Microsoft Word 2007 ichrie conference Proceedings Final-Final 06-06-07. doc

CONCLUSIONS 
Past literature suggests that the consumers’ self (involving their preferred personality dimensions) has an 
influence over their perception of a brand’s personality, provided that they have a strong preference for the brand. 
This empirical research showed that self-congruity development with a preferred tourism destination brand could 
also be built based on the tourists’ efforts in developing a relationship with the destination brand.
The findings from this research relied on only one tourism destination brand. A variety of different 
destination brands would most certainly help to improve the generalizability of the research findings. The research 
showed that the preferred personality of the individual (relating to the “self”) has an influence over the perceived 
personality of their preferred brand. But it does not tell us which aspect of the self (actual self, ideal self, private self 
and public self) is responsible for this self-congruity with a preferred destination brand. This provides an opportunity 
for further research to test which is actually preferred by an individual. 

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