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Community attitudes to tourism
Communityattitudes to tourism A comparativeanalysis Peter E. Murphy To manage tourism in popular urban destinations, information regarding local residents’ attitudes and preferences is needed. This paper presents a comparative study of three different types of destination area, seeking community reactions to the industry and ways in which such information may guide future strategies. A discriminant analysis shows that there are two underlying functions that distinguish the three towns; none of them has the ideal community attitudes towards tourism. The aesthetics and community impact of local tourism are identified as major concerns in the three towns, and their relative position on these two functions is used to provide some elementary guidance lo improve the industry’s local image.
Peter E. Murphy is at the Department of Geography. University of Victoria, Victoria, BC. Canada. The author wishes to acknowledge the financial support of a Canada Council grant which made the fieldwork and data collection possible, and the cooperation of the three communities involved in the study.
The growth of mass tourism has brought great pressure on certain destination areas and a call for some form of management to make these pressures more bearable. Problems of congestion, land use conflict, and erosion are beginning to be tackled in natural landscapes, using resource concepts such as multiple-use and carrying capacity.’ But where similar issues arise in an urban context, such solutions appear more elusive because of the added complexity of local residents, who see their community invaded and changed by tides of visitors. Doxey has summarised the situation as an irritation continuum, where “in the minds of residents, the outsider represents a challenge to the life style of the destination”.* Hence, if we are to move toward a management goal for urban tourism destinations, it becomes necessary to consider the attitudes of local residents to tourism development, and to search for ways of integrating the public in those development decisions that affect their community. The purpose of this paper is to examine the attitudes and perceptions of residents in various types of urban destination areas, to see if they offer any explanation concerning local reactions to tourism development, and provide any guidelines for future management strategies. It is noted that past surveys and studies3 often revealed a dichotomy of benefits and disadvantages associated with tourism, and it will be informative to see if the situation is influenced by the type and form of tourism adopted by a destination area. Accordingly, it was decided to compare objectively three distinctively different types of tourism centre, to see if their residents’ attitudes and local management options varied according to the emphasis they had developed.
Research I. US Forest Service, Outdoor Recreation Master Plan for the Wind River Range of the Shoshone National Forest (Shoshone National Forest, Wyoming, USDA Forest Service, 1964); Rorke Bryan, Much is Taken, Much Remains (North Scituate, Mass, Duxbury Press, 1973), pages 281-286; and John H. Burde and Joseph Lenzini, “Timber harvest and aesthetic quality: can they coexist?“, in D.E. Hawkins, E.L. Shafer, J.M. Rovelstad, eds, Tourism Planning and Development Issues, (Washington, DC, George Washington University, 1980), pages 121-l 32.
Ol43-2516/81/030189-7SO2.00
design
A destination area classification that can be used to differentiate various types of tourism centre is provided by the industry’s typology of visitors, namely ‘day trippers’, ‘short-stay’, and ‘long-stay’ visitors. A day-trip centre, with its characteristic high day-time visitor volumes and limited overnight stops, provides a great deal of activity but restricted interaction and spending within the community at large. A short-stay centre is associated with touring holidays, where visitors spend one or two nights at a regional centre before moving on. Thus there is more opportunity for economic and social contact with the community and, because of its centrality, such a town often possesses a significant service sector which reduces its reliance on tourism. A long-stay centre is associated with the traditional holiday resort where people spend a week or two of their
0 1981 IPC Business
Press
189
Community attitudes to tourism
2. George V. Doxey, “A causation theory of visitor-resident irritants: methodology and research inferences”, The Impact of Tourism, Sixth Annual Conference Proceedings of the Travel Research Association, San Diego, California, September 1975, page 195. 3. P.A. Management Consultants Ltd, The Marketing and Development of Tourism in the English Lakes Counties (London, English Tourist Board, 1973), pages 71-74; Sir George Young, Tourism: Blessing or Blight? (Penguin, 1973); D. Affeld. “Social aspects of the development of tourism”, Planning
and Develooment of the Tourist Industry in’the EC2 Region (New York, United Nations, 1976), pages 109-l 15; and Frank Wolman & Associates, Action Plan - Yukon
Tourism Response to the Alaska Highway Pipeline (Whitehorse, Yukon, Department of Tourism, Yukon Territorial Government. 1978). Pages 5-26. 4. Rob&t-Waterhouse, “Torbay: correctina a faultv imeression”. The Guardian Week&, 18 January’1 98 1, page 22. 5. Pilot surveys were conducted in each community, involving interviews with the tourist sector and local government officials. These were later supplemented by a postal survey that had an average return rate of 66%. Not all the responses gathered were used in this analysis because no missing data could be handled for the selected variables. 6. R.J. Johnston, Multivariate
Statistical Ana!vsis in Geograph.v (London,
190
Longrnan,
1978), page 237.
