Identifying tourist profiles to reduce overtourism: the case of a cultural destination

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rocío Martínez Suárez ◽  
José Alberto Castañeda García ◽  
Miguel Ángel Rodríguez Molina

Purpose Knowing the behavior of tourists visiting cultural destinations enables better management of tourist flows, a better understanding of areas with greater tourist density and an opportunity to decongest popular neighborhoods. The purpose of this study is to segment tourists according to their spatio-temporal behavior and identify the primary variables that characterize the resulting segments, which will help urban destinations prevent problems arising from the saturation of tourists in certain areas. Design/methodology/approach To do this, this paper analyzes the behavior of tourists visiting the southeastern Spanish city of Granada, one of the most highly visited cultural tourism destinations. The data analysis used the methodology of sequence alignment which is used to identify segments as a function of their contained elements and the order in which these appear. Findings The results demonstrate the existence of three segments with different behavioral patterns: the “explorer tourists” segment, the “non-traditional cultural tourists” segments and the “typical cultural tourists” segment. These segments show differences in the concentration of their visits. This study discovered that the segments that visit a greater number of destination areas are those with less cultural orientation, higher travel budgets and younger and more frequent visitors. Originality/value In the segmentation not only keep in mind the visited areas, but the order in which they were visited as well. In addition, one should consider the time that each tourist remains in each relevant zone of the destination, given that the visiting time is an important variable to assess the congestion of an area.

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Qiwei Han ◽  
Margarida Abreu Novais ◽  
Leid Zejnilovic

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to propose and demonstrate how Tourism2vec, an adaptation of a natural language processing technique Word2vec, can serve as a tool to investigate tourism spatio-temporal behavior and quantifying tourism dynamics. Design/methodology/approach Tourism2vec, the proposed destination-tourist embedding model that learns from tourist spatio-temporal behavior is introduced, assessed and applied. Mobile positioning data from international tourists visiting Tuscany are used to construct travel itineraries, which are subsequently analyzed by applying the proposed algorithm. Locations and tourist types are then clustered according to travel patterns. Findings Municipalities that are similar in terms of their scores of their neural embeddings tend to have a greater number of attractions than those geographically close. Moreover, clusters of municipalities obtained from the K-means algorithm do not entirely align with the provincial administrative segmentation.


2016 ◽  
Vol 28 (6) ◽  
pp. 1137-1154 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ziene Mottiar

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the motivations of social entrepreneurs. It explores the case of the Gathering in Ireland in 2013, when against a backdrop of recession, the national Government encouraged individuals and communities to organize events and invite the Diaspora to visit Ireland as a way of helping the country to revitalize. Some 5,000 events took place across the country during the year, and this paper examines this in the context of social entrepreneurship. Three research questions are posed: Who were these tourism and social entrepreneurs who organized events as a result of the Gathering? What motivated them to engage in these activities? Will this social entrepreneurship activity be maintained beyond 2013 and how has it been impacted by the Gathering? Design/methodology/approach The empirical research was conducted in two counties in Ireland, Co. Kerry and Co. Westmeath. The research tools used were key informant interviews, a survey of event organizers and focus groups. Findings Key findings show that the Gathering has resulted in the emergence of new social entrepreneurs, but it has also had a positive impact on those who had run their events before, as it made them be more strategic in the way they planned and ran their event and also resulted in them thinking about these events in terms of tourists rather than just the local community. They also developed new skills which will aid their future development. It is clear that social entrepreneurs can play a fundamental role in the development of tourism destinations, and this is an important topic for researchers in tourism to be concerned about. Originality/value The originality of this paper lies in the fact that it addresses the issue of motivation of social entrepreneurs and challenges us to think more about how these types of entrepreneurs identify the problem that they will address. Furthermore, this case shows that the motivation for such action can be prompted by a national strategy, rather than as the literature heretofore represented it as an innate motivation that materialized and developed within particular individuals.


2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (6) ◽  
pp. 631-634 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jorge Costa ◽  
Mónica Montenegro ◽  
João Gomes

Purpose This paper aims to introduce the papers in this issue and explain the pertinence of the strategic question. Design/methodology/approach A brief context for the strategic question is provided, as well as the issue alignment and a content analysis of the papers selected. Findings From the analysis of the papers selected for this theme issue, it becomes clear that tourism has become one of the major players in international economic, social and technological sectors, while representing one of the main income sources for developed and developing countries. Originality/value The papers selected for this issue shed light on an important problem: increasing tourist flows and overtourism at some world top destinations.


2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 323-335 ◽  
Author(s):  
Seyed Reza Bahadori ◽  
Neda Torabi Farsani ◽  
Zahed Shafiei

Purpose Spiritual tourism is a niche tourism studied under cultural tourism. Religious events play an important role in attracting spiritual tourists. This paper aims to highlight the introduction of Yazd city (Iran) as a new spiritual tourism destination with emphasis on Shiite religious events and rituals. This research has the following three major purposes to assess the motivation of international tourists for participating in spiritual tours, examine the attitude of tourists towards spiritual tourism activities and investigate the effect on international tourists’ perceptions and views of spiritual tours organized in the Muharram and Ashura events. Design/methodology/approach This study was conducted in Yazd, Iran. Data for this study were collected through a questionnaire which was distributed in organized spiritual tours during the Muharram and Ashura events. A quantitative method was used and the data were analyzed using SPSS tools. Findings On the basis of the results of this study, it can be concluded that international tourists are interested in spiritual tourism activities and attractions in Yazd city, and spiritual tours can be a strategy against Islamophobia. Originality/value This research paper investigated the attitude of tourists to spiritual tourism activities and the effect on international tourists’ perceptions and views of spiritual tours organized in the Muharram and Ashura as the most important events in Shiite culture.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Verica Milutinovic ◽  
Jelena Musanovic ◽  
Dejan Beric

Purpose This study made an advance over previous work by providing a modified model for measuring the competitiveness of tourism destinations based on competitive performance from a stakeholder perspective. Furthermore, this paper aims to evaluate the sources of relative strengths and weaknesses perceived of a destination. Design/methodology/approach This study uses a quantitative approach to seek opinions of 135 tourism stakeholders. Univariate and bivariate statistical analyses were used to describe the profile of the respondents, quantify the main findings and test the proposed hypotheses. Findings The results highlight the importance of safety in determining the attractiveness of a destination and its significance for the competitiveness of a destination. The strongest indicator of competitiveness is “Core resources and attractions,” while the weakest indicator is “Destination management.” Also, employees in public institutions and in the tourism industry in general have different opinions about competitive tourism destinations for most dimensions. Research limitations/implications Despite the fact that the findings do not consider the demand side, which has a major impact on the destination, they minimize the research gap and contribute to the existing literature review. Practical implications The results are of particular value to stakeholders and destination management responsible for strengthening the competitiveness of tourism destinations. Originality/value The research progressed over previous studies by developing and empirically testing a modified conceptual model for measuring destination competitiveness from a supply-side perspective and recommending improvements for the emerging tourism destinations.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jorge Costa ◽  
Mónica Montenegro ◽  
João Gomes

PurposeThe study explores the concept of sustainability as a measure of tourism success from the perspectives of the Portuguese Promotional Tourism Boards.Design/methodology/approachThe study reviews current approaches to defining sustainability and explores how this can contribute to measuring success in tourism destinations using the case of the Portuguese Promotional Tourism Boards to shed light on the theme issue question.FindingsThe evidence that the impacts of tourism are not all beneficial to destinations and their residents is mounting and well addressed by the main world tourism agencies who are now promoting alternative ways for the industry to adopt a more holistic approach to measure the success of tourism destinations. This approach is also being adopted and promoted by some of the world's best tourism destinations.Originality/valueBased on contributions from the Portuguese Regional Promotional Tourism Entities (ERTs), it was possible to define a successful tourism destination as the one that creates income for the local community and ensures the quality of life of the population; values and preserves local identities, heritage, culture and traditions; and promotes the sustainable use of ecosystems and the preservation of natural resources, while practising a circular economy approach. Based on the same source, it was possible to identify the most important variable in evaluating the success of a tourist destination: the level of satisfaction of residents with tourism.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Marwa M. El-Ashmouni

PurposeThis paper aims to examine the transformation of the concept of cultural tourism within the sociopolitical empowerments, changes of visual realms and normative contexts, which is embedded within museums as institutions.Design/methodology/approachThese discussions will be conceptualized through investigating the shifts in the metamorphosis of the architectural vocabulary of Egypt's museums between nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This analysis will be highlighted through connecting both the notion of the “tourist reflexivity” of John Urry and Jonas Larsen in The Tourist Gaze 3.0 (2011) and the notion of the “interstitial spaces” and “new internationalism” of Homi Bhabha in The Location of Culture (1994). The analysis expands to interrogate these two notions as prelude for reflecting on representations of colonial and postcolonial museums in Egypt, starting from the Museum of Egyptian Antiquities, Cairo (c. 1863) to the most recent, the Egyptian Grand Museum, Cairo (c. 2002).FindingsThe analysis revealed that while colonial museums endeavored to stage external cultural authority and postcolonial ones staged traditions' liminality through “New internationalism”, they created spatiotemporal interstices. This finding, while is a timely example with the rising global cultural encounters that emerged during this transformative age, it challenges the collective imaginations of architects to liberate from traditional nationalism.Originality/valueThe paper offers novel theoretical and architectural analysis of Egypt's museums through the exigency of nationalism and “new internationalism”. The encounter between both notions is a timely example given the recent involvements by the “Modern State” and the recent pandemic upheaval that revealed the inevitability of globalism and the discursivity of such notions.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (6) ◽  
pp. 719-723
Author(s):  
Pedro Machado

Purpose By embracing the entire community of travellers, despite their capacity, tourism destinations that have the opportunity to appeal to the art of inclusive tourism policies in the Center of Portugal, are analyzed, showing the importance for a tourist destination to adapt these policies to the notoriety of the destination brand. Design/methodology/approach This paper offers a practical viewpoint based on the state-of-the-art of public policies relating to inclusive and accessible tourism in the Center of Portugal and their impacts on the destination branding. Findings Taking into account the territorial specificity of the Center of Portugal, the asymmetries of development and cohesion, Tourism Center of Portugal (TCP) has sought to develop projects and actions in partnership with the different actors in the territory that promote territorial cohesion, integrated and sustainable development and the attractiveness of the inland region. Practical implications All the projects developed to support accessible and inclusive tourism, in which TCP is an active part, create a network of tourist services to become destinations more accessible and inclusive for everyone. Originality/value Inclusive and accessible tourism is little explored by DMOs. In this paper, the case of the Center of Portugal region is presented, highlighting a series of unprecedented initiatives that are being developed, aiming to provide the destination with unique points of differentiation.


Author(s):  
Sílvia Quinteiro ◽  
Vivina Carreira ◽  
Alexandra Rodrigues Gonçalves

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the relevance of developing literary tourism in Coimbra. Design/methodology/approach This exploratory qualitative research identifies existent resources and development potential of literary tourism. The instruments of data collection were bibliographic research, questionnaires, interviews and participant observation. Findings There are few literary tourism products in Coimbra, which contrasts with the number of literary places identified, namely, on the left bank of the River Mondego. Tourism development stakeholders in Coimbra have not paid enough attention to the emergence of literary tourism and the opportunities for the development of new sustainable cultural products related with it. Research limitations/implications This study is limited by the size and continual renewal of the corpus, which implies a constant updating of data regarding authors and texts. Practical implications This study will lead to the production of a database of Coimbra’s literary resources and a digital literary map, allowing any citizen or entity to design and implement literary tourism products. Originality/value To the best of authors’ knowledge, this is the first study reviewing the potential of Coimbra as a literary tourism destination. Moreover, it discusses literary heritage as a source of products and experiences to foster more balanced tourist flows throughout the city.


Author(s):  
Brian Wyant

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to generate information about the contours of police responsiveness, focussing on how quickly and precisely police make firearm arrests after a shooting incident. Design/methodology/approach – Using a modified version of the Knox close pair method, a spatio-temporal clustering technique, over 11,000 shooting incidents and firearm arrests between 2004 and 2007 in Philadelphia, PA were analyzed. Findings – Police are responding quickly and in a geographically targeted fashion to shootings. Across Philadelphia elevated patterns of firearm arrests were approximately two and a half times greater than would be expected if shootings and firearm arrests lacked a spatio-temporal association. Greater than expected patterns of firearm arrests persisted for roughly one-fourth of a mile and for about one week from the shooting incident but the strength of these associations waned over space and time. The pattern of police response varied slightly across different police divisions. Research limitations/implications – The current method uncovered spatio-temporal patterning and determined when these patterns were significantly different from what would be expected if the events were completely independent. Specific events and processes surrounding each event are not known. Practical implications – Findings can help inform the knowledge about police behavior in terms of how police produce arrests. Originality/value – The patterns observed here provide more micro-level detail than has been revealed in previous studies regarding police responsiveness to firearm violence while also introducing a more integrated spatially and temporally specific framework.


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