Evaluating the Temple Administrative Quality (TAQ) Model for Char Dham in the Indian Subcontinent: A User-Generated Content (UGC) Analysis from TripAdvisor

Past comparisons of willingness-to-pay (WTP) tended to focus on differences between international tourists and domestic tourists. However, this simple distinction does not account for whether visitors from each of the two groups are on multiple-destination trips or not. Our study of visitors to Puerto Rico's rainforest found that whether tourists were on multiple-destination trips or not was an equally important determinant of WTP. Specifically, while WTP of international tourists on multiple-destination trips was the highest at nearly $200 per trip, the second highest was domestic tourists on multiple-destination trips at $163 per trip. International tourists on single-destination trips had a value of $134, while domestic tourists on single-destination trips was the lowest at $110. Prior studies finding that international tourists had higher WTP may, in part, be due to the fact that the majority of domestic tourists take single-destination trips.

Tourism‐led growth hypothesis is widely studied from the international tourism perspective, but the number of studies related to domestic tourism is limited. This study provides an empirical investigation on the impacts of both international and domestic tourism on the economic growth of China, with human capital as a control variable. This study defines the presence of tourism‐led growth as the existence of a cointegrating relationship between international/domestic tourism and national income when national income is the dependent variable. The findings show that international tourism does not influence economic growth, but domestic tourism has an increasing positive impact on economic growth.

Tourists’ experiential perceptions and specific behaviors are of importance to facilitate geographers’ and planners’ understanding of landscape surroundings. In addition, the potentially significant role of online user generated content (UGC) in tourism landscape research has only received limited attention, especially in the era of artificial intelligence. The motivation of the present study is to understand international tourists’ online reviews of Mt. Huangshan in China. Through a state-of-the-art natural language processing network (BERT) analyzing posted reviews across international tourists, our results facilitate relevant landscape development and design decisions. Second, the proposed analytic method can be an exemplified model to inspire relevant landscape planners and decision-makers to conduct future researches. Through the clustering results, several key topics are revealed, including international tourists’ perceptual image of Mt. Huangshan, tour route planning, and negative experience of staying.

This paper presents a global overview of international tourism, concentrating on three major themes: generating regions, destination zones and the creation of resorts and regions. The world's major markets for international tourism are to be found in Europe and North America, regions which also constitute the world's major destination zones. Distinct groupings can be identified in each with changes in both markets and destinations being slow and limited. The development of international tourism has also created new resorts and tourist regions, the relative importance of international and domestic tourism being a key distinguishing feature.

Domestic tourism is supposed to compose the largest and most unaddressed proportion of the tourism ‘iceberg’, but has been overshadowed by the interest in international tourism on behalf of academics and policy makers. Unlike international tourism which depends greatly on global systems and mega-infrastructure, domestic tourism deems to have evolved and sustained itself in the absence of heavy investments and commercialization. It has also been suggested as an appropriate substitute to international tourism under the influence of external factors such as disasters and crises. In tourism studies, not many researchers have engaged themselves in the topic of domestic tourism in the Middle-east region especially in Saudi Arabia. The focus on domestic tourism is important in Saudi Arabia as the country is one of the biggest exporters of tourists going out of the kingdom, and the government is trying to retain a larger portion of tourism spending of its local tourists in the national tourism industry. In view of this, this paper attempts to discuss the potentials and challenges of developing domestic tourism in the Asir region, which is situated in the southwestern part of Saudi Arabia. The analysis is based on secondary data and supported by interviews with twelve tourism operators and hoteliers in the region. The findings revealed that Asir region is a unique tourist destination and has considerable unrealized potential, however, the growth of domestic tourism requires diversification in terms of product, market and geographical areas. As tourism development is a comprehensive undertaking involving many sectors and stakeholders, it is crucial for the government to come up with multi-hierarchical, all-inclusive and coordinated development strategy, and these are the challenges to which the country’s tourism industry should respond to promote domestic tourism.

This study examines the mobility challenges tourists face in Ziro Valley, Arunachal Pradesh, India. The research was conducted in September 2022 during the Ziro Festival of Music and surveyed a diverse group of international, national, and domestic tourists. The primary goal was to identify the most significant factors that impede tourist mobility to and within their destinations. The study employed a field survey methodology, gathering data from a cross-section of tourists to understand their experiences. To analyse the collected data, researchers used Garrett's ranking technique, a statistical method for ranking items based on their perceived importance. This technique was specifically applied to determine the key challenges affecting overall tourist mobility and to investigate the specific inconveniences faced by international tourists in Arunachal Pradesh and all tourists during their stay in Ziro Valley. The findings of this research indicate that the condition of road communications is the most significant factor hindering tourist mobility. This poor road infrastructure poses a considerable barrier, making it difficult for tourists to reach their desired destinations and navigate the region effectively. The study’s results highlight the urgent need for improvements in the transportation network to enhance the tourist experience and promote tourism in the Ziro Valley. In conclusion, this paper successfully identifies and ranks the key mobility challenges encountered by tourists in the Ziro Valley. By using Garrett's ranking technique, the study provides a clear and data-driven understanding of the most pressing issues. The findings strongly suggest that improving road infrastructure is essential to overcoming these obstacles and facilitating smoother travel for visitors. This research serves as a valuable resource for policymakers and tourism developers aiming to enhance the region's accessibility and appeal.

International tourism has become one of the sectors of the global economy most affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. The purpose of the study is to identify the main features of the development of the tourism industry of the Republic of Belarus in 2017–2021, as well as to assess the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on international and domestic tourism of the republic. Quantitative indicators reflecting the development of tourism in the Republic of Belarus in 2020 fell from 5 to 10 times. In 2021, they mostly began to recover, but only some of the indicators, mainly related to domestic tourism, reached the level of the pre-pandemic period. In the structure of domestic and inbound tourism, there was a decrease in the share of sports and health tourism in favor of recreational and other types of tourism. The volume of inbound tourism fell significantly more than outbound tourism, especially for tourists outside the CIS countries. In the ratio of foreign tourist flows in the regions of the republic, the share of the Grodno region has sharply decreased from 25.9 to 0.4 %, and the flow to a number of other regions has also noticeably decreased. Almost 90 % of all tourists began to go to the Brest region and Minsk.

This study investigates the impact of domestic and international tourism on economic complexity, a crucial determinant of economic resilience and growth. While tourism is widely recognised for its role in economic development, its specific effects on a nation's economic complexity – a measure of an economy's ability to produce diverse and sophisticated products – remain underexplored. Motivated by this gap, we hypothesise that domestic tourism and international tourism positively influence economic complexity, with effects varying across different income levels. We apply dynamic panel data models to address potential endogeneity issues using a comprehensive dataset of 123 economies, spanning 45 high-income, 33 upper-middle-income, and 45 lower-middle-income countries over two decades. Our findings reveal that domestic and international tourism expenditure significantly enhances economic complexity globally, with domestic tourism having a consistent positive effect across all income groups. In contrast, international tourism positively impacts lower – and upper-middle-income economies but has a negative effect in high-income economies. These results highlight tourism's nuanced role as a driver of economic complexity, offering empirical support for tourism-led development policies. The study provides valuable insights for policymakers and researchers on leveraging tourism for sustainable economic development, emphasising the need for tailored strategies based on income levels.

The purpose of this study was to determine the behaviour of domestic tourists towards destinations and tourism services in KwaZulu-Natal in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. Numerous studies confirm that the tourism industry is prone to unforeseen circumstances. Globally, the pandemic has developed a radical and inescapable change in the world and has had a severe impact on the tourism industry as it witnessed a significant shift in travel behaviour both locally and internationally. Internationally, governments imposed strict regulations to curb the spread of the pandemic such as closing their borders and restricting international travel. Equally, domestic travel was restricted as there were national lockdowns implemented which limited peoples’ movements within their country of residence. Hence, the COVID-19 pandemic adjusted how domestic leisure tourists plan their travel and travel behaviour when preparing for their leisure trips. According to the literature, during a pandemic, tourists prefer going to places that are remote and not crowded while some seek destinations that include technological innovations to eliminate human contact. Furthermore, the literature shows that whilst there are several factors that influence the behaviour of tourists’, this study focused on the social, situational, personal, and economic factors and these factors fall under external and internal factors. There are numerous scholars focusing on international tourist behaviour, however, limited literature is available regarding domestic tourist behaviour especially with the KwaZulu-Natal context. This study adopted a convergent mixed- method approach by using a purposive sample of 10 tourism role-players that represented the qualitative data as well as a snowball sample of 89 domestic leisure tourists representing the quantitative data. Primary data was obtained through the administration of online questionnaires as well as through conducting virtual interviews. The quantitative data was analysed using SPSS and the qualitative data was analysed using NVIVO. According to the findings, there were several changes in domestic tourist behaviour during the pandemic. The study highlights risk aversion behaviour and extreme safety precautions from domestic tourists as a primary priority when making holiday bookings during a pandemic. Furthermore, both qualitative and quantitative data reveal that many domestic tourists experienced financial difficulties that led to booking cancellations and lesser participation in tourism offerings amidst the pandemic. Moreover, the primary and the secondary data concur that there was a greater preference for domestic travel during and after the pandemic. Notably, there was a minority of young domestic tourists who still preferred crowded spaces amid the pandemic. This study provides opportunities for Destination Marketing Organisations (DMOs) and tourism role-players to focus on economic and psychosocial sustainable strategies that will promote domestic tourism during a pandemic.