annual vacation. As the resort title implies, such towns are often economically dependent on tourism, and are more susceptible to the vagaries of weather and seasonal cycles than the other two centres. The day-trip centre is represented in this study by Windsor, with its royal castle and scenic stretch of the River Thames. Overseas visitors staying in London frequently take day-trip coach tours, combining visits to Windsor Castle and Hampton Court. Domestic visitors come for day excursions in their own cars and combine a visit to the Castle with a picnic along the Thames or in Great Windsor Park. The result is an extremely congested city centre during the day, but quiet evenings as there are few hotels or other facilities needed to cater for the excursionist. The short-stay centre is represented by the city of York, a historic regional centre that provides an overnight stop for domestic visitors to the Yorkshire Dales and Moors, in addition to its own attractions. For overseas visitors, the medieval walled city with its famous minster and museums has become a popular midway stopover in the London-Edinburgh ‘milk-run’. Because of this demand for overnight accommodation, York offers a wider selection of facilities than are available in Windsor, enabling the community to benefit through increased employment and amenities. The long-stay centre is represented by Torquay which, despite being part of Torbay, remains distinctively different. “Torquay, at the dramatic north end of the bay, is Britain’s closest approximation to a Mediterranean resort.“4 Unlike the previous examples, tourism is the major economic activity in this case, and local government has combined with the private sector to enhance facilities and extend the season. The result is a rich complement of hotels, sport, and entertainment facilities that supplement the natural attractions ofthe area to create a true community industry. To compare and assess the impact of these different types of tourism on the local residents and their subsequent attitudes towards the industry, data were collected from each centre via interviews and mail questionnaires in the spring of 1977.5 A total of 283 usable responses were obtained, 68 from Windsor, 89 from Torquay, and 126 from York. Three aspects of community feeling towards local tourism developments were examined (Table 1). An indication ofthe industry’s community status was sought through questions relating to its impact and the respondents’ assessment of local tourism planning. Personal attitudes towards tourism were examined via a series of attitude statements covering a variety of issues. A respondent’s personal profile and its potential relevance were examined in terms of selected social and residential characteristics. To provide an objective method of comparing the resident responses in the three tourist centres, a discriminant analysis was applied to the data. Discriminant analysis can be used to test and generalise hypotheses, by investigating whether a certain set of related variables can successfully discriminate between groups of observations.6 In this case, the hypothesis is that community attitudes will vary according to the type of tourism destination area. It is predicted that the day-trip centre of Windsor will have the poorest community attitude because it has the worst of all worlds (all the problems of congestion and few of the employment or amenity opportunities that the industry can offer). A mixed response is expected in the long-stay centre of Torquay. with a favourable
International
Journal
of Tourism
Management
September
198 I
Communit_v attitudes to tourism Table
1.
Variables
Group Community
used
in discriminant
analysis
of three
tourist
towns
Variables Status
1. Number
of benefits
2. Number
of disadvantages
3. Whether
town
4. Whether
respondent
recorded.
should
recorded. attract
happy
more with
visitors.
local
tourism
planning. 1. “Tourism
Attitude
means
available
for
2. “Providing
more
local
leisure
facilities
are
people.”
tourist
facilities
is a burden
on the
rates.” 3. “Ordinary tourism
people
4. “Tourists ment 5. “The Profile
don’t
feel
any
benefits
from
at all.” interfere
of their town
1. Personal
own
with
the
residents’
enjoy-
town.”
is better
kept because
of its tourism.”
connections
with
industry.
from
tourism
2. Age. 3. Length
of residence.
4. Occupation. 5. Distance
of residence
focus.
response being tempered by the seasonality and dominating aspect of the industry. The most positive attitude is expected in York, where its short-stay emphasis provides a more balanced tourism development that can be integrated into the local economy.
