Antecedents to Consumers’ Green Hotel Stay Purchase Behavior during the COVID-19 Pandemic: The influence of green consumption value, emotional ambivalence, and consumers’ perceptions

When traveling for tourism purposes during the COVID-19 pandemic, some consumers might want to stay at green hotels because of these products' images and practices. At the same time, these green establishments also need consumer support to remain in business once the virus is under control. This study explores green hotels' challenges and opportunities by examining the factors that contribute to consumers' green hotel stay purchase behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic. A total of 429 participants completed questionnaires, and the answers revealed that consumers' perceived health risks and green hotels' perceived persuasiveness can affect their emotional ambivalence that, in turn, can affect their green purchase behavior of hotel stays. Furthermore, the relationship between emotional ambivalence and purchase behavior can be moderated by consumers' green consumption values. The findings of this research contribute to the tourism literature and green product consumption research. In addition, implications for green hotel practitioners are discussed.


Introduction
The global economy and society have been affected by the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic since it was first reported during the winter of 2019 (WHO, 2020). The tourism and hospitality industry has been seriously affected due to policies implemented with the aim of suppressing the spread of the virus, such as traveling restrictions and quarantine requirements (BBC, 2020a). For example, the economic output of the UK's hospitality sector in 2021 was down by 21% from that of 2019 (Hutton, Irvine, & Foley, 2022). Furthermore, industry experts suggest that the tourism and hospitality industry might be negatively affected for an extended period even after the virus is controlled, as consumers' confidence and financial resources might take longer to recover (BBC, 2020a(BBC, , 2020b. On the other hand, with vaccine programs rolling out in some countries, such as the UK and the USA, consumers might consider traveling again for tourism purposes (Huang, Shao, Zeng, Liu, & Li, 2021;Jiang & Wen, 2020). Experts have forecasted that the UK's domestic tourism market will increase by 65% in 2021 over 2020 (Visit Britain, 2021). This development will affect hotels and other accommodation service providers in the UK because >25% of domestic UK tourists' spending is related to overnight trips (Visit Britain, 2021).

Sustainable tourism and green hotels
In addition to contributing to the economy and society, the hospitality and tourism industry has impacted the natural environment (Han, Hsu, & Sheu, 2010;Kim & Han, 2010;Vrontis, Christofi, Giacosa, & Serravalle, 2022). Streimikiene, Svagzdiene, Jasinskas, and Simanavicius (2021) showed that tourism industries contribute approximately 8% of global carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. For this reason, the concept of sustainable tourism has received additional attention from policymakers, practitioners, and researchers since the 1990s (Bramwell, Higham, Lane, & Miller, 2017;Trišić et al., 2021). The World Tourism Organization defines sustainable tourism as tourism institutions and activities that take into account its current and future impacts (e.g., economic, social, and environmental), addressing the needs of consumers, the industry, the environment, and host communities (Martin, Rivera, & Gutierrez, 2020;Zhang & Chan, 2020).
Within the concept of sustainable tourism, the green hotel sector might warrant additional attention because the establishments in this sector have programs to mitigate their negative influences on the environment (e.g., Chen & Peng, 2012;Han et al., 2010;Kim & Han, 2010). The concept of green hotels can be traced back to the idea of green management, which is attributable to the public's increasing awareness of global resource depletion, environmental protection, and ecological conservation (Lee & Cheng, 2018). Because of this development, the popularity of green hotels among consumers and researchers has increased since the early 2000s (Yadav, Balaji, & Jebarajakirthy, 2019). According to Chen and Peng (2012), a green hotel is an environmentally friendly lodging property that follows ecologically sound programs and practices. As of Summer 2021, 465 UK hotels and inns have received certification for their sustainable practices from the Green Tourism Business Scheme, and another 105 hotels are waiting for their applications to be reviewed (Green Tourism, 2022). This scheme is validated by Visited Britain and accredited by the International Centre for Responsible Tourism (Dunk, Gillespie, & MacLeod, 2016;Green Tourism, 2022;Jarvis, Weeden, & Simcock, 2010).
Although green hotels were positively perceived by some consumers prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, research has suggested that environmentally friendly tourism and hospitality products have become more popular than conventional tourism and hospitality products during and after the COVID-19 pandemic (Cai, Xu, & Gao, 2021;Huang et al., 2021;Jiang & Wen, 2020;Wang, Wang, Zhang, Jebbouri, & Wong, 2022). This expected popularity stems from the fact that more consumers are expected to place a higher value on products that contribute to sustainability and promote harmony between the natural environment and themselves (Jiang & Wen, 2020). Twenty-eight percent of UK adults agree that they value the environment more than they did before the pandemic (Alexander, 2022). Balaji, Jiang, and Jha (2019) pointed out that it is important that hotels accommodate public sentiment by formulating more eco-friendly strategies and practices.
On the other hand, reports have shown that green hotels are often more expensive than other hotels, and many UK consumers' financial situations have been negatively affected by the COVID-19 pandemic (Alexander, 2022;Hutton et al., 2022). The situation can be challenging for green hotel practitioners and worth additional research because these businesses' survival depends partially on consumers' willingness to purchase their services (Berger, 2019;Griskevicius, Tybur, & Van den Bergh, 2010;Maté-Sánchez-Val & Teruel-Gutierrez, 2022;Peng, 2020).

