Children in Tourism

Children represent a significant proportion of the world’s population. Children and families form the most important emotional bonds in society, and it is these social relationships that often drive demand and supply in tourism. Recently, there has been increasing attention on the tourist experiences of children, families, and intergenerational wellbeing. However, there is dearth of research on family-related dimensions of tourism businesses and host-children studies. Although it is estimated that 19 million children are engaged in the tourism industry, our knowledge of child labour issues is limited. The subjective dimensions of tourism impacts on host-children have been overlooked along with the role of children in family entrepreneurship.

This Research Topic focuses on children’s roles, as economic and social actors, by proposing a child-inclusive/ childist approach to tourism. This is part of a broader social justice agenda, which is critical in tourism research to privilege children’s rights, their participation, and wellbeing.

This research topic focuses on children’s roles in tourism by proposing a child-inclusive/ childist approach. It seeks empirical and conceptual contributions that offer significant contributions to knowledge on topics including, but not limited to:

- Child-labour in tourism
- Children in tourism family entrepreneurship
- Host-children in tourism destinations
- Children's tourism experiences
- Children and wellbeing in tourism
- Childism in tourism
- Children in social tourism
- Child sex tourism
- Inclusive methodology for children in tourism
- Children in field work
- Ethics of researching children in tourism