Results The discriminant analysis results indicate that the three tourist centres can indeed be differentiated on the basis of their community attitudes toward tourism development. Furthermore, the stepwise procedure makes it possible to identify the relative importance of individual variables in this differentiation process (Table 2). The variable which accounted for the largest separation of the three tourist centres was whether or not the respondents were happy with their existing level of tourism planning. Awareness of tourism and the need to plan this activity is apparently a major consideration in the minds of the respondents and confirms the importance of tourism management in all three selected centres. Happiness with tourism planning differentiated York from both Torquay and Windsor (significant F ratios of 13.16 and 11 a22 respectively), but it failed to distinguish statistically between Torquay and Windsor (insignificant F ratio of 0.08). This indicates the York residents were more favourably disposed to their tourism management than were the residents of Torquay and Windsor. The entry of the second variable (industry connections) permitted a successful differentiation of all three centres. Its importance is probably attributable to the way in which tourism permeated the Torquay community far more than that of Windsor or York. The third variable entered was whether or not tourism leads to a better kept town. This illustrates the importance of appearance to residents, and again York can be distinguished from the other two centres. Checks of the raw data revealed both Torquay and Windsor had more negative responses towards this variable than did York.
International
Journal
of Tourism
Management
September
198 1
191
Community
attitudes to tourism Stepwise
Table
2.
Step
Variable
discriminant
entered
analysis Between-group
Wilk’s
F ratios
Lambda
with
tourism
TorquayYork
0.08 *
13.16
1 1.22
0.856
5.52
12.87
5.61
0.819
3.69*
10.87
6.66 5.71
0.925
Windsor-York
1.
Happy
2.
Connections
3.
Better
4.
Ordinary
people
0.793
4.39
8.28
5.
Number
of benefits
0.761
5.21
6.83
5.23
6.
Interfere
0.74 1
4.55
6.73
4.64
7.
Attract
0712
4.16
7.10
4.38
8.
Occupation
0.691
3.86
6.36
4.65
with
planning
Torquay-Windsor
industry
kept
more
people
9.
Number
0665
4.03
5.64
4.94
10.
Burden
on the rates
0643
4.38
5.20
4.67
of residence
0626
3.97
5.06
4.73
0.609
3.63
5.09
4.70
0.598
3.59
4.68
4.54
11.
Length
12.
Distance
13.
More
of disadvantages
from focus
leisure
facilities
N = 283. *Nor significant at p = 0.0 1.
Overall, two observations can be made about the results in Table 2. First, a successful differentiation of the three centres required many variables. Of the fourteen variables submitted to analysis, all but “age” were entered into the final equation. Second, each area of investigation examined in the research design was represented in the first three variables, indicating the significance of each area. These observations reveal the complexity of community attitudes toward tourism, but the analysis can assist in our understanding of these multifaceted relationships by identifying the major underlying functions that account for the differentiation. The final equation produces two discriminant functions (Table 3). These can be identified using the rotated standardised coeffcients of the thirteen variables to provide a description of the generated functions. Table 3 shows the first function has been identified as an aesthetics function, since it is positively associated with a better kept town (0.581) and negatively related to the desire to attract more visitors (-0.505). The second function can be described as community impact because the three highest absolute loadings were on community and economically related variables. Confirmation that these two functions successfully differentiated between the three tourist centres is indicated by the between-group F ratio they generated for the three towns (Table 3). York has been significantly differentiated from Torquay and Windsor, with respective ratios of 4.68 and 4.54. Torquay and Windsor have a weaker but still significant separation of 3.59. This comes as no surprise, given the slow separation process that unfolded for these two centres during the stepwise procedure. Another method of determining the success of a discriminant analysis is to examine the degree to which it successfully locates individuals in their original subset (tourist centre) using the two generated functions as the sole selection criteria. The aesthetics and community impact functions correctly classified 63% of the respondents, which is a satisfactory result for social science research
192
International
Journal
of Tourism
Management
September
198
1
Community Table
3.
