For many travellers, the communal sharing nature of a hostel is part of the experience, providing an opportunity to meet other people from other places in a way that simply does not happen if everybody has their own private hotel room.
Of course, some hostels offer private rooms too, and in any case what weary travellers want at the end of the day is comfortable and clean hostel furniture to relax on and to get their tired head down for a few hours' sleep.
But a newly published study suggests that the cleanliness of hostel furniture, fixtures and rooms in general could have a big impact on how secure guests feel during their stay.
In an article published in the International Journal of Hospitality Management, Naveen Amblee of the Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode explains that security, cleanliness and location are three of the key decision-making attributes when travellers are deciding where to stay.
Yet relatively little research has been conducted to look into how each one of these attributes influences the other - including the influence of cleanliness on the guest's sense of security.
Amblee obtained data from a hostel-booking website and used a word of mouth method to analyse people's opinions of security and cleanliness at each establishment.
He found not only that the two are closely associated with one another, but that the connection between security and cleanliness is even stronger than that between security and location.
"Based on our empirical study, we find that customer perceptions of hostel security are primarily determined by the cleanliness of the establishment, followed by its location," he writes in the August 2015 edition of the journal.
The findings are significant whether your hostel is based in a crime-free area, or in a location where security is a genuine concern, as the condition of your hostel furniture, decor and so on could help to make sure guests perceive your premises as being safe and secure.
In genuinely safe areas, that helps you to avoid missing out on bookings due to incorrect perceptions of your establishment - while if crime of any kind is a genuine concern, the appearance of your rooms can help to reinforce a sense of security among your guests while you take other measures to keep them safe.