Gaps in the literature
Researchers have been studying COVID-19's influences on the tourism and hospitality industry (e.g., Foroudi, Tabaghdehi, & Marvi, 2021;Peng & Chen, 2021;Shin & Kang, 2021;Yu, Seo, & Hyun, 2021); however, opportunities for further research exist. First, there is a gap in the hospitality and tourism literature regarding consumers' decisions to purchase tourism and hospitality products during highly uncertain times and/or times that can be perceived as risky (Li, Wen, & Ying, 2018;Peng, 2020;Peng & Chen, 2021). Protection motivation theory can be used to explain consumers' decisions to change their buying behavior (e. g., Peng, 2020;Peng & Chen, 2021;Wong & Yeh, 2009); nevertheless, few research frameworks have been proposed and tested by studies that adopted this theory. Additional research into the factors that lead consumers to change their purchase behavior can be beneficial for the existing tourism and hospitality literature.
Second, the tourism and hospitality literature can benefit from additional research into how consumers process conflicting emotions. On the one hand, some consumers might want to participate in overnight trips because of the benefits these trips can offer. On the other hand, hospitality services sometimes require consumers to be in an enclosed environment with other customers and service staff, which increases the likelihood that they will contract the virus (BBC, 2020a;Chen, Peng, & Hung, 2015). For this reason, some consumers might experience conflicting emotions. Such research could be important for understanding consumer behavior during the pandemic because service providers will need to inform and persuade consumers to visit their premises (e.g., hotels) when the pandemic has been partially controlled. The heuristic-system model can be a suitable model for understanding this issue, as this model is used to study how individuals process information through different routes (Akhtar, Sun, Chen, & Akhtar, 2020;Book, Tanford, & Chang, 2018;Ruiz-Mafe, Chatzipanagiotou, & Curras-Perez, 2018). However, more emphasis can be placed on the influence of negative information and contexts other than reacting to online reviews (Book et al., 2018). Consumers' actual behavior, rather than behavioral intentions, after exposure to conflicting information can also be further investigated.
Third, green product consumption studies have shown that consumers who purchase green products regularly might share certain personal values (Berger, 2019;De Silva, Wang, & Kuah, 2021;Khan & Mohsin, 2017), but Gonçalves, Lourenco, and Silva (2016) suggest that the literature can further address green product consumption from the perspective of values. De Silva et al. (2021) proposed that consumers' consumption values (i.e., value-for-money consciousness, environmental consciousness, and status consciousness) have the ability to moderate their decision to purchase remanufactured products. Nevertheless, their findings can be further examined because remanufactured products are not the same as green products despite having green benefits. In addition, electronic goods have different characteristics than services because the latter are mainly intangible and last a short period of time (De Silva et al., 2021;Peng, 2020;Peng & Chen, 2019a).

Research objectives, originality, and potential contributions
To narrow the gaps in the literature, this research proposes a framework for examining the factors that contributed to UK domestic tourists' green hotel stay purchase behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic. This research has the following objectives. First, it examines how consumers' emotional ambivalence can be affected by the health risks associated with the COVID-19 pandemic. Second, this research aims to investigate how consumers' emotional ambivalence can be affected by the perceived informativeness and persuasiveness of green hotels' information on their health and wellbeing practices regarding COVID-19. In addition, the influence of emotional ambivalence on consumers' green hotel stay purchase behavior is tested. Third, the ability of consumers' green consumption values (i.e., value-formoney consciousness, environmental consciousness, and status consciousness) to moderate the impact of emotional ambivalence on purchase behavior is explored.
In terms of originality and contributions, this research is one of the few studies to explore the factors that contribute to consumers' green purchase behavior of hotel stays by focusing on their emotions and how they process information. The results might add incremental value to tourists' consumption behavior during uncertain and risky times. In addition, this research might shed new light on the opportunities and challenges faced by green hotels during the COVID-19 pandemic. For this study's theoretical implications, by adopting protection motivation theory and the heuristic-systematic model, this research proposes and empirically examines a conceptual model that predicts tourists' decisions to purchase green hotel stays during the COVID-19 pandemic. The results obtained through this study could assist hotel practitioners with helping consumers lower their emotional ambivalence and stimulating their buying behavior.

Key research on the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic on the hospitality industry
As presented earlier, some research has been conducted on the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic on the hospitality industry; therefore, connecting this study with prior works highlights the distinctiveness of this research and can contribute to the discussion of how green hotels can sustain themselves during uncertain times. The purpose of this section is to highlight and synthesize the work that is most relevant to the current research.
Among the scholars who have studied consumers' buying behavior for hospitality products, the work conducted by Akhtar et al. (2020), Peng and Chen (2021), and Shin and Kang (2021) is most relevant to the current research. Peng and Chen (2021) used protection motivation theory to study diners' restaurant reservation session abandonment behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic. They suggested that consumers are motived to protect themselves, such as not finishing their online reservation sessions, when the buying decision is perceived as dangerous, including dining out when the infection rate is high. After analyzing 408 diners' responses, Peng and Chen (2021) contributed to the literature by confirming that protection motivation theory can be applicable to the understanding of consumer behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, further research on this theory is still needed because Peng and Chen (2021) assumed that consumers would find dining out during the pandemic to be risky but did not examine the impact. Akhtar et al. (2020) adopted a heuristic-systematic model to examine consumers' attitude ambivalence when exposed to conflicting online hotel reviews. After analyzing 476 tourists' responses, these authors confirmed that the persuasiveness and informativeness of the message can significantly affect tourists' attitudes. The framework in Akhtar et al. (2020) is important to the present research because it also focuses on consumers' online evaluations of hotels. Nevertheless, the transferability of their model to this research context remains to be examined because how consumers evaluate online hotel reviews might be different from how they evaluate hotels' COVID-19-related health and safety measures due to the potential severity of catching the COVID-19 virus.
To understand consumers' perception of risk during the COVID-19 pandemic, the work by Shin and Kang (2021) is important. They focused on consumers' perception of health risk and how to lower hotel consumers' perceived health risk through technology devices. After three experimental studies, they identified the antecedents to consumers' perceived health risks. The key influence of Shin and Kang (2021) on the present study is their testing of the perceived health risk variable and relevant measurement items. They confirmed that this variable is reliable and valid when applied in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic but also suggested that future studies should focus on a specific type of hotel and incorporate variables that are not related to technology innovation.
Because this research focuses on green hotel stay purchase behavior, the influences of consumers' consumption values need to be taken into account. De Silva et al. (2021) conducted a comprehensive study on this topic. By studying 956 UK and Chinese consumers' responses, these authors confirmed that personal consumption values (i.e., value-formoney consciousness, environmental consciousness, and status consciousness) can moderate UK consumers' remanufactured product purchase intentions. The work in De Silva et al. (2021) is significant to this study because of its focus on the UK's contexts and remanufactured products, which also offer green benefits such as from green products; nevertheless, whether their results can be applicable to service-based, green product consumption decisions during risky and uncertain times remains to be investigated. After this discussion of prior works that have a significant impact on this study, the following sections present in a structured and logical manner this research's overarching theory, main research framework, and its important factors.

Overarching theory-protection motivation theory
This research draws on protection motivation theory as its overarching theory. This theory has been used to examine individuals' likelihood of engaging in protective behavior when exposed to a risky decision-making process or a decision that has highly uncertain outcomes (Peng, 2020;Roger, 1975). According to Roger (1975) and Maddux and Rogers (1983), individuals will have the motivation to protect themselves from risks and harms arising from several stages in the decision-making process. They will evaluate the severity of the risk, the likelihood of the risk being realized, and the ability of the potential protective behavior to mitigate the risk.
Subsequent studies have adopted and expanded this theory for different contexts, including marketing communication, tourism research, and hospitality studies (e.g., Gallopel-Morvan, Gabriel, Gall-Ely, Rieunier, & Urien, 2011;Peng, 2020;Peng & Chen, 2019b;Wong & Yeh, 2009). The relevant framework of protection motivation theory has been expanded by different researchers, but its central proposition remains: consumers are likely to engage in protective behavior when making a consumption decision that is risky and/or has a highly uncertain outcome. Protection motivation theory applies to this research context because some consumers might consider staying at hotels, including green hotels, during a pandemic to be risky; therefore, they might want to engage in protective behavior despite the availability of vaccines, and these hotels are open for business (Culbertson, 2021;European Medicines Agency, 2021;Zimmer, Corum, & Wee, 2021).