Discriminant
Rotated
standardised
Community
attitudes to tourism
functions
and
between-group
coefficients
on:
Function
analysis 1
Function
2
status
Number
of benefits
-0.2
Number
of disadvantages
-0.305
Attract
more
Happy
with
11
-0.505
visitors tourism
0.214
0.233
planning
-0.469 -0.371 -0.219
Attitude More
leisure
Burden Ordinary
0.214
facilities
on the
0.122
people
0.306
Interfere Better
0.581
kept
0.319 -0.434
-0.120
rates
0.412 -0.310 0.026
Profile Connections Age Length
with
industry
-0.335 * 0.407
of residence
0.445
Occupation Distance
from
tourism
Between
group F ratios
focus
Windsor
Torquay
0.315
0.406 * -0.009 0.335 -0.128
Windsor
3.594 (0.000)
York
*Variable solution.
not entered
into stepwise
4.678
4.536
(0.000)
(0.000)
where there are so many extraneous factors. This indicates that the tourism attitudes and concerns of the majority of residents have been identified, and can now be examined in terms of future management implications.
Discussion The varied tourism development of the three study areas and their community reaction can provide some direction to future strategies involving destination area management. Despite the complex nature of the industry and its community interactions, the analysis was able to simplify community attitudes into two over-riding concerns. The aesthetics and community impact functions confirm the importance of physical and economic impacts and indicate, furthermore, that relative performance in these areas can be used to distinguish between various centres. None of the tourist centres investigated was in the ideal position of being positively related to both discriminant functions, and their relative position in Figure 1 provides an opportunity to test the hypothesised interrelations for the three centres. York and Torquay are in a relatively good situation, being positive on one function, but Windsor, as predicted, is in the worst situation, recording a negative association for both functions. Thus the predicted pattern is partially correct, but the results reveal all the centres require some improvement in community attitude. The management implications of these results suggest that York and Torquay need to improve their community relations in certain directions, while Windsor must
International
Journal
of Tourism
Management
September
198 1
193
Community
attitudes to tourism
L-
I
Function 2
:’
-3
I
I
Torquoy Wmdsw
- - -
York
.
I
Figure
Function
1.
-
-
-
-
.
I
I
-3
-2
Group
I
-I
centroids
and
I
1
I
I
0
I
2
3
dispersion
for three
tourist
centres
consider major strategy revisions if it is to develop a more positive community attitude toward the industry. York’s tourism has focused attention on, and thus aided, the city’s heritage and appearance. Hence its positive rating on the aesthetics function comes as no surprise. But its residents are evidentIy concerned about the degree of community return York is receiving from the industry. Their negative score on this function, and comments added to the questionnaires, reveal widespread scepticism concerning the economic benefits. Unless you are either a hotelier, cafe proprietor or shopkeeper, you derive no benefit (financial) from tourism. But I stifi like them! As far as York is concerned, tourism is a burden to the ratepayer. We subsidise many of the activities. Such personal observations and the statistical analysis suggests more attention should be given to demonstrating the city’s economic benefits from the industry’s contributions to taxes and employment. In contrast, Torquay’s economic dependence on tourism and its more seasonal business makes its community impact more obvious, although not always popular. While the majority of respondents were positively disposed toward the industry, one who refused to answer the questionnaire still acknowledged its economic significance. Of course tourism affects us all - but mainly it keeps the vast majority of us on our knees . . . The mere mention of tourism gives me a pain in the neck. I’m disabled, I don’t live on Social Security - but Torquay and the tourist industry make sure that I keep my place and that I and many more like me are kept in reserve
for any low paid jobs that may come with the season.
Despite this economic significance, many residents are questioning the industry’s impact on the quality of their life. The penetration of residential areas by spot development, such as guest houses and fast food outlets, and problems of rowdyism and vandalism. were some of the concerns expressed in the questionnaire responses.
