From attendance motives to satisfaction drivers: Extending the push-pull framework in academic conferences

Abstract

Academic conferences play a key role in knowledge dissemination, professional development, and international collaboration. While prior research has extensively examined motivational factors influencing conference attendance, crossnational evidence on how these motivations translate into participant satisfaction remains limited. Addressing this gap, the present study investigates the impact of key motivational factors on satisfaction among academic conference participants using a multi-country sample of academic conference attendees from 18 different countries. Drawing on the push–pull framework, five motivational dimensions are examined: destination and leisure, academic and professional development, networking, travel convenience, and costs. Data were collected via an online survey, resulting in 127 valid responses, and analyzed using descriptive statistics, reliability analysis, Pearson’s correlation analysis, and multiple regression analysis. The results show that destination and leisure and academic and professional development significantly predict satisfaction, whereas networking, travel convenience, and costs do not. These findings highlight a distinction between attendance motivators and satisfaction drivers and extend the push–pull framework to the post-conference evaluation stage, offering practical implications for conference design and management.