Iowa State Fair food – including corn dogs to pork chop at a stick – might be showcased as one example of “authentic food” at the upcoming international conference co-hosted by Iowa State University.
The 23rd annual Graduate Education and Graduate Student Research Conference in Hospitality and Tourism, to become held Jan. 3 to 5 in Fort Worth, Texas, are going to be co-hosted by Iowa State and Texas Tech University.
Iowa State is considered worldwide for their excellence in research in hospitality management. This system has been ranked 15th on the list of world’s top 100 hospitality and tourism programs, in accordance with the Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Research.
The upcoming conference will attract countless students and faculty members from around the globe. This year’s participants include those from Canada, China, Colombia, England, the Philippines, Mexico, Thailand, and Turkey. ?
Defining ‘authentic food’
Research by graduate student Zahidah Ab Latif and advisers SoJung Lee and Eunha Jeong is among the 24 Iowa State papers accepted for the conference and 274 accepted from students globally. Ab Latif will present among Iowa State’s eight stand-up presentations, for the best in-depth and involved than poster presentations.
The study concentrated on defining “authentic food” – debate in tourism because food portrays national or regional specialties and represents unique and authentic things about a destination. Authentic food can motivate tourists and increase satisfaction utilizing their travels. However, such food have been interpreted and measured in various ways.
Ab Latif’s study could be the first to develop a measurement scale for authentic food while in the tourism setting. It aims to support destination event organizers recognize perceived authentic food in a state fair setting and plan strategic marketing tools to draw in more traffic to particular event.
“Based over the final findings, we found authentic meals is significantly and positively influencing the state fair experience and attachment towards the state fair,” Ab Latif said. “In simple terms, state fair attendees who perceived food authenticity use a more positive state fair experience, thus leading those to contain a stronger attachment to your state fair.”
Ab Latif chosen to concentrate on 33 forms of food on the Iowa State Fair. She interviewed 13 people – seven attendees, four organizers, as well as two vendors – with previously experienced food along at the Iowa State Fair. She followed that program two online surveys about state fair food throughout the country – first surveying 252 people, then 401 people.
The research stated that 78 percent of us surveyed think state fair your meals are authentic. Participants with the study defined authenticity by four factors: unique, original, traditional, and native.
“They probably had pork chop in their state fairs, though the Iowa State Fair had the top pork chop on the stick a result of the freshness from the ingredients grown in Iowa,” Ab Latif said.
Leadership roles
Lee, an assistant professor in apparel, events, and hospitality management, was national chair of the committee reviewing research papers in this year’s conference. Associate professor Thomas Schrier served since the liaison between co-hosts Iowa State and Texas Tech, and organized a practice session for participants.
Eighteen Iowa State manages to graduate and 12 faculty members have 24 papers accepted with the conference. Their research topics include green restaurant advertising, to food service workers’ information about food allergies and food safety, to the helpfulness of Yelp, the mobile app that provides crowd-sourced reviews about local companies.
“As a faculty member, I want our students to possess very secure research skills and concepts,” Lee said. “It continues to be great yearly to get the variety of presentations we’ve had within the conference. We’re with a good stage immediately having more stand-up presentations than poster presentations. Tailored for Ph.D. students, this is a great an opportunity to share their research ideas that will go toward their dissertation.”
Some of your research will be provided with posters, while others – such as papers about authentic food – might be showcased in 20-minute stand-up presentations. Discussion and feedback within the conference will help the former pupils publish the work they do and advance their skills as scholars.
“The conference is usually a platform where I purchase feedback in my small work from experts during my research area and related studies,” Ab Latif said. “It is really important for my situation to do more robustness checks inside my paper before submitting to top journals.” ?
Those from Iowa State presenting the work they do include students Asit Bandyopadhayay, Dede Hamm, Eunkyoung Park, Fanli Zhou, Heelye Park, Nelson M. Placa, Nishapat Meesangkaew, Nripendra Singh, Nur Hidayah Che Ahmat, Valerie Salter, Xi Wang, Xiaolong Shao, Xingyi Zhang, Yang Xu, Yi Luo, Yiqi Wang, and Yuxiang Xu, as well as Ab Latif.
The students are advised by Chin-Hsun “Ken” Tsai, Eric Olson, Jewoo Kim, Ching-Hui “Joan” Su, Lakshman Rajagopal, Liang Tang, Susan Arendt, Tianshu Zheng, and Wen Chang, coupled with Lee, Jeong, and Schrier, all Iowa State faculty members in apparel, events, and hospitality management.