194
International
Journal
of Tourism
Management
September
198 1
Community
attitudes to tourism
I am only too happy visitors should enjoy our beautiful country, but I am not happy with their late night noise, and behaviour, litter and conjestion [sic] of our roads, Too many of the younger and rowdier generation with too little respect for cleanliness, good manners and the Older Generation, Loud noise and vandalism outside my previous address forced me to sell up and move. Evidently tourism development in this community needs to pay more attention to local life-styles. Firmer controls over business intrusion and operating hours could help to alleviate friction and preserve the aesthetic beauty of this area. Windsor’s residents were unhappy about both aesthetics and community impact. They disliked the concentration on the Castle, which brought about excessive congestion, litter and change to the town centre. Tourism in Windsor brings nothing but nuisance value to the town. Tour operators seem to be interested in the Castle, not in Windsor. Furthermore, they cited price gouging, the loss of local food stores, and the Castle’s monopoly of the tourist revenue as major negative impacts. Local people shop in Slough because of poor parking, congested shops and souvenir and antique shops which are of little use to Windsorians. The Castle is the major attraction. It brings them in, but Windsor doesn’t get any rates [local property taxes] or income from them. Here a strategy of diversification could help both problems. The spreading of tourism business to other attractions (such as Windsor Safari Park, The Household Cavalry Museum, Clivedon House, and Eton College) could disperse the crowds and expenditures more evenly throughout the community. Promotion of more attractions would encourage longer stays and provide added impetus for more tourist accommodation and amenities. While such observations and suggestions should be ragarded as preliminary generalisations, due to the limited sample sizes and focus on only one aspect of tourism management, it is still felt that the discriminant analysis has provided a more objective means of appraising and comparing community attitudes towards tourism than the previous reliance on researcher observations. The results show residents develop identifiable attitudes towards tourism, and that these can vary according to the type of development undertaken in their town. Identification of the aesthetics and community impact functions indicates residents are primarily interested in two features of tourism: the ways in which it can develop local amenity resources and provide additional income for the community. The results, however, demonstrate that each function is a two-edged sword which will require appropriate management and control if development is to present benefits rather than problems to the community. Future management strategies should consider not only the general issues of aesthetics and community impact, but apply any proposals on a contextual basis, relating remedies and developments to specific community desires and resources. For after all, if tourism is to develop within a community, the hosts of the ‘host industry’ must become willing partners.
International
Journal
of Tourism
Management
September
198 1
195
Peter E. Murphy is at the Department of Geography. University of Victoria, Victoria, BC. Canada. The author wishes to acknowledge the financial support of a Canada Council grant which made the fieldwork and data collection possible, and the cooperation of the three communities involved in the study.
The growth of mass tourism has brought great pressure on certain destination areas and a call for some form of management to make these pressures more bearable. Problems of congestion, land use conflict, and erosion are beginning to be tackled in natural landscapes, using resource concepts such as multiple-use and carrying capacity.’ But where similar issues arise in an urban context, such solutions appear more elusive because of the added complexity of local residents, who see their community invaded and changed by tides of visitors. Doxey has summarised the situation as an irritation continuum, where “in the minds of residents, the outsider represents a challenge to the life style of the destination”.* Hence, if we are to move toward a management goal for urban tourism destinations, it becomes necessary to consider the attitudes of local residents to tourism development, and to search for ways of integrating the public in those development decisions that affect their community. The purpose of this paper is to examine the attitudes and perceptions of residents in various types of urban destination areas, to see if they offer any explanation concerning local reactions to tourism development, and provide any guidelines for future management strategies. It is noted that past surveys and studies3 often revealed a dichotomy of benefits and disadvantages associated with tourism, and it will be informative to see if the situation is influenced by the type and form of tourism adopted by a destination area. Accordingly, it was decided to compare objectively three distinctively different types of tourism centre, to see if their residents’ attitudes and local management options varied according to the emphasis they had developed.
Research I. US Forest Service, Outdoor Recreation Master Plan for the Wind River Range of the Shoshone National Forest (Shoshone National Forest, Wyoming, USDA Forest Service, 1964); Rorke Bryan, Much is Taken, Much Remains (North Scituate, Mass, Duxbury Press, 1973), pages 281-286; and John H. Burde and Joseph Lenzini, “Timber harvest and aesthetic quality: can they coexist?“, in D.E. Hawkins, E.L. Shafer, J.M. Rovelstad, eds, Tourism Planning and Development Issues, (Washington, DC, George Washington University, 1980), pages 121-l 32.
