration process is 83.3% as
they are agreed that the process of registration is not hard at all.

Figure 8: User impression on the apps.

Figure 9: Registration process on the apps.

Figure 10: Satisfaction on the apps.

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5. CONCLUSION

FoodHunterApps is designed to make users more enthusiastic in discovering fabulous food
around Johor Malaysia. This is because of the collecting points activity that may lead the
users to be a good food review. In addition, this apps can also be the guidance for the tourist
from oversea to find attractive local food in Johor. This application a quite user- friendly
platform because of the simple user interface and ease-to-understand application. This also
one of the initiatives to promote the tourism activity in Johor. Since Johor have an official
website for tourism, this application is an additional option for the tourist to discover more
about the state specially to enhance the functionality of the promotion for the local food
tourism. On top of that, this application indirectly may also help in improve the seller’s
business. At the same time, this also can benefit to the overall economic in Johor. Not only
that, it also an alert for the sellers to keep their standard or quality because of people will
give rating and reviews about their restaurant. If people start to complaint, it will affect the
name and reputation of the restaurant. The respondents agree to rate the overall function
is 3 (moderate), and it can be concluded that the application needs more improvise before
it being publish practically with more feedbacks from expert’s opinion.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Noraqila Aiman Abu is a postgraduate student in specialism of built
environment (Geospatial Big Data Analytics). She completed her BSc. in Surveying Science
and Geomatics, UiTM Shah Alam, Malaysia. [email protected]. Foodhunter.Apps:
A Geospatial Mobile and Social Media Applications for Food Tourism.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT: The authors would like to thank to the Faculty of Architecture,
Planning and Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA (UiTM), Selangor, Malaysia for
supporting this study.

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120

Proceedings of the 3rd International Language & Tourism Conference 2019
Sustaining Global Development Goals through Language, Education and Tourism
Kulliyyah of Languages and Management, International Islamic University Malaysia,

Pagoh Edu Hub, Malaysia 18th-19th October 2019

IDENTIFYING MUSLIM YOUTH TRAVELLERS’ PERSPECTIVES ON THE
ATTRIBUTES OF SHARIAH COMPLIANT HOTELS

Muhammad Hariz Irfan Hamdan*1, and Siti Salwa Md Sawari2
1, 2 Department of Tourism, Kulliyyah of Languages and Management, International

Islamic University Malaysia, Johor, MALAYSIA.
(E-mail: *[email protected], [email protected])

ABSTRACT
Sharia Compliant Hotel is one of the new emerging concepts and innovative services in
Islamic tourism specifically in hospitality industry. This concept focuses more on the Muslim
travellers and countries in providing services needed by Muslims. However, the concept is
still at the initial stage and thus, more research is required because most of the people are
still confusing with the Sharia terms especially the hotel owners. This research aims to
recognise the Muslim youth traveller’s perceptions towards Shariah Compliant Hotel
attributes. The data was collected using questionnaires which were distributed to 269
undergraduate students from Kulliyyah of Languages and Management (KLM), International
Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) and it was analysed using SPSS software. The findings
showed that most of the respondents agreed that facilities were the most important
attribute in Sharia Compliant Hotel. From these findings, it is recommended for students to
take appropriate actions to experience and understand more about the Shariah compliant
hotels. Further research should be conducted in other areas and among students of
different universities using random sampling procedure.

Keywords: Tourism; Motivation; Youth; Behaviour

121

1. INTRODUCTION

Malaysia is one of the popular destinations among Muslim tourists who come from foreign
countries especially Middle East (Othman et al., 2015). Various Islamic countries are being
involved with Islamic concept which are influenced from the growing number of Muslim
population from 1.6 billion in 2010 to 2.2 billion by 2030 (Economist, 2011). Malaysia is one
of the countries that wants to be part of popular Islamic tourism destination in the world.
Malaysia consists of multiple races and religions, which adopts new planning and
implementation for Islamic tourism in many important products and services particularly in
Sharia compliant accommodation such as hotels and resorts. Moreover, this would become
a new source of revenue for economic and infrastructure development for Malaysia tourism
sector.

Recently, as the number of Muslim has increased globally, this has become a sign for
other cooperate tourism sectors to prepare and cater the demand of all Muslim travellers
at the same time to offer more tourism products and services according to Islamic
requirements. Sharia compliant hotel is one the best examples that has been developed
to fulfil the needs of this growing market. The Ministry of Tourism and Culture has
announced that Malaysia would promote Muslim market, collaborate with many
organisations as well as different parties such as Islamic Tourism Centre and International
Islamic University Malaysia, and become an important member of Organisation of Islamic
Countries by conducting programs and events such as World Islamic Conference in Kuala
Lumpur in 2008 and hosting the first OIC Global Islamic Tourism Conference and Exhibition
in 2008 (Shafaei & Mohamed, 2015).

