Against the background of a new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial change, a complex domestic and overseas environment, and the transformation of China’s economic development mode, General Secretary Xi Jinping creatively puts forward the concept of “new quality productivity,” which points out the way forward for tourism development and provides a fundamental guideline. This study summarizes the difficulties and directions for new quality productivity in tourism. First, it proposes that new quality productivity is an inherent requirement for the deepening of tourism development and expounds on the important role that scientific and technological innovation plays in it. Second, it proposes a two-way influence mechanism for the development of new quality productivity of tourism from the two dimensions of the overall driving power of tourism and its huge market demand. Third, it elaborates on the role of science and technology in the new quality productivity of tourism from both positive and negative perspectives. Finally, we highlight six major difficulties in developing new quality productivity in the tourism industry: data quality, human capital, means of production, industrial ecology, financial support, and production relations.

This paper untangles the various perspectives and academic issues regarding tourism research. It mainly focuses on three topics: the nature and practical significance of tourism, modes of thinking in response to the changing trends in tourism demand, and issues that need attention for the deepening of tourism research. This paper explores the nature of tourism from the perspective of necessity and spatial-temporality, classifying the types of tourism experiences based on multiple dimensions. Moreover, it suggests that four modes of thinking, including scenario thinking and platform thinking, are required in response to changes in tourism demand. Finally, it proposes that in the promotion of tourism research, close attention should be paid to the two core issues of “adopting a problem-solving approach in academic research” and “adhering to academic ethics in data selection”.