Sharing Internship Experience on the Internet: A Study of Tourism and Hotel Management College Students

The major objective of the current research is to compare the use of two online media, namely online-personal (platforms for communicating with someone the senders know like email and social networking sites) and online-collective (platforms for communicating with someone unknown to the senders like weblogs and Internet forums) for sharing internship experience by the tourism and hotel management college students. This study also investigates whether the use of these media vary with gender and Internet usage. Drawing on the findings from a self-administered survey with tourism and hotel management college students in a Hong Kong university, this study reveals that respondents are more likely to use online-personal media than online-collective media. Online-collective media are also found to be prevalent among males. While knowledge about interns’ experience is paramount for the improvement of internship program, internship officers and industry practitioners are recommended to ask interns to provide social networking site accounts.