Islamic concept is very wide and it does not have any exact or specific definition.
However, according to the World Tourism Organization (WTO), “Tourism comprises the
activities of people travelling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for
not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes”. Henderson
(2010) stated that “Islamic tourism is the product development and marketing efforts
designed for and directed at Muslims. Besides, Ala-Hamarneh (2011) defined Islamic
tourism as “an economic, cultural and religious (conservative) concept”. Another definition
refers to every type of tourism excluding those which contradict with Islamic values
(Shakiry, 2006). Generally, it could be understood that Islamic tourism comprises the
Islamic principles and relates to tourism products and services in management for the
purposes of satisfying and delivering experiences to tourists. Most of the tourists were
Muslims. For instance, some of Sharia compliant hotels adopted the Islamic principles to
fulfil the demand of Muslim as well as Non-Muslim tourists. Hence, Islamic tourism is seen
as one of the most important earning in Malaysia economic development as long as there
is continuous improvement in products and services specifically for Muslim tourists and
other tourism components such as facilities, transportation, food and beverage and so on.
Overall, this study focuses on identifying the attributes of Sharia Compliant hotel based on
Muslim youth travellers’ perspectives.

122

2. LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 SHARIAH COMPLIANT IN HOSPITALITY INDUSTRY

This part will elaborate the overview of Shariah Compliant, Shariah Compliant aspects that
have been discussed in previous study and the attributes of Shariah Compliant hotel.

2.2 OVERVIEW OF SHARIAH COMPLIANT

Abdullah (2010) defined Shariah Compliant which comes from an Arabic word as the ‘way’
or ‘path’ that referred to both, the Islamic system of law and the totality of the Islamic way
of life as Shariah deals with many things including politics, economics, banking, business,
family, sexuality, hygiene and social issues. The word ‘Shariah’ usually refers to law that
derives from religious aspect which is the Quran and the Sunnah as the main sources of
Islamic law. In general, compliance means conforming to a rule, such as specification,
policy, standard or law. Shariah law prohibits anything which is against the Islamic teaching
such as gambling, drinking alcohol, eating prohibited animals and so on. Shariah law
determines what is Halal (acceptable) and what is Haram (unacceptable). This also applies
when Muslims travel to anywhere where they should obey the Shariah law. Ahmad (2000)
highlighted that the activities which are in accordance with the Shariah law must be based
on four philosophical foundations; tawhid, rububiyyah, khilafah and tazkiyyah.

According to Al Sari (2010), Shariah Compliant aims to fulfil basic human necessities which
are religion, life, property, intellect and posterity. Therefore, it can be concluded that
Shariah compliant basically comprises all aspects of human life that a person must have for
a perfect life. When applying to the tourism and hospitality industry, it provides basic needs
for Muslims as well prohibits anything that is against Islamic principle. Furthermore,
Shariah Compliant in hospitality deals more with financial matters and investment where
the whole operation should follow the Shariah (Ibrahim et al., 2015). In Islam, travelling
does not only focus on performing Hajj and Umrah but also for many purposes such as
education, medical and so on, so that Muslims can develop their mind and ponder Allah’s
creations for their own benefits. Overall, Shariah Compliant does not only focus on law,
education and economy but it also gives attention to tourism and hospitality as well.
However, Muslim Friendly and Shariah Compliant are two different concepts. According to
Islamic Tourism Malaysia, Muslim Friendly refers to products or services in travel and
tourism industry guided by Shariah law that cater or provide facilities for Muslim travellers
such as Musolla and prohibit alcohol or any illegal activities which are against Islamic rules.
In contrast, Shariah Compliant in hospitality is more clearly defined which refers to any kind
of activities that must follow what have already stated in Sharia principle. It provides
suitable facilities not only for Muslims but also for the whole operation in tourism and
hospitality industry.

123

2.3 SHARIAH COMPLIANT ASPECTS

There were very limited studies related to Shariah Compliant in tourism industry as it is still
at the early stage and further research is needed. In general, Shariah Compliant refers to
investment and financial matters that have been mentioned earlier. It also focuses on law
aspect which guides any action to refer to the Quran and the Sunnah of Prophet
Muhammad SAW which are the main sources of Islamic law. In Malaysia tourism industry,
Shariah Compliant is still in progress under Islamic tourism development to attractMuslim
tourists from the Middle East (Samori & Sabtu, 2014). On the other side, Muslim-Friendly
in the hospitality industry has been implemented in Muslim countries including Malaysia
to provide basic facilities and necessities for Muslim travellers such as prayer room
(musolla), qiblat, Quran, gender segregation and Halal food consumption.

2.4 SHARIAH COMPLIANT ATTRIBUTES IN MALAYSIA CONTEXT

The demanding of Islamic tourism keeps increasing nowadays among travelers due to
availability of Halal products and Shariahh compliant practices. (Mahamod, al, 2015).
More efforts have been done by government and private sector in promoting Malaysia
as Islamic Tourism destinations such as Islam Hadhari or Islamic Civilization which has
been introduced by previous Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi, The Halal
Master Plan, Establishment of Islamic Tourism Centre (ITC) by Tourism Malaysia in 2009
and hosting the first OIC Global Islamic Tourism Conference and Exhibition and World
Islamic Conference in Kuala Lumpur (Shafaei & Mohamed, 2015).

Islamic banking and investment already well-established in Malaysia has been provided
for all people as they were not focusing on tourism and hospitality sector but more
toward business purposes. Islamic Spa concept is also being introduced with the emerge
of Shariah Compliant in Malaysia. (Othman et, al. 2015). The other concept such Halal
Food and basic facilities such musollaa, qiblah, Quran and so on already exist in many
hospitality services such hotels to cater Muslim travellers but these only fulfil the Muslim-
Friendly concept as has been mentioned earlier even there is none proper standard to call
Shariah Compliant to any tourism and hospitality in term of certification, guideline or
related to it in Malaysia except to those services which been classified. The current
investigation found that Malaysia is now focusing to implement Shariah Compliant hotels
concept in fulfilling demand of Muslim tourists.