Domestic tourism is a critical part of tourism development in Rwanda. However, most of the government’s efforts have been concentrated on the development of international tourism. This focus has resulted in considerable growth in the country’s most significant contributor to the national economy. While the impact of domestic tourism has been addressed in the latest developed Rwanda’s National Tourism Strategy, the initiatives set forward have had minimal effects. This paper aimed to address the issue of an increased focus on domestic tourism contribution in developing the economy of Rwanda besides international tourism. The rationale for this paper supports a strong motivation for a more dedicated approach by Rwanda’s tourism stakeholders (public and private) to develop the country’s domestic tourism market alongside the international market with reference to the national parks of Rwanda. The population under this study was composed of three different groups of respondents at three national parks in Rwanda. These were local residents living adjacent to the three national parks under study; the park authorities and government officials (policymakers) in tourism and conservation-related matters, and tourism and conservation experts. The researcher developed a structured questionnaire that was administered to the selected respondents. The administration of the questionnaire was done by the researcher with the help of three research assistants. The researcher used descriptive analysis to analyse the data. The data collected using the open-ended questions were analysed using content analysis. The study established that domestic tourism is yet to be developed in Rwanda. The study also reported that domestic tourism has the potential of leading to significant economic development by supplementing revenue generated by foreign tourists

The purpose of the study is to identify the tourist preferences of Russians for the period 2004–2021 and their change under the influence of modern challenges. The study is based on the analysis of an array of statistical data on organized tourism for the period 2004–2021 in the context of federal districts and regions of the Russian Federation. The study used methods of economic analysis, general scientific, as well as geographical and statistical methods; median values were calculated. The study made it possible to form a general idea of the main vacation destinations of Russian citizens and their development trends, as well as the dynamics of tourist preferences of Russians under the influence of economic, geopolitical and other factors. It has been revealed that there are significant differences in the dynamics of domestic and international tourist flows: domestic tourism is characterized by a stable trend line, international tourism – by significant fluctuations caused by the influence of modern challenges. Among the federal districts, the North-Western is the leader in terms of intensity of both domestic and international tourism in 2019 and 2021. The North Caucasus District occupies the opposite position. Southern is the only district where there was a predominance of the intensity of domestic tourism over international tourism. 14 destinations were identified in the tourist preferences of Russians by country for the period 2004–2021. It is shown how the challenges of our time and the variety of operating factors are reflected in the dynamics, volumes and shares of Russian organized tourists receiving destinations. The results obtained allow us to form a general idea of the main areas of recreation and trends in their development, as well as the dynamics of tourist preferences of Russians at a country level. The practical application of the proposed approach will expand the possible options for management decisions.

A picture is worth a thousand words. User-generated photos (UGPs) are increasingly accompanying online reviews of hotels. This article draws on media richness theory to estimate the effects of UGPs on hotel reviews’ helpfulness. Based on a sample of 1,159,590 valid reviews with 464,316 photos, we utilized an integrated analytical model incorporating both econometric analyses and image-processing techniques. The results show that reviews accompanied by UGPs are generally rated as more helpful than those with textual content only. Furthermore, photos showing guestroom objects were rated as more helpful than those showing food & beverages. Finally, the positive effects of UGPs on review helpfulness were especially prominent for hotels with lower prices and negative reviews. This study adds new insights to the online review literature and advances the methodological approach in analyzing unstructured user-generated content. This study provides important implications for hotel managers and online booking platforms regarding UGP management.

A large number of research results show that a place's tourism image is an important factor affecting international tourists' choice of tourism destinations and their willingness to travel. In recent years, the Chinese government has launched a series of new tourism strategies to enhance and shape China's national tourism brand by launching a large number of tourism activities, thereby attracting domestic and foreign tourists to a certain extent. However, from the data point of view, the development of China's inbound tourism has gradually weakened in recent years, and the increase in the number of inbound tourists has stabilized, indicating that the current national tourism brand built by China has not yet exerted sufficient influence on a global scale. World-wide visibility is still low. Therefore, from the perspective of foreign tourists, it is very meaningful to explore the generation mechanism of China's national tourism image and cognitive form. From the perspective of the international tourists' urban tourism image of Haikou under social media, based on the existing literature, through the use of literature analysis, network mining and text analysis, this paper analyzes in detail the perception of Haikou by international tourists. City tourism image. And based on this, the city tourism image of Haikou City is studied in detail, and the city tourism image of Haikou City is explored from the perspective of international tourists. This paper mainly analyzes the consumption demand and behavior of international tourists in Haikou City, grasps the existing tourism advantages of urban tourism in Haikou City, and analyzes the reasons for the existing shortcomings such as low international influence, insufficient tourism brand characteristics and insufficient tourism facilities. And propose corresponding improvement suggestions. To enrich international tourists' research literature on China's national tourism image, and to promote Haikou's overseas tourist tourism business, with a view to building Hainan Island into a world-class international tourism destination.

Information at tourism destinations. Importance and cross-cultural differences between international and domestic tourists

This study has been prepared pursuant to resolution 100 (IV) adopted by the General Assembly at its fourth session (Rome, September 1981) concerning the Organization’s general programme of work for the period 1982-1983, prepared by the Secretary-General. It was entered as a special activity under the heading “Sociological effects of tourism” of the programme. The aim of this study is as follows: “To analyse the varying social effects of domestic tourism using appropriate techniques and disciplines – its costs and direct or indirect social benefits; to show why domestic tourism is more wide-spread than international tourism. The study will examine the means through which administrations and public authorities can contribute to domestic tourism and its devel-opment. “Taking into account” that at least 80 per cent of world tourism movements stem from domestic tourism, the study will also examine the results of the seminar on domestic tourism convened by IUOTO at Ottawa.