Research framework-the heuristic-systematic model
To support protection motivation theory, this research adopts the heuristic-systematic model as its main research framework. The heuristic-systematic model, which was proposed by Chaiken (1980), is a model that focuses on how individuals receive and process information by considering the impact of feelings and thoughts (Kim, King, & Kim, 2016;Zhang, Zhao, Cheung, & Lee, 2014). This model has been applied to consumer research, including research on hospitality services, tourism products, sustainable apparel, and e-cigarettes (Katz, Erkkinen, Lindgren, & Hatsukammi, 2018;Kim, Lee, & Yang, 2015;Ruiz-Mafe et al., 2018;Shi, Gong, & Gursoy, 2020).
Among the studies adopting the heuristic-systematic model, Akhtar et al. (2020) research is relevant to this study, as it examines consumers' evaluation of online reviews of hospitality products. Akhtar et al. (2020) test and confirm the effect of reviews' perceived informativeness and perceived persuasiveness on consumers' ambivalence. The reason is that when evaluating information, individuals will use cognitive effort, such as review informativeness, as well as noncontent-related informational cues, such as review persuasiveness (Chaiken, 1980;Zhang et al., 2014). In the context of this research, which aims to examine consumers' green hotel stay purchase behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic, whether hotels' information regarding their steps to mitigate the influence of the COVID-19 virus is accurate (i.e., informativeness) and/or convincing (i. e., persuasiveness) might be an important factor in consumers' emotional ambivalence.
Based on the work by Ruiz-Mafe et al. (2018), informativeness in this study refers to consumers' cognitive perception of whether the information provided by green hotels in their attempt to mitigate the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic is accurate, complete, consistent, and adequate, and persuasiveness refers to consumers' affective perceptions of the degree to which such information is convincing, reliable, and relevant. Emotional ambivalence refers to the occurrence of incompatible emotions when consumers consider making a green hotel stay reservation (Huang, Korfiatis, & Chang, 2018;Schmalz & Orth, 2012). This factor might be significant when hospitality services are open for businesses even though the spread of the COVID-19 virus might not be fully stopped. Regarding the consequences of emotional ambivalence, this research focuses on consumers' purchase behavior, which is measured by the number of nights that consumers reserved with a hotel and the cost of their reservations (Chen & Peng, 2012).
In addition to green hotels' perceived informativeness and perceived persuasiveness, this research suggests that consumers' perception of health risk might need to be incorporated into our model. In studies on the COVID-19 pandemic's influences on the consumption of hospitality and tourism products (Foroudi et al., 2021;Peng & Chen, 2021;Shin & Kang, 2021), researchers have found that consumers' perception of risk is an important factor. This factor is particularly significant when consumers have insufficient information about the product and/or seller, such as hotels' health and safety measures against the COVID-19 virus (Chen & Chang, 2012;Peng, 2020). Among the different types of risks associated with consuming tourism and hospitality products, Shin and Kang (2021) suggest that the effect of perceived health risk on consumers can be further investigated because of the COVID-19 virus's impact on an individual's health and wellbeing. In this research, perceived health risk refers to consumers' perception of the impact of contracting the COVID-19 virus as a result of staying in green hotels during the COVID-19 pandemic (Shin & Kang, 2021).

Green consumption values-value-for-money consciousness, environmental consciousness, and status consciousness
To examine consumers' green hotel stay purchase behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic, this study also considers the influence of green consumption values. The study of green consumption values is rooted in the field of psychology and the literature on personal values (De Silva et al., 2014;Sheth, Newman, & Gross, 1991). Consumption values can be seen as consumers' tendency to express their beliefs through their consumption behavior (Haws, Winterich, & Naylor, 2014). Researchers have suggested that consumers' consumption values are important factors that can affect their product purchase behavior, including their purchase of green hotel stays, electronic goods, and fashion items (Gonçalves et al., 2016;Itani, Kassar, & Loureiro, 2019;Wang, Wang, Wang, Yan, & Li, 2018;Yan, Keh, & Wang, 2021).
The concept of consumption values is applicable to the study of green product consumption because individuals tend to view environmental issues, such as global warming and climate change, differently, partially depending on their beliefs and values (Yan et al., 2021). In addition, their behavior is sometimes guided by their beliefs and concerns with regard to how human activities can affect the natural environment (Gonçalves et al., 2016). When examining British and Chinese consumers' environmentally friendly behavior, De Silva et al. (2021) evaluated the moderating roles of three green consumption values: valuefor-money consciousness, environmental consciousness, and status consciousness. Haws et al. (2014) suggest that researchers identify green product-related consumption values when investigating consumers' decisions to purchase green products. The reason is that these values can better reflect the alignment of resource conservation at the personal level with societal benefits through consumers' green behavior compared to values that have been applied to the consumption of general products.
Based on the works by the aforementioned researchers, this study explores how these green consumption values might moderate consumers' hotel stay purchase behavior. In this research, environmental consciousness measures consumers' desire to protect and conserve the environment through the products that they consume (De Silva et al., 2021). Status consciousness refers to consumers' drive to signal their status and wealth by purchasing conspicuous products (De Silva et al., 2021). Value-for-money consciousness can be defined as consumers' concern for paying low prices, subject to some quality constraints (Lichtenstein, Netemeyer, & Burton, 1990).

Hypotheses
Based on the literature reviewed and the research gap identified, this study proposes its framework (Fig. 1). The first hypothesis of this research is that perceived health risk positively influences emotional ambivalence. Previous studies have shown that consumers' perception of risks can positively affect their emotions and subsequent behavior toward tourism products and hospitality services (Chang & Ko, 2017;Peng & Chen, 2021). Because the health consequences of catching this disease can be severe, researchers who have studied the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the hospitality and tourism industry have noted that consumers' perception of risk might be a key determinant for this industry's, including green hotels', ability to recover some of their lost customers once the pandemic is under control (Foroudi et al., 2021;Peng & Chen, 2021;Shin & Kang, 2021). In the context of green hotel stay purchase behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic, we hypothesize that consumers are likely to be more emotionally conflicted about staying at a green hotel when they perceive that there is a higher probability of catching the COVID-19 virus; therefore, we propose the following hypothesis (H1).

H1.
Perceived health risk has a positive effect on emotional ambivalence.
The second hypothesis of this research is that perceived A. Chen and N. Peng Tourism Management Perspectives 47 (2023) 101107 informativeness negatively affects emotional ambivalence. Akhtar et al. (2020) confirmed that conflicting hotel reviews that are perceived as informative can cause consumers to be ambivalent about staying at that hotel. Tourism and hospitality industry experts have suggested that hotels' performance during the COVID-19 pandemic partially depends on their ability to keep their guests healthy and safe from the virus (Coffey, 2020;Elliott, 2021;Hospitalitynet, 2021). Because consumers generally cannot sample these health and safety measures before arrival, hotels might have to provide sufficient information on their measures against the COVID-19 virus through online platforms (e.g., webpages and social media) before consumers make reservations (Coffey, 2020;Magnini & Zehrer, 2021). In other words, when purchasing green hotel stays during the COVID-19 pandemic, hotels that provide complete information about their health and wellbeing practices regarding the impact of the COVID-19 virus are less likely to cause consumers to feel emotionally ambivalent. For this reason, the following hypothesis is proposed (H2).
H2. Perceived informativeness has a negative effect on emotional ambivalence.
The third hypothesis of this study is that perceived persuasiveness has a negative impact on consumers' emotional ambivalence. When multiple vendors promote similar products online, researchers have suggested that consumers' emotions and behavior are sometimes conditioned by their perception of a vendor's persuasiveness (Prendergast, Ko, & Yin, 2010;Ruiz-Mafe et al., 2018;Sparks, Perkins, & Buckley, 2013). During the COVID-19 pandemic, industry experts noted that tourism and hospitality practitioners need to effectively communicate their health and safety practices to potential customers (Coffey, 2020;Hospitalitynet, 2021). Perceived persuasiveness may be particularly relevant in this study's context because describing green hotels' health and safety measures practices to protect against the COVID-19 virus in an online environment is generally easy for consumers (Akhtar et al., 2020;Kim, Kim, & Park, 2010;Prendergast et al., 2010;Wu, 2013). Based on the above discussion, green hotels that provide convincing information on how they protect customers' health and wellbeing against the COVID-19 virus might experience significantly reduced consumer emotional uncertainty. Thus, we propose the following hypothesis (H3).

H3
. Perceived persuasiveness has a negative effect on emotional ambivalence.
The fourth hypothesis of this research is that emotional ambivalence can negatively affect consumers' green hotel stay purchase behavior. Previous studies on hospitality products have confirmed that emotionally conflicted consumers change their consumption behavior, such as closing the reservation webpage Peng & Chen, 2021). The main reason is that negative emotions play a dominant role in an online consumption context . Industry experts have pointed out that ensuring that consumers can book and stay with confidence was key to survival during the COVID-19 pandemic (Coffey, 2020). This is because staying at hotels for tourism purposes during the COVID-19 pandemic was a nonessential consumption behavior with a high health risk. Consumers who experience mixed emotions when trying to reserve green hotel stays might change their purchase behavior, such as spending less on green hotel stays and/or reducing the length of their stay. Based on the discussion above, this study predicts that consumers' emotional ambivalence negatively contributes to their purchase behavior (H4).

H4
. Emotional ambivalence has a negative effect on green hotel stay purchase behavior.
The fifth hypothesis of this research is to test the influence of status consciousness on the relationship between emotional ambivalence and green hotel stay purchase behavior. A previous study has shown that status consciousness has the ability to moderate UK consumers' sustainable product buying behavior (De Silva et al., 2021). Furthermore, researchers have generally agreed that status signaling is a key reason for buying green products, including hotel stays (Berger, 2019;Butcher, Phau, & Shimul, 2017;Fifita, Seo, Ko, Conroy, & Hong, 2019;Gupta, Dash, & Mishra, 2019). Practitioners have suggested that some consumers place a higher value on green hotels during pandemics because selecting sustainable products during the COVID-19 pandemic might have signified their contributions to society and the natural environment (Gupta et al., 2019). This research proposes that emotional ambivalence has a smaller impact on green hotel stay purchase behavior, such as spending, for consumers who are highly conscious of their socioeconomic status than for consumers who are less conscious of their socioeconomic status (H5).

H5
. Emotional ambivalence has a weaker negative effect on purchase behavior for consumers with higher status consciousness than for consumers with lower status consciousness.
The sixth hypothesis of this study examines the influence of environmental consciousness on the relationship between emotional ambivalence and green hotel stay purchase behavior. De Silva et al. (2021) suggested that consumers' consciousness of products' impacts on the natural environment might moderate their consumption behavior. In addition, because tourism and hospitality products can often have a significant impact on the natural environment due to how they operate, hospitality product consumption studies have shown that consumers' concerns over the natural environment are a key factor affecting their consumption behavior (Gupta et al., 2019;Han et al., 2010;Kim & Han, 2010;Teng, Lu, & Huang, 2018). Jiang and Wen (2020) suggested that some consumers are more interested than before the COVID-19 pandemic in products that promote harmony between the natural environment and themselves. To examine the influence of environmental consciousness on green hotel consumers, this study predicts that for consumers who are more concerned about the natural environment, their green hotel stay buying behavior is less affected by their emotional uncertainty than that of consumers who are less conscious about the natural environment (H6).

H6.
Emotional ambivalence has a weaker negative effect on the purchase behavior of consumers with higher environmental consciousness than for consumers with lower environmental consciousness.
The seventh hypothesis of this study examines the ability of valuefor-money consciousness to moderate the relationship between emotional ambivalence and green hotel stay purchase behavior. De Silva et al. (2021) proposed that value-for-money consciousness might moderate consumers' buying behavior for remanufactured electronic products because these products are usually less expensive than the new ones. The situation is usually the opposite for green products because researchers have pointed out that these products, including green hotel stays, tend to be more expensive than their nongreen counterparts (Berger, 2019;Kang, Stein, Heo, & Lee, 2012;Teng, Wu, & Lu, 2013). As some consumers are more value-for-money conscious than they were before the COVID-19 pandemic because of its influence on the economy (Alexander, 2022;Hutton et al., 2022), value-for-money consciousness can be a variable that moderates consumers' green hotel stay buying behavior. This research hypothesizes that for consumers who are more conscious about a product's value-for-money, such as those who always try to maximize product quality with the money they spend, their emotional ambivalence has a stronger negative effect on green hotel stay purchase behavior than that of consumers who are less conscious about such value (H7).

H7.
Emotional ambivalence has a stronger negative effect on the purchase behavior of consumers with higher value-for-money consciousness than for consumers with lower value-for-money consciousness.

Sampling and data collection methods
To achieve the aim of this research, which is to examine the factors that contribute to consumers' green hotel stay purchase behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic, a quantitative research method was used because of its suitability for examining cause-and-effect relationships. Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) was used to recruit participants in this research (Santos & Giraldi, 2017). In addition to providing easy access to a wide and diverse range of participants during the COVID-19 pandemic, where social distancing was encouraged by some public health authorities, MTurk is considered a reliable sample source (Santos & Giraldi, 2017;Sugathan & Ranjan, 2019). In addition, because this research focuses on consumers' online hotel booking behavior, using MTurk increased the likelihood of reaching consumers with this experience.
An online survey was prepared prior to data collection and was then posted on MTurk for individuals to participate. Individuals could fill out the survey after the study's purpose was presented to those who agreed to participate and passed the screening questions. A description and examples of green hotels were also provided to participants at this stage (Chen & Peng, 2012). To be eligible to complete the survey, the potential participants needed to 1) be over the age of 18 years; 2) live in the UK; and 3) have reserved a UK-based green hotel stay for tourism purposes any time after March 2020. The sampling method of this research was nonprobability purposive sampling. In addition, the participants were asked to provide the name of the hotel with which they made reservations. The researchers checked whether the hotel name provided by the participants had a certificate (i.e., gold, silver, or bronze) from the Green Tourism Business Scheme (Green Tourism, 2022). These steps were taken to increase the chance of collecting usable questionnaires. During the eight-week data collection period, a total of 429 usable questionnaires were collected.

Questionnaire design and research instrument
This study's participants completed a questionnaire that consisted of two sections. The first section collected the respondents' demographic and socioeconomic information, such as their gender, educational background, and age, to allow the researchers to gain a better understanding of their backgrounds. The second section included 27 statements on their purchase behavior (Chen & Peng, 2012), emotional ambivalence (Peng & Chen, 2021), perceived health risk (Shin & Kang, 2021), perceived informativeness (Holdack, Lurie-Stoyanov, & Fromme, 2020), perceived persuasiveness (Akhtar et al., 2020), status consciousness (De Silva et al., 2021), value-for-money consciousness (De Silva et al., 2021), and environmental consciousness (De Silva et al., 2021). These statements helped the researchers gather quantitative data to examine our hypotheses. To measure emotional ambivalence, perceived health risk, perceived informativeness, perceived persuasiveness, status consciousness, value-for-money consciousness, and environmental consciousness, a seven-point Likert-type scale was used in the item design (i.e., 1-strongly disagree to 7-strongly agree). To measure purchase behavior, one open-ended question and two multiplechoice questions with seven-point Likert-type scales were used. The items for each variable are presented in Table 1.

Data analysis and results
Based on the aim and objectives of this research, quantitative data were collected and analyzed. IBM SPSS Statistics 25 and IBM SPSS AMOS 25 were used to examine the data. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze participants' demographic and socioeconomic data (Table 2). Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to check the reliability and validity of the measurement items. Structural equation modeling (SEM) 1. In the survey, the Hotel X is the green hotel that participants reserved or stayed with. 2. Questions in italics were eliminated due to low factor loading.
was performed to examine whether the proposed model was acceptable and whether the hypothesized paths were significant. Although this approach might not be ideal for exploring consumers' green hotel stay purchase behavior beyond the proposed model and hypotheses, it allows researchers to evaluate complex models that involve a large number of hypotheses (Tomarken & Waller, 2005).

Model measurement
Because the measures of this study's constructs are established scales, Anderson and Gerbing (1988) two-step approach was used to analyze data relating to our measurement items, model, and hypotheses. In the first step, we performed CFA to determine whether the measured variables reliably reflected the hypothesized latent variables. In the second step, SEM was used to examine the structural relationships. In other words, the measurement model was examined using CFA to validate the research constructs before investigating the relationships between variables in the hypothesized model.
The factor loading of all items was above Fornell and Larcker (1981) recommended threshold of 0.7. Moreover, the squared multiple correlations supported the reliability of this research's measurement items. Composite reliability, convergent validity, and discriminant validity were also established to confirm the measurement model. The composite reliability scores shown in Table 3 were within the range of 0.76 and 0.93 and above the 0.7 threshold (Hair, Sarstedt, Ringle, & Mena, 2012). To check for convergent validity, we used Fornell and Larcker (1981) approach, which requires that the factor loading be >0.7 and that the average variance extracted (AVE) be >0.5. As shown in Table 3, the AVE values ranged from 0.53 to 0.81, and all factor loadings were above 0.5; therefore, convergent validity was confirmed (Fornell & Larcker, 1981).
We assessed discriminant validity by following Fornell and Larcker (1981) recommendation by comparing the AVE for each individual construct with the shared variances between each individual construct and all other constructs. The results fulfilled this requirement; therefore, discriminant validity was established.
Because the respondents completed the survey at the same time, common method variance is a potential issue of concern. To rule out such effects, Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Jeong-Yeon, and Podsakoff (2003) common latent factor (CLF) method was used. The differences between the regression weights with and without the latent variable were similar (<0.20), indicating that method bias was not a significant issue in this study.

Structural model
After the overall measurement model was found to be acceptable (χ 2 /df = 2.22; RMSEA = 0.053; CFI = 0.976; GFI = 0.943; NFI = 0.957), the structural model was examined. The model fit was good (χ 2 /df = 4.05; RMSEA = 0.084; CFI = 0.937; GFI = 0.901; NFI = 0.919) 1 . After the structural model was examined, we tested our proposed hypotheses. H1 was supported (t = 5.30; β = 0.48; p < 0.001) because perceived health risk had a positive impact on emotional ambivalence. In other words, participants were more emotionally conflicted about staying at green hotels when traveling if they perceived staying at green hotels as risky to their health. H2 was not supported (t = − 1.88; β = − 0.15; p > 0.05), as perceived informativeness had no significant impact on emotional ambivalence. In other words, whether green hotels provided sufficient information about their COVID-19-related health and wellbeing practices did not influence participants' emotions significantly. H3 was supported (t = − 6.53; β = − 0.60; p < 0.001) since perceived persuasiveness had a negative and significant impact on emotional ambivalence. This study's participants had fewer mixed emotions if green hotels had persuasive messages about their health and wellbeing practices. H4 was supported (t = − 9.20; β = − 0.36; p < 0.001) because emotional ambivalence had a negative impact on purchase behavior. In other words, participants of this research spent less on their green hotel stay and/or reserved fewer nights with green hotels if they had high mixed emotions about such consumption behavior. A summary of the hypothesis testing results (H1-H4) can be found in Table 4.

