Psychological foundations of solo dining experience in tourism and hospitality industry. A mixed methods study

Solo dining has gained substantial recognition in the restaurant business worldwide. Considering the growing trend of solo dining, it has attracted increasing interest from academia and industry. Since the current stage of knowledge on solo dining practices and their management is limited and scattered, it requires integration to provide scholars with an outline of the current state of knowledge in this field, as well as the industry expert insights. To address this issue, the current study applies a mixed-method approach to first gather insights from the existing literature by conducting a systematic literature review (SLR). Subsequently, in order to substantiate SLR findings, a qualitative study is designed to garner industry expert views on solo dining experience, enhancing restaurant practices and strategies. The SLR has revealed three distinct thematic areas, such as solo dining antecedents, solo diner's experience while dining, and the solo diner's outcome behaviour. Based on these insights, it was necessary to identify the practical takeaways for the restaurants in the hospitality industry; therefore, a qualitative study was designed following the mixed-method approach of research design. The empirical results present solo dining strategies implemented by restaurant owners and staff. The Gioia technique of qualitative analysis of data brought forward four solo dining aggregate dimensions presenting the solo diner's profile, adaptive comfort, human touch, and restaurant strategies. This study makes a novel contribution to the solo dining literature by identifying psychophysiological aspects of solo dining and offering managerial insights for restaurant industry professionals.