3. METHODOLOGY

The research was conducted using quantitative data. The data was collected through
online surveys, face-to-face surveys and WhatsApp application. This method was used to
help explain and elaborate the quantitative results. The research population consisted of
900 undergraduate students from KLM, IIUM who were from four different courses;
Tourism Planning and Hospitality Management, English for International Communication,
Arabic for International Communication and Malay for International Communication.
Through sampling method, this research was conducted to 269 undergraduate students

124

from KLM, IIUM to represent the Muslim youth travellers. This study used Krejcie and
Morgan’s (1970) purposive sampling method. This method was selected based on the
characteristics of the population and the objectives of the study. It is also known as
judgmental, selective or subjective sampling.

3.1 INSTRUMENT FOR DATA COLLECTION

Survey questionnaires on Muslim youth travellers were distributed to IIUM
undergraduate students which consist of Shariah Compliant hotel attributes and students’
perceptions towards it. There were four sections which were; Section A: Demographic
Data, Section B: General perception towards halal certification, Section C: Shariah
compliant hotel attributes and Section D: Analysis of Muslim youth perspectives.

4.0 FINDINGS

For data collection, 269 undergraduate students of IIUM were purposely selected as a
sample of this study. The respondents were chosen from different courses which were KLM
in Tourism, English for International Communication, Arabic for International
Communication and Malay for International Communication. In terms of gender, the
percentage of male respondents was 22.4% (N=60) while the percentage of female
respondents was 77.7% (N=209). The demographic characteristics of respondents are
presented in Table 1.

Table 1 Demographic Characteristic of Students based on gender

Variable Frequency Percentage (%)

Gender 60 22.3%
Male 209 77.7%
Female 269 100%
Total

4.1 THE MUSLIM YOUTH TRAVELLER’S PERSPECTIVES TOWARDS THE ATTRIBUTES OF
SHARIAH COMPLIANT HOTEL

Analyses were carried out to find out the answer to the second research question. Table 2
shows the Muslim youth traveller’s perspectives towards the attributes of Shariah
compliant hotel. This section covers five items which are food and beverage, facilities,
finance, interior design and operation. Table 4.6 shows the result of the study.

Firstly, for food and beverage item, most of the respondents were agreed or strongly
agreed with the statements ‘the hotel must prohibit alcohol drink’, ‘the hotel must be Halal
and have Halal certificate including food preparation’, ‘the hotel does not contain Najis
according to Shariah law’ and ‘the hotel should be safe from consuming harmful
substances such as poison’. 56.3% (N=152) of the respondents were strongly agreed that
the hotel must prohibit alcohol drink whereas 181.1% (N=29) of the respondents were

125

agreed. Most of the respondents were strongly agreed that the hotel must be Halal and
have Halal certificate including food preparation which was 69.9% (N=188) while only 1.1%
(N=3) of them disagreed. For the statement ‘the hotel does not contain Najis according to
Shariah law’, 72.1% (N=194) of the respondents were strongly agreed, 19.3% (N=52) were
agreed and 0.7% (N=2) were strongly disagreed. For the statement ‘the hotel should be
safe from consuming harmful substances such as poison’, 74.3% (N=200) of the
respondents were strongly agreed, 5.2% (N=14) were neutral and only 3.0% (N=8) were
strongly disagreed.

The second item highlighted about the facilities. The finding showed that 74.3% (N=200)
of the respondents were strongly agreed that the hotel must provide basic necessities and
facilities for Muslims such as prayer room, Quran in every room, qiblah and so on while
0.4% (N=1) were strongly disagreed. Besides, 65.1% (N=175) of the respondents were
strongly agreed for gender segregation of hotel facilities, 20.8% (N=56) of them were
agreed and only 7.8% (N=21) were neutral. On the other hand, 69.9% (N=188) of the
respondents were strongly agreed that the hotel must emphasis on the convenience of
location for facilities and only 0.4% (N=1) disagreed and strongly disagreed.

In terms of finance, the finding revealed that 67.3% (N=181) of the respondents were
strongly agreed that all hotel financial system should follow the Islamic system, while
19.0% (N=51) were agreed and only 0.4% (N=1) were strongly disagreed or disagreed. For
the statement ‘the hotel financial system must follow zakat principles’, 55.4% (N=149) of
the respondents were strongly agreed and 27.5% (N=74) were agreed. For ‘the hotel must
prohibit conventional insurance’ statement, 54.6% (N=147) of the respondents were
strongly agreed, 14.1% (N=38) were neutral and only 0.4% (N=1) of them were strongly
disagreed. The number of respondents who were strongly agreed that ‘the hotel must
prohibit stockbroking’ was 52.0% (N=140), followed by 26.8% (N=72) who were agreed with
the statement and 18.6% (N=50) were neutral. Furthermore, 50.6% (N=136) of the
respondents were strongly agreed, 26.8% (N=72) were agreed and 18.2% (N=49) were
neutral for the statement ‘the hotel must prohibit share trading in non-Shariah compliant
securities and companies’.

Lastly, for interior design item, 46.1% (N=124) of the respondents were strongly agreed,
30.9% (N=83) were agreed, 17.8% (N=48) were neutral, 2.6% (N=7) were strongly
disagreed and disagreed that the hotel must have larger function room to segregate male
and female travellers. Besides, majority of the respondents were strongly agreed (63.6%
(N=171)) that the hotel should have qiblah marker in the room to indicate the direction of
Mecca while 1.1% (N=3) of the respondents were strongly disagreed. Apart from that,
57.6% (N=155) of the respondents were strongly agreed, 21.2% (N=57) were agreed, 16.7%
(N=45) were neutral, 3.0% (N=8) were strongly disagreed and 1.5% (N=4) were disagreed
that the hotel should ban improper entertainment. For the statement ‘the hotel art should
be conservative’, 43.5% (N=117) were strongly agreed and 26.8% (N=72) were agreed while
only 3.0% (N=8) were strongly disagreed and 2.6% (N=7) were disagreed. For the statement
‘the interior design of the hotel toilet and bed should not be placed in the qiblah direction’,
63.2% (N=170) were strongly agreed, 18.2% (N=49) and only 3.3% (N=9) respondents were
strongly disagree. Furthermore, 55.8% (N=150) of the respondents were strongly agreed

126

that the arts in the hotel should not depict the human, animal or any form that are against
the Islamic rules, while only 0.7% (N=2) were disagreed and 14.5% (N=39) were neutral.

In terms of operation, the study revealed that 34.2% (N=92) of the respondents were
strongly agreed that the majority of the hotel staff should be Muslims, while 27.1%
(N=73) were agreed, 24.5% (N=66) were neutral, 9.3% (N=25) were disagreed and 4.8%
(N=13) were strongly disagreed. For the statement ‘The hotel should place female staff at
the female floor and male staff at the male floor’, 43.9% (N=188) of the respondents were
strongly agreed, 27.9% (N=75) were agreed and 18.6% (N=50) . On the other hand, 39.0%
(N=105) of the respondents were strongly agreed, 32.0% (N=86) were agreed and 4.1%
(N=11) were strongly disagreed that the television shows and services should be
conservative. Lastly, for the statement ‘the hotel staff should wear proper attire and cover
their aurah’, 53.2% (N=143) were strongly agreed and 24.2% (N=65) were agreed, while
only 3.7% (N=10) were disagreed and 1.5% (N=4) were strongly disagreed.

Table 2: The Muslim Youth Traveler’s Perspectives Towards Shariah Compliant Hotels in
Attributes

Item SDA DA N A SA M SD
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5)

Food and Beverage

1. The hotel must prohibit 12 14 43 49 152 4.1 1.14
alcohol drink
73
4.4% 5.2% 15.9 18.1 56.3
%%%

2. The hotel must be Halal - 3 20 58 188 4.6 .676

and have Halal 0

certificate including food

preparation. - 1.1% 7.4% 21.6 69.9

%%

3. The hotel does not 2 3 18 52 194 4.6 .728

contain Najis according 1

to Shariah law.

.7% 1.1% 6.7% 19.3 72.1
%%

4. The hotel should safe 8 6 14 41 200 4.5 .919
6
consumption from

harm such poison, toxic

and 3.0% 2.2% 5.2% 15.2 74.3
hazardous. %%

Facilities

1. The hotel must provide 1 - 18 50 200 4.6 .634
7
basic necessity

amenities and facilities

127

for Muslim such prayer

room, Quran in every

room, qiblah and etc.

.4% - 6.7% 18.6 74.3
%%

2. The hotel facilities must 9 8 21 56 175 4.4 .991
1
cater for specific

gender and separate

for male and 3.3% 3.0% 7.8% 20.8 65.1
female. %%

3. The hotel must 1 1 13 66 188 4.6 .631
emphasis's on the 3

convenience of location

for facilities.

.4% .4% 4.8% 24.5 69.9

%%

Financial

1. All the hotel financial 1 3 33 51 181 4.5 .780
2
system must be

financed through

Islamic financial

arrangement.

.4% 1.1% 12.3 19.0 67.3
%%%

2. The hotel financial 1 4 41 74 149 4.3 .820
system
must follow zakat 6

principles.

.4% 1.5% 15.2 27.5 55.4
%%%

3. The hotel must prohibit 1 5 38 78 147 4.3 .819
conventional insurance.
6

.4 1.9% 14.1% 29.0% 54.6%

4. The hotel must prohibit 1 6 50 72 140 4.2 .868
stockbroking.
8

.4 2.2% 18.6% 26.8% 52.0%
%

5. The hotel must prohibit 5 7 49 72 136 4.2 .957
2
share trading in non-

Shariah compliant

securities and
companies
. 1,9 2.6% 18.2% 26.8% 50.6%
%
Interior Design

1. The hotel must have 7 7 48 83 124 4.1 .979

larger function room to 5

128

cater male

and female separately 2.6 2.6% 17.8% 30.9% 46.1%

%

2. The hotel should have 3 2 21 72 171 4.5 .766
1
marker in the room

indication direction

towards

Mecca. 1.1 .7% 7.8% 26.8 63.6

%

3. The hotel should be 8 4 45 57 155 4.2 .995
9
banning improper

entertainment such as

night clubs

3.0 1.5% 16.7% 21.2% 57.6%
%

4. The hotel art should 8 7 65 72 117 4.0 1.02
conservative
54
3.0 2.6% 24.2% 26.8% 43.5
%

5. The hotel toilet and bed 9 14 27 49 170 4.3 1.06
should not be placed in 37

the 3.3 5.2% 10.0% 18.2% 63.2%
direction of Mecca %

6. Arts in the hotel shall 10 2 39 68 150 4.2 .994

not depict the human 9

form and animals or

any form that against

the Islamic rules

3.7 .7% 14.5% 25.3% 55.8%
%

Operation

1 . Majority of staff Hotel 13 25 66 73 92 3.7 1.15

shall be Muslim 79

4.8% 9.3% 24.5 27.1 34.2
%%%

2. The hotel should 9 17 50 75 118 4.0 1.08
37
monitor female staff

only female floor and

male staff for male

floor 3.3% 6.3% 18.6 27.9 43.9
3. The hotel must be %%%

11 17 50 86 105 3.96 1.095

conservative tv show

and services

129

4.1 6.3 18.6 32.0 39.0
%% % % %

Overall, it can be seen that among the attributes of Shariah compliant hotel, Muslim youths
have chosen facilities above others with the mean value of 4.570, followed by food and
beverage (mean=4.484), finance (mean=4.345), interior design (mean=4.269) and
operation (mean=3.996). Nevertheless, all these attributes are important to be highlighted.

Table 3: Overall Muslim Youth Traveler’s Perspectives Towards Shariah Compliant Hotels
in Attributes

Attributes Std Deviation Mean Rank
Food and Beverage .591 4.484 2
Facilities .589 4.570 1
Financial .730 4.345 3
Interior Design .739 4.269 4
Operation .889 3.996 5

In conclusion, this study discovered that most of the respondents agreed with all Sharia
compliant hotel attributes in terms of food and beverage, facilities, finance, interior design
and operation. It has proven that Henderson’s (2010) theory was aligned with the
respondent’s perspectives where Sharia compliant hotels should follow provided standard
or guidelines. This result also agreed with Ahmad, et al. (2013) which focused on customer
awareness and acceptance of Sharia compliant hotel. The study concluded that most of the
customers begin to accept Shariah concept and practices as long as the hotels give positive
insight on it. However, Shariah compliant hotels that offer Islamic attributes were unknown
due to the lack of publicity. Customer acceptance level will be highly influenced by their
awareness of the concept and practices (Ahmat et al., 2012). Perhaps, Malaysian
government, especially the Ministry of Tourism and Culture could implement extensive
strategies to promote Shariah Compliant hotel concept and practices in its policy making,
practice, and information as these could provide a niche to the country’s tourism industry.

5.0 CONCLUSION

The current research revealed that most of the students had high level of perspectives
toward Shariah compliant hotels regarding Halal certification. Five important Islamic
attributes are food and beverage, facilities, finance, interior design and operation.
Generally, all the respondents were strongly agreed and agreed through all Halal
certification and attributes. From these findings, it is recommended for students to take
appropriate actions to experience and understand more about the Shariah compliant
hotels. Further research should be conducted in other areas and among students of
different universities using random sampling procedure.

130

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Muhammad Hariz Irfan Hamdan currently is final year student at Kulliyyah Languages and
Managment, International Islamic University Malaysia, Pagoh Edu Hub Malaysia. Majoring in
Tourism Planning Hospitality and Managment. Title of paper is identifying Muslim youth
travellers’ perspectives on the attributes of shariah compliant hotels

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131

Proceedings of the 3rd International Language & Tourism Conference2019
Sustaining Global Development Goals through
Language, Education and Tourism

Kulliyyah of Languages and Management, International Islamic University Malaysia,
Pagoh Edu Hub, Malaysia 18th-19th October 2019

INTERNATIONAL ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY MALAYSIA (IIUM) STUDENT’S
ACCEPTANCE ON VIRTUAL REALITY (VR) AS A TOURISM MARKETING TOOL

Nuraliah Atika binti Mohd Tukit*1 and Nur Hidayah Abd Rahman2

1, 2 Department of Tourism, Kulliyyah of Languages and Management, International Islamic
University Malaysia, Pagoh Edu Hub, Muar, Johor.

(E-mail: *[email protected], [email protected])

ABSTRACT

Youths are very vulnerable to the rapid development of technology specifically on students.
The presence of varieties online applications that can be downloaded on their smartphone
have exposed them to the latest technology especially in Virtual Reality (VR) technology.
Hence, Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) is applied in this study in order to understand
the factors that influencing student’s acceptance in Virtual Reality (VR). Technology
Acceptance Model (TAM) is an assessment to predict use and acceptance of information
systems and technology by individual user. Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) consists of
seven elements which are Perceived Ease of Use (PEOU), Perceived Usefulness (PU),
Perceived Enjoyment (PENJ), Interest (INT), Personal Innovative (PI) Accessibility (ACC) and
Anxiety (ANX). This study aims to determine the most influence variable using Technology
Acceptance Model (TAM) on student’s acceptance. This study is a quantitative study with
questionnaires and online survey as the instrumentation in collecting the data. There are
100 students of International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) as the respondents of this
study from three different campuses, which are Gombak, Kuantan and Pagoh campus. The
result of this study displays that the most influence variable in Technology Acceptance Model
(TAM) is Perceived Enjoyment (PENJ) while the least influence variable is Accessibility (ACC).
This study highlights on the enhancement of the potential to revolutionize the promotion
and selling of tourism from tourism player specifically marketer on how to market and
promote their destination or product by implementing Virtual Reality (VR) technology in
their tourism product and service. Therefore, with the implementation of the new
technological advancement in tourism and hospitality industry able to boost up the industry
not only to the government but also service provider that generate the benefit by applying
Virtual Reality (VR) technology in their business as part of the marketing tool.

Keywords: Students’ acceptance; Virtual Reality (VR); Technology; Marketing Tool;
Technology Acceptance Model (TAM)

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1. INTRODUCTION

Technology in tourism and hospitality industry is crucial nowadays due to the consumption
of the internet every day in our daily life. Virtual Reality (VR) technology is a growing
application that attract the attention of the practitioners and expertise in tourism and
hospitality because this application really helps them to enhance the customer satisfaction
and increase the number of visitor of their destination. VR technology is defined as a
technology which are allowing the user to interact, experience touch a computer simulated
environment whether that environment is a replication of the real world or an imaginary
one in the past, future or present which has been mentioned by Guttentag (2010) and
Mandal (2013). The implementation of VR technology in tourism destination is due to a
great potential for destination promotion because of the immerse sensations it can offer
and the ability to communicate in a long distance and experience feels.

However, marketing is one of the most widely used to promote Virtual Reality (VR)
technology, and plays a key role in tourism and hospitality industry. Marketing is defined
as a management activities and decision aimed at successfully addressing opportunities
and risk in a progressive environment, actively signing and distributing the needs-
satisfactory product proposition to the user in a manner to achieve the goals of the
industry, user and community mentioned by Cronje et al. (2007). In addition, Prideaux, B.
(2002) explained that the contribution of Virtual Reality (VR) technology to market a
destination has an extensive ability due to the potential to transform the promotion and
selling of tourism destination.

Virtual Reality (VR) technology is newly discovered in Malaysia, however other countries
for instance London, Paris, North Korea had already discovered this advanced technology
in the past few years. For instance, museum or any other cultural sites have implemented
the VR technology since museum is the preferable destination to test the popularity of the
potential special exhibition, and a tour company mentioned by Guttentag (2008). Xiang,
Mangini and Fesenmaier (2015) explained that to enhance youth to come to museum by
the integration of VR technology in museum seem effective. In general, students are more
active and involved in travel planning than past generations since they are interested in
using a variety of instruments to seek travel information. Thus, VR can help convey
experiences, increase awareness and purchase intention described by (Huang et al 2016;
Klein 2003). Young people or students prefer computer application which for delight in
learning and VR technology presents opportunity to experience environment which for
reasons of time, distance, scale and safety would not otherwise be available to many youth
mentioned by Mumtaz (2001). Therefore, International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM)
students were chosen as their target respondents. The aim is to understand the student’s
acceptance of Virtual Reality (VR) technology as a marketing tool among International
Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM) by adopting the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM).

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2. LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 VIRTUAL REALITY (VR) IN TOURISM INDUSTRY

Strickland (2007) described that the Virtual Reality (VR) technology experience should
include three dimensional images that appear to be life-sized from the user’s perspective,
and the ability to track user’s motions, especially the head and eye movements, and adjust
the image on the display images to reflect the changes in perspective. In addition, Virtual
Reality (VR) based on a three-dimensional, stereoscopic head-tracker displays, body
tracking and binaural sounds. It is also known as, multi-sensory, immersive experience. An
effective VR causes the user to become unaware of the real surroundings and only focus
on the existence in the virtual environment. Nonetheless, Virtual Reality (VR) is the illusion
of involvement in a synthetic environment rather that environment mentioned by M.
Gigante (1993)

2.2 MARKETING TOOL

Marketing or promotion is an everyday activity and it should be done comprehensively in
order to succeed. Morrison and Alastair M. (2013) explained that the success of destination
marketing may also be influenced by groups outside of Destination Marketing Organization
(DMO), the organization must collect and handle the efforts of all the parties involved in
order to accomplish the great result. In recent years, there has been an increasing interest
in Virtual Reality (VR) technology as a marketing tools in destination marketing due to the
rise number of user of the technology among youth. Marketers are now designate their
attention and marketing cost to inbound promotion tactics to make sure that changes have
occured in user behaviour. Virtual Reality (VR) technology is basically one of the digital
marketing where using all kinds of information and communication (ICTs) in destination
marketing.

2.3 PREVIOUS STUDY IN VIRTUAL REALITY

Several studies have been done related with this study, but most of the countries such as
Austria, Paris, New York and others have implemented this technology but there is a small
number of the study specifically in Malaysia. Virtual Reality (VR) technology is an artificial
environment, that revitalices real-world experiences mentioned by Guttentag (2010). In
protecting heritage, Virtual Reality (VR) technology offer realistic experience without
jeopardizing and destroying heritage site and allows visit to sites with sensitive
environments or situations not suitable for crowds. The study in Malaysia has been done
by Kamarulzaman and Siang (2014) entitled Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR)
Reality Combination as a Holistic Application for Heritage Preservation in the UNESCO
World Heritage Site of Melaka is focusing more on the museum itself. This study
emphasized on the combination of Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) which
able to give an alternative form of access to threatened heritage sites and objects that

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lessen the impacts of visitors’ overcrowding but at the same time heighten the overall
experience of the tourist when they visit to museum around Melaka.

Other than that, a study entitled Virtual Reality (VR) in destination marketing is one of the
example study that has been done by Tiusanen (2017). Marketing planning, market
research, market segmentation, marketing strategies and marketing control and evaluation
are the main parts of the role of Destination Marketing Organization (DMO) in tourism. The
aim for this study is to find out how Virtual Reality (VR) and its role in destination marketing.
Thus, it shows that Virtual Reality (VR) technology can truly be a trend and mainstream
technology in destination marketing to boost up the tourism industry as well as to generate
income to the local community.

2.4 TECHNOLOGY ACCEPTANCE MODEL (TAM) OF VIRTUAL REALITY (VR)

Technlogy Acceptance Model (TAM) was introduced by Davis (1989) and this model is used
to determine the acknowledgement of technology and information systems by individual
users. This model has been implemented widely in different studies that examine the
individual technology acceptance behaviour in different system constructs. Technology
Acceptance Model (TAM) it is a complicated interaction of intellectual and passionate
procedures that contributes to the approval or dismissal of modernization by
understanding recognition as a favorable reactive of an concept, in the context of effective
readiness explained by Guttentag & D. A. (2010). Davis (1989) stated that there are two
main elements in TAM which are Perceived Usefulness (PU) and Perceived Ease of Use
(PEOU). Therefore, Disztinger et al. (2017) has modified and extended this model by
including other independent variables such as Perceived Enjoyment (PENJ), Interest (INT),
Personal Innovativeness (PI), Accessibility (ACC) and Technology Anxiety (ANX). It has been
widely used model to help understand and explain user behavior in an information system.
Therefore, the TAM was adopted as the guideline to achieve the main purpose of this study
which is to understand factors that influencing IIUM students’s acceptance on Virtual
Reality (VR) as a marketing tool. Thus, this study is applying the Technology Acceptance
Model (TAM) as an assessment to determine the most influential variable using Technology
Acceptance Model (TAM) on IIUM student’s perception on Virtual Reality (VR) as a
marketing tool.

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Figure 1: Framework of the study

3. METHODOLOGY
Google Form is the instrumentation for data collection in this study and there are two
sections in the questionnaire which are Section A and Section B. The items was measured
in multiple choice questions (nominal) for Section A and Likert scale ranking in Section B
(ordinal). In Section A, it involves of the demographic profiling of the respondents in order
to perceive the background of the respondents and its interrelation with the questionnaire.
Section B contains of the items related with the variables on VR technology and consists of
seven variables in order to understand the student’s acceptance of IIUM students on VR
technology as a marketing tool.
The current total population of IIUM students is 26,000 (as of December 2018). According
to Krejcie and Morgan (1970), the sample size for population over 20,000 should be 377.
However, Hair et al. (2016) explained that minimum sample size should be at least 100
respondents. Thus, 100 respondents of IIUM students have responded in order to
understand the student’s acceptance on VR technology as a marketing tool. The sampling
technique used in this study is convenience sampling using snowballing approach, where
the link of the online questionnaire were distributed to friends who are currently studying
in IIUM Gombak, Kuantan and Pagoh via Whatsapp, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. The
collected data has been coded and analysed by using IBM Statistical Package for the Social
Sciences known as (SPSS) 25th version and Microsoft Excel 2013 for descriptive analysis

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and rank the most influence variables using statistical technique for instance frequency,
percentage and mean.

4. MAIN RESULTS

The variables of TAM were then tested to determine the level of acceptance of IIUM
students on VR as a marketing tool. The items were constructed into questionnaire and led
to a new information on the acceptance of the IIUM students towards Virtual Reality (VR)
technology. The profile of the respondents is shown in Table 1 and the results of TAM for
IIUM students is shown in Table 2. As shown in Table 1, the female respondents contribute
to the highest percentage of 68% (N= 68) with the age group of 23-27 years old. Most of
the respondents were Malaysian with 98% (N=98), and 95% (N=95) of the respondents
were bachelor’s degree student.

Table 1: Profiles of the respondents

Label Indicator Frequencies Percent
Gender Male 32 32%
Nationality Female 68 68%
Age Malaysian 98 98%
Non-Malaysian 2 2%
Level of Education 18-22 years old 38 38%
23-27 years old 60 60%
28-32 years old 1 1%
33-37 years old 1 1%
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) 3 3%
Master’s Degree 2 2%
Bachelor’s Degree 95 95%

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Table 2: TAM for IIUM students

CODING ITEMS MEAN

PENJ1 PERCEIVED ENJOYMENT (PENJ) 4.1300
PENJ2 I think this technology is an enjoyable system 4.38
PENJ3 4.09
PU3 I believe that the actual process of using this technology is
PU2 pleasant to use 3.92
PU1 Virtual Reality (VR) technology would be compatible to use 3.8833
PEOU2
PEOU1 PERCEIVED USEFULNESS (PU) 4.01
PEOU3 Virtual Reality (VR) technology is an effective system 4.01
PI3 3.63
PI1 Virtual Reality (VR) technology would be convenient to use 3.8133
PI2 4.16
Virtual Reality (VR) technology is an accessible to access
INT3 4.03
INT2 PERCEIVED EASE OF USE (PEOU)
INT1 I think that Virtual Reality (VR) technology is an applicable 3.25
PENJ1 system 3.7967
PENJ2 I believe that Virtual Reality (VR) technology is an easy to
PENJ3 use 3.93
Virtual Reality (VR) technology is complicated system
ACC1 3.88
ACC2 PERSONAL INNOVATIVE (PI)
ACC3 I would like to learn more about computer-based methods 3.58
such as Virtual Reality (VR) technology
I am curious about using computer-based technologies such 3.2700
as Virtual Reality (VR) technology 3.49
I already had an interest in computer-based technologies 3.18
such as Virtual Reality (VR) technology system
INTEREST` 3.14
I keep myself informed about technological advances 3.2000

I always try to stay up-to-date with the latest technology 3.37
such as Virtual Reality (VR)
I often aware when a new device is launched 3.28

ANXIETY (ANX) 2.95
I often worry about being overwhelmed by new technology
such as Virtual Reality (VR) technology 3.1467
I think that making a mistake when using the Virtual Reality 3.35
(VR) scares me
I am distrustful of new technical devices such as Virtual 3.23
Reality (VR) technology 2.86
ACCESSIBILITY (ACC)
I think Virtual Reality (VR) technology is basically accessible
to everyone
I find Virtual Reality (VR) technology is easy to acquire

I think that almost everyone can afford Virtual Reality (VR)
technology

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The ranking was established and constructed in descending sequence to analyse which
factor has the most influence among IIUM students. Table 2 shows that the ranking of the
variables in descending order to identify which variable has the most significance to this
study. The highest ranking is contribute from Perceived Enjoyment (PENJ) with 4.13
followed by the Perceived Usefulness (PU) with 3.88. This indicates the IIUM students
agreed that VR technology is a technology that enjoyable and pleasant to use as a
marketing tool. The third ranking is received Perceived Ease of Use (PEOU) with 3.81 where
IIUM students believed that Virtual Reality (VR) technology is eased to use at any time or
anywhere. The least significant variable is accessibility that influences IIUM students due
to the affordability and the accessible of the technology to the other age range.

For Perceived Usefulness (PU), IIUM students had believed that using a particular system
would enhance their motivation towards travelling. Moreover, majority of the respondents
agreed that VR technology and they are positively influences the interest by aware with a
new device is launched and stay up-to-date with the latest technology. The respondents
had agreed that they are personally well informed about new technological advances and
they want to learn more about the computer-based methods such as VR technology. On
the other hand, majority of the respondents had disagreed that VR technology is not
affordable to obtain due to the physical accessibility, even though VR technology might be
expensive to buy. However, in terms of information accessibility, the respondents strongly
agreed that VR technology would be beneficial for them. IIUM student perceived that they
are overwhelmed and distrustful on using new technology like VR technology because they
felt that VR is complicated system.

5. CONCLUSION

This study was conducted to understand of the student’s acceptance of Virtual Reality (VR)
technology as a marketing tool among International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM).
Furthermore, this study help to provide a better understanding to the researcher about the
most influential variable using Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) on IIUM student’s
perception on Virtual Reality as a marketing tool. Thus, Virtual Reality (VR) technology is
well known technology among IIUM student’s and able to attract youth especially to
tourism destination that least visitors such as museum, historical building and others.

The limitation of this study is due to the integration of Virtual Reality (VR) into the tourism
sector remain a limited amount of existing research has directly examined. Other than that,
the respondents of this study were only focused on IIUM student’s only. Future research
might widen the population of the study from IIUM student’s to all youth in Malaysia and
the outcome of that study able to strengthen the understanding about Virtual Reality (VR)
technology as a marketing tool not only focusing on the destination but it also comprises
of everything in tourism industry.

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Virtual Reality (VR) technology is increasing in popularity and capability, and with this, the
implications for hospitality and tourism industry will evolve. As an emerging topic of
interest, many have considered the possible ways Virtual Reality can boost the industry
forward. The current Virtual Reality (VR) technology does not appear to offer significant
challenges to the demand to visit real places, and in fact offers enhanced opportunities for
marketing. But as the technology evolves in the coming years, tourism destinations and
operators would be wise to ensure there are compelling reasons to actually visit the real
place, and promote the distinctions from other experiences that may be replicated in the
virtual world. Though many examples have been identified in this paper, however, it is
difficult to truly predict yet how consumers will adapt to the usage of VR technology in
tourism industry.

In conclusion, it is shows that with the implementation of the new technological
advancement in tourism and hospitality industry able to boost up the industry itself but
also the producer or service provider can gain the benefit by applying Virtual Reality (VR)
technology in their business as part of the marketing tool.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT: I am most indebted to by, Dr Nur Hidayah Binti Abd Rahman, whose
enduring disposition, kindness, promptitude, thoroughness and friendship have facilitated
the successful completion of my work. I put on record and appreciate her detailed
comments, useful suggestions and inspiring queries which have considerably improved this
paper.
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