Moderating effects of status consciousness (H5), environmental consciousness (H6), and value consciousness (H7)
To verify the moderating effect of status consciousness on the relationship between emotional ambivalence and purchase behavior (H5), we conducted a multigroup analysis to compare the constrained and unconstrained models. Before the analysis, the study participants were divided into two groups using the mean split. On a seven-point Likerttype scale, the mean respondent status consciousness score was 5.00. Thus, those with mean scores >5.00 were placed into the high status consciousness group (N = 263), and those with mean scores below 5.00 were placed into the low status consciousness group (N = 166). degree of freedom is <0.05, goodness-of-fit index (GFI) is above 0.90, normed fit index (NFI) is above 0.90, comparative fit index (CFI) is above 0.9, and root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) is between 0.05 and 0.08 (Hooper, Coughlan, & Mullen, 2008;Schumacker & Lomax, 2016). RMSEA shows how well the model would fit the population covariance matrix. GFI calculates the proportion of variance that is accounted for by the estimated population covariance. NFI examines the model by comparing the chi-squared of the model to the chi-squared of the null model. CFI can be considered a revised form of the NFI, which takes sample size into consideration. The chisquare divided degree of freedom measures the magnitude of discrepancy between the sample and fitted covariance matrices while taking sample size into account (Hooper et al., 2008).
The chi-square difference between the constrained and unconstrained models was assessed based on the difference in the degrees of freedom (Anderson & Gerbing, 1988). The results showed that the high status consciousness group and the low status consciousness group were significantly different at the model level (Δchi-square = 30.86, Δdf = 15, p < 0.01). To identify whether the two groups were significantly different on the hypothesized path (i.e., the effect of emotional ambivalence on green hotel stay purchase behavior), the coefficients for this path were compared. Because the difference in the regression coefficients between the constrained and unconstrained models was not significant (Δchi-square = 2.34, Δdf = 1, p > 0.05), status consciousness did not play a moderating role in the hypothesized path. Based on the statistical test results, H5 was not supported (Table 5 and Fig. 2).
The same procedure was performed to test the moderating effect of environmental consciousness (H6). The mean participant environmental consciousness score was 4.91 on a seven-point Likert-type scale. A total of 191 participants were categorized into the high environmental consciousness group, and 236 participants were categorized into the low environmental consciousness group. The statistical test results showed that the high environmental consciousness group and the low environmental consciousness group were significantly different at the model level (Δchi-square = 73.89, Δdf = 15, p < 0.001). Further statistical tests showed that regression coefficients between the constrained and unconstrained models were significant (Δchi-square = 57.68, Δdf = 1, p < 0.001); therefore, environmental consciousness has the ability to moderate emotional ambivalence's influence on green hotel stay purchase behavior. Based on the above analysis, H6 was supported (Table 6 and Fig. 3).
To test the moderating effect of value-for-money consciousness on the relationship between emotional ambivalence and purchase behavior (H7), the same procedure was carried out. The mean participant valuefor-money consciousness score was 5.00 on a seven-point Likert-type scale. A total of 212 participants were categorized into the high valuefor-money consciousness group, and 271 participants were categorized into the low value-for-money consciousness group. The chi-square difference test results showed that the value-for-money consciousness group and the low value-for-money consciousness group were significantly different at the model level (Δchi-square = 34.73, Δdf = 15, p < 0.001). Furthermore, the statistical tests showed that the regression coefficients between the constrained and unconstrained models were significant (Δchi-square = 18.24, Δdf = 1, p < 0.001). For this reason, value-for-money consciousness has the ability to moderate the effect of emotional ambivalence on green hotel stay purchase behavior. on the above analysis, H7 was supported (Table 7 and Fig. 4). Fig. 5 shows this Bold numbers on the diagonal elements are square root of each construct's AVE value. CrA = Cronbach's Alphas; CR = Composite reliability; AVE = Average variance extracted. PB = Purchase behavior; EA = Emotional ambivalence; PHR = Perceived health risk; PI = Perceived informativeness; PP = Perceived persuasiveness.     research's hypothesis testing results.

General discussion
Staying at hotels, including green hotels, during the COVID-19 pandemic is a consumption decision that poses risks; however, in 2021, UK consumers were participating in overnight tourism activities more often than they did in 2020 (Visit Britain, 2021). In addition, due to the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic, studies have suggested that some consumers might prefer to buy tourism and hospitality products that are sustainable and environmentally friendly (Cai et al., 2021;Huang et al., 2021;Jiang & Wen, 2020). In this section, a discussion of how this study's findings align with the literature on protection motivation theory, the heuristic-systematic model, and green consumption values is presented. This discussion is followed by a more elaborate discussion of the theoretical implications of this research based on the results of the hypothesis testing.
First, some UK consumers started to travel again for tourism purposes after COVID-19-related restrictions were lifted in the summer of 2021 (Hutton et al., 2022;Institute for Government, 2022;Visit Britain, 2021). However, individuals who have been vaccinated can still become ill after being infected by the COVID-19 virus (CDC, 2022). For this reason, the consumers in this research who experienced incompatible emotions when making a green hotel stay reservation negatively affected their green purchases of hotel stays, such as spending less on green hotel stays and/or reducing the length of their stays (Peng & Chen, 2021;Roger, 1975;Wong & Yeh, 2009). The findings of this research generally align with those of the existing hospitality literature that has adopted protection motivation theory (e.g., Peng & Chen, 2021). However, different from Peng and Chen (2021), this research tests the impact of perceived health risks.
Second, UK government officials, medical experts, and hospitality service providers have been providing COVID-19-related information since the outbreak of this pandemic. Some of this information has appealed to public sentiment, while others have tried to affect the public's cognitive perceptions. For this reason, the heuristic-systematic model, which suggests that consumers might use their feelings and/or thoughts when processing information (Kim et al., 2016;Zhang et al., 2014), was used to examine green hotel consumers' behavior. Our data analysis results generally support the adoption of this model in the context of this research. Nonetheless, the analysis also shows that UK consumers look for noncontent-related informational cues (i.e., heuristic  information processing) when buying green hotels stays during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Third, there are 2400 UK tourism businesses that have joined the Green Tourism Business Scheme (Green Tourism, 2022). In addition, more than a quarter of UK adults agree that the COVID-19 pandemic has made them value the natural environment more than before (Alexander, 2022). However, researchers have also pointed out that individuals view environmental issues differently, which partially depends on their values; moreover, individuals' consumption values can affect their purchase behavior (Gonçalves et al., 2016;Itani et al., 2019;Wang et al., 2018;Yan et al., 2021). Furthermore, De Silva et al. (2021) found that status consumption, value-for-money, and environmental consciousness can moderate UK consumers' remanufactured product buying behavior. Our results partially support the above notion and those of De Silva et al. because consumers with certain green consumption values (i.e., valuefor-money and environmental consciousness) are more likely than their counterparts to not allow their conflicting emotions to affect their green hotel stay purchase behavior. After a general discussion of how the findings of this study align with those of the literature, the next section further elaborates on the theoretical implications in relation to our hypothesis testing results.

Theoretical implications-discussion of antecedents to purchase behavior (H1-H4)
The results of this research have four additional theoretical implications for the literature on green hotels and sustainability. First, researchers studying tourism and hospitality products have suggested that consumers' perception of risk is an important antecedent to their subsequent feelings and behavior (Peng, 2020;Peng & Chen, 2021). Existing reports and studies have shown that consumers' perception of COVID-19 pandemic-associated health risks can have a prolonged impact on the tourism and hospitality industry (BBC, 2020a(BBC, , 2020bCoffey, 2020;Foroudi et al., 2021;Hospitalitynet, 2021;Peng & Chen, 2021;Shin & Kang, 2021). However, few research frameworks have considered the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic on hotel consumers' buying behavior. In addition, previous studies on the impact of the perception of risk might not be sufficient because they might not have focused on health-related risks (Deng & Ritchie, 2018;Peng & Chen, 2021;Sohn, Lee, & Yoon, 2016).
To narrow the gaps in the hospitality literature, this study incorporates perceived health risk as a variable into the heuristicsystematic model to investigate consumers' green hotel stay reservation behavior. The finding obtained from testing Hypothesis 1 confirms that consumers are likely to experience mixed emotions about staying at green hotels if they are concerned that doing so might have negative implications for their health and safety as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. On the one hand, this result aligns with that of existing studies on the influence of risk perception on consumers' service product buying behavior (e.g., Chang & Ko, 2017;Peng, 2020;Peng & Chen, 2021). On the other hand, this study is one of the few that focuses on the effect of perceived health risk.
Second, in contrast to the results of previous studies (Akhtar et al., 2020;Holdack et al., 2020), the finding obtained from testing Hypothesis 2 does not support the contention that perceived informativeness can significantly affect consumers' emotional ambivalence. The general public has received a flood of information since the COVID-19 pandemic began (Mohammed et al., 2021). Some consumers might have experienced what researchers describe as COVID-19 information overload. When experiencing this type of information overload, some consumers' emotions might be less sensitive to additional COVID-19 pandemicrelated information (Liu, Liu, Yoganathan, & Osburg, 2021;Mohammed et al., 2021). This lower sensitivity might be one explanation for why consumers' conflicting emotions about staying at green hotels during the COVID-19 pandemic are not significantly lowered even if they perceive that hotels have provided adequate information on their COVID-19 safety measures.
Third, this study supports the contention that consumers are less ambivalent about making a reservation at green hotels if such hotels have convincing messages regarding their COVID-19 safety measures. The result obtained from testing Hypothesis 3 is consistent with the findings in Akhtar et al. (2020) and aligns with previous research on consumer shopping behavior in an online environment Prendergast et al., 2010;Wu, 2013). When there are multiple vendors promoting their services online, it is important to have convincing and persuasive messages.
Fourth, consumers' conflicting emotions over their green hotel stay purchase behavior (i.e., spending and length of stay) significantly lower such behavior (Hypothesis 4). This finding is consistent with that of the previous literature that has tested the influence of emotions on behavioral intentions (Chen et al., 2015;Peng & Chen, 2021). By using actual reservation behavior rather than intentions, this research additionally contributes to the literature. A comparison of the literature on a heuristic-systematic model and hypothesis testing results (i.e., H2, H3, and H4) infers that consumers' green purchase behavior of hotel stays during the COVID-19 pandemic was made through their affective (i.e., heuristic) rather than cognitive perceptions (i.e., systematic). However, this is not to suggest that these consumers are not concerned about the COVID-19-related information provided by the hotel, but they might have already received similar information from other sources (e.g., public health authorities).
No statistics exist on UK domestic tourists' average length of stay at green hotels or spending at these hotels per night when traveling. However, the average length per stay prior to the COVID-19 pandemic for UK domestic tourists was approximately three nights, and the average spending per night on accommodations was approximately $89 (Tourism Alliance, 2019;Visit Britain, 2021). In this study, the research on the median length of stay at green hotels was two nights, and the median spending was between $175 and $274 per night. It is possible that the influence of the COVID-19 pandemic caused the participants of this study to stay at green hotels for fewer nights than they did previously. Mintel (2022) reported that UK consumers took fewer domestic holidays between August 2020 and August 2021 due to travel restrictions in response to new waves of COVID-19. It is also interesting that the participants in this research appeared to have spent more per night on accommodations than did general domestic tourists prepandemic. Because relevant data are scarce at the time of this research, it is difficult to know whether this study's participants generally spent more per night on accommodations than did other UK domestic tourists or because they are staying fewer nights due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Although information on consumers' hotel stay purchase behavior is limited, this finding can have implications for practitioners when trying to promote their services during highly uncertain times and/or times that can be perceived as risky.

Theoretical implications-discussion of consumption values' moderating effect (H5-H7)
The findings of this research on the moderating effects of value-formoney consciousness, environmental consciousness, and status consciousness also have theoretical implications. First, in terms of the impact of emotional ambivalence on hotel stay purchase behavior, no significant difference is found between high-and low-status conscious consumers (H5). In the green product consumption literature, researchers have suggested that status signaling is a key reason for buying green products (Berger, 2019;Butcher et al., 2017;Fifita et al., 2019;Gupta et al., 2019). In addition, De Silva et al. (2021) confirmed that status consumption can moderate consumers' behavior. One explanation for the difference between the findings of this research and the results in the literature might be that green hotel stays do not represent essential consumption behavior and that the consequences of contracting the COVID-19 virus can be severe (Peng & Chen, 2021). Regardless of their interest in and concerns over gaining social status, the participants in this study spend less on their hotel stays and/or reserve fewer nights when they feel emotionally conflicted about staying at green hotels during a pandemic.
Second, our findings demonstrate that environmental consciousness can moderate the relationship between emotional ambivalence and green hotel stay purchase behavior (H6). This result is similar to the findings in Gupta et al. (2019) and De Silva et al. (2021). When making reservations at green hotels, consumers who are conscious of the natural environment are different from those who are less conscious of the natural environment. More importantly, the negative effect of emotional ambivalence on green hotel stay behavior becomes nonsignificant for consumers with higher environmental consciousness but remains significant for consumers with lower environmental consciousness. This result shows that consumers' willingness to support green products might be crucial to the performance of green hotels during the COVID-19 pandemic (Berger, 2019;Galati, Thrassou, Christofi, Vrontis, & Migliore, 2021;Peng, 2020). Moreover, the present research extends De Silva et al. (2021) by examining green service-based products instead of remanufactured products. Furthermore, this study investigates consumers' actual behavior rather than their intentions.
Third, this research confirms that consumers who are highly conscious of a product's value-for-money differ from those who are less concerned (H7). Consumers with high value-for-money consciousness might alter their buying behavior (e.g., spend less on their hotel stay and/or reserve fewer nights with the hotel) when they experience mixed emotions when reserving hotels stay online. However, when these consumers are emotionally ambivalent, the buying behavior of their cost-conscious counterparts is less likely to be affected. This result is different from that of the literature (e.g., De Silva et al., 2021). In the research of De Silva et al. (2021), the moderating effect of value-formoney on UK consumers' remanufactured product buying behavior is not significant. One possible explanation for this difference is that remanufactured electronic products often come with a warranty and are less expensive than new products. However, green products are usually more expensive than their nongreen counterparts, and hotel stays generally do not come with a warranty, as do physical goods (Berger, 2019;Kang et al., 2012;Lichtenstein et al., 1990;Peng & Chen, 2019aTeng et al., 2013). The finding on the moderating effect of valuefor-money consciousness provides additional insights into the existing green product literature and sustainability research and can assist green hotel practitioners in learning more about their guests and formulating appropriate marketing strategies.

Practical implications
This research has several implications for practitioners to consider. First, with vaccine programs rolling out in some economies and new COVID-19 virus variants being discovered (Holcombe & Waldrop, 2021;Our World in Data, 2021;Zimmer et al., 2021), the public's perception of health risk can be expected to vary between regions and fluctuate over time. Before reopening their businesses, green hotel practitioners might want to pay attention to the development of the COVID-19 pandemic and the cost of running their establishments. Through this information, practitioners might be able to determine whether to reopen their establishment and the level of operations that must be economically viable. On the other hand, once the pandemic is under control, practitioners can reasonably expect an increase in their business because consumers might be more prone to seek environmentally friendly tourism and hospitality products. For green hotel practitioners, it will be useful to have control over whether to accept or decline reservation requests-similar to the controls that Airbnb's hosts have. Whether through the hotel's webpage or third-party platforms, this level of control during an uncertain period could allow green hotel managers to plan ahead (e.g., staffing and capacity) based on consumers' perceptions of health risks when they make reservations.
Second, to help consumers be less emotionally conflicted about staying at their green hotels, practitioners might have to highlight their health and safety measures against the COVID-19 virus through internetbased marketing, such as having a health and safety measures section on their webpage, social media platforms, and collaborative third-party websites. When communicating this information to potential customers, practitioners do not need to excessively worry about the completeness of their messages. Consumers may have already received sufficient information on this issue from other sources Mohammed et al., 2021). Moreover, some social media platforms (e.g., Twitter) might have restrictions on the number of words allowed in each post.
On the other hand, practitioners could try to make their messages more convincing. One of the first steps that hoteliers can do is communicate their message through credible social media platforms and trustworthy third-party websites. In addition, practitioners need to make their messages more persuasive, which can be accomplished by using posts that contain pictures and videos. To highlight their environment to website and social media page visitors in a persuasive manner, hoteliers might want to consider using augmented reality technology to create an augmented hotel tour. Alternatively, videos on the hotel's health and safety measures, such as how contactless technology has been used, could be made available through website browsers and on social media platforms. In addition, if the hotel has been accredited by the local tourism bureau for its health and safety practices after having passed additional COVID 19-related health inspections, it could highlight that information on their websites and social media pages. To be effective, hoteliers might want to create a communication team consisting of experts who are familiar with online communication channels and sustainable practices.
Third, based on our findings, green hotel practitioners can expect that consumers who made a reservation with them during and shortly after the COVID-19 pandemic are likely those who care about the natural environment or are slightly less value-for-money sensitive. To attract consumers who are conscious of the natural environment, practitioners can consider highlighting their hotels' green initiatives, such as water conservation programs and energy-efficient designs, on their websites, social media pages and other communication materials. Hoteliers should not take advantage of consumers who are less value-formoney sensitive but can consider including free products in these consumers' reservations, such as restaurant meals, tour guides, and other entertainment activities. This information could be provided in an obvious spot on the hotel's website or pinned at the top of its social media page. Although consuming green products is a signal of consumers' status, practitioners might not need to highlight their green hotels' benefits that enhance such consumer status until the COVID-19 pandemic is further controlled. Regardless of their status consciousness level, consumers who emotionally conflicted over staying at green hotels due to the perceived risk of contracting the COVID-19 virus changed their purchasing behavior by spending less on their hotel stays and/or reserving fewer nights at a hotel.

Conclusions
This study makes contributions to the literature but has several limitations. First, researchers have suggested that consumers' trust and knowledge in green products can often influence their green product perception and buying behavior (Berger, 2019;Chen & Peng, 2012). Although the concept of perceived persuasiveness might overlap somewhat with consumers' trust and perceived informativeness might share some similarities with consumers' knowledge, they are not the same. Future studies might want to use structural equation modeling to further test the relationships of consumer trust and knowledge with their risk perceptions, emotions, and green product buying behavior. Additionally, studies have shown that consumers' purchase behavior of green products can be directly affected by environmental concern/ consciousness ( Kumar & Ghodeswar, 2015;Tan, Ojo, & Thurasamy, 2019). The present research tested this variable's moderating effect but not its direct influence on buying behavior. Future studies can consider examining the direct, moderating, and mediating effects of environmental consciousness to obtain a comprehensive understanding of this factor.
Second, because international tourism to the UK was still restricted at the time of this study, only domestic UK tourists were included. Nevertheless, a significant number of UK residents made overseas visits before the COVID-19 pandemic, and many have made international visits since April 2022 (ONS, 2022). Future research might want to explore overseas UK tourists' decisions to purchase green hotel stays. Additionally, useful would be to examine inbound UK tourists' consumption behavior of green tourism products using big data. This approach can help with an understanding of tourists' concerns and behavior when offering cross-disciplinary implications for green tourism product development (Shams, Vrontis, & Christofi, 2022).
Third, this study adopted a heuristic-systematic model to examine consumers' buying behavior of green hotel stays during the COVID-19 pandemic. This model's performance is acceptable; however, other models could have performed as well. For example, similar to the heuristic-systematic model, the elaborate likelihood model (ELM) also leads to suggestions that individuals have two information processing methods (i.e., the central and peripheral routes). Researchers could make significant contributions to the literature by carrying out model comparison research to determine which model is more suitable when examining consumers' buying behavior of green products.