The Impact of Rural Tourism Entrepreneurs' Hometown Identity on Entrepreneurial

Fuhua Xiang ^*

• Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China

The persistence of rural tourism entrepreneurs is critical to rural destinations' sustainable development, especially in the post-COVID-19 world. Yet the factors driving entrepreneurial persistence in the rural tourism context remain under-researched. The purpose of this paper is to examine the factors that shape the persistence of rural tourism entrepreneurs. Given the communityembedded nature of rural entrepreneurship, this study approaches the formation of entrepreneurial persistence from a hometown identity perspective. The theory of planned behavior was adopted to build a theoretical model depicting the associations among hometown identity, attitude, subjective norms, perceived behavioral control, and entrepreneurial persistence. The model was then tested using questionnaire data from three rural tourism destinations in Guizhou Province, China. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was then carried out to test the effects in the theoretical model. Results revealed that hometown identity indirectly affected entrepreneurial persistence through attitude and perceived behavioral control. Additionally, hometown identity moderated the relationship between subjective norms and entrepreneurial persistence. This paper offers new insights into the persistence of rural tourism business owners in their entrepreneurial efforts. Additionally, the findings provide valuable guidance for rural tourism destination managers as well as rural tourism entrepreneurs.