Ol43-2516/81/030189-7SO2.00
design
A destination area classification that can be used to differentiate various types of tourism centre is provided by the industry’s typology of visitors, namely ‘day trippers’, ‘short-stay’, and ‘long-stay’ visitors. A day-trip centre, with its characteristic high day-time visitor volumes and limited overnight stops, provides a great deal of activity but restricted interaction and spending within the community at large. A short-stay centre is associated with touring holidays, where visitors spend one or two nights at a regional centre before moving on. Thus there is more opportunity for economic and social contact with the community and, because of its centrality, such a town often possesses a significant service sector which reduces its reliance on tourism. A long-stay centre is associated with the traditional holiday resort where people spend a week or two of their
0 1981 IPC Business
Press
189
Community attitudes to tourism
2. George V. Doxey, “A causation theory of visitor-resident irritants: methodology and research inferences”, The Impact of Tourism, Sixth Annual Conference Proceedings of the Travel Research Association, San Diego, California, September 1975, page 195. 3. P.A. Management Consultants Ltd, The Marketing and Development of Tourism in the English Lakes Counties (London, English Tourist Board, 1973), pages 71-74; Sir George Young, Tourism: Blessing or Blight? (Penguin, 1973); D. Affeld. “Social aspects of the development of tourism”, Planning
and Develooment of the Tourist Industry in’the EC2 Region (New York, United Nations, 1976), pages 109-l 15; and Frank Wolman & Associates, Action Plan - Yukon
Tourism Response to the Alaska Highway Pipeline (Whitehorse, Yukon, Department of Tourism, Yukon Territorial Government. 1978). Pages 5-26. 4. Rob&t-Waterhouse, “Torbay: correctina a faultv imeression”. The Guardian Week&, 18 January’1 98 1, page 22. 5. Pilot surveys were conducted in each community, involving interviews with the tourist sector and local government officials. These were later supplemented by a postal survey that had an average return rate of 66%. Not all the responses gathered were used in this analysis because no missing data could be handled for the selected variables. 6. R.J. Johnston, Multivariate
Statistical Ana!vsis in Geograph.v (London,
190
Longrnan,
1978), page 237.
annual vacation. As the resort title implies, such towns are often economically dependent on tourism, and are more susceptible to the vagaries of weather and seasonal cycles than the other two centres. The day-trip centre is represented in this study by Windsor, with its royal castle and scenic stretch of the River Thames. Overseas visitors staying in London frequently take day-trip coach tours, combining visits to Windsor Castle and Hampton Court. Domestic visitors come for day excursions in their own cars and combine a visit to the Castle with a picnic along the Thames or in Great Windsor Park. The result is an extremely congested city centre during the day, but quiet evenings as there are few hotels or other facilities needed to cater for the excursionist. The short-stay centre is represented by the city of York, a historic regional centre that provides an overnight stop for domestic visitors to the Yorkshire Dales and Moors, in addition to its own attractions. For overseas visitors, the medieval walled city with its famous minster and museums has become a popular midway stopover in the London-Edinburgh ‘milk-run’. Because of this demand for overnight accommodation, York offers a wider selection of facilities than are available in Windsor, enabling the community to benefit through increased employment and amenities. The long-stay centre is represented by Torquay which, despite being part of Torbay, remains distinctively different. “Torquay, at the dramatic north end of the bay, is Britain’s closest approximation to a Mediterranean resort.“4 Unlike the previous examples, tourism is the major economic activity in this case, and local government has combined with the private sector to enhance facilities and extend the season. The result is a rich complement of hotels, sport, and entertainment facilities that supplement the natural attractions ofthe area to create a true community industry. To compare and assess the impact of these different types of tourism on the local residents and their subsequent attitudes towards the industry, data were collected from each centre via interviews and mail questionnaires in the spring of 1977.5 A total of 283 usable responses were obtained, 68 from Windsor, 89 from Torquay, and 126 from York. Three aspects of community feeling towards local tourism developments were examined (Table 1). An indication ofthe industry’s community status was sought through questions relating to its impact and the respondents’ assessment of local tourism planning. Personal attitudes towards tourism were examined via a series of attitude statements covering a variety of issues. A respondent’s personal profile and its potential relevance were examined in terms of selected social and residential characteristics. To provide an objective method of comparing the resident responses in the three tourist centres, a discriminant analysis was applied to the data. Discriminant analysis can be used to test and generalise hypotheses, by investigating whether a certain set of related variables can successfully discriminate between groups of observations.6 In this case, the hypothesis is that community attitudes will vary according to the type of tourism destination area. It is predicted that the day-trip centre of Windsor will have the poorest community attitude because it has the worst of all worlds (all the problems of congestion and few of the employment or amenity opportunities that the industry can offer). A mixed response is expected in the long-stay centre of Torquay. with a favourable
International
Journal
of Tourism
Management
September
198 I
Communit_v attitudes to tourism Table
1.
Variables
Group Community
used
in discriminant
analysis
of three
tourist
towns
Variables Status
1. Number
of benefits
2. Number
of disadvantages
3. Whether
town
4. Whether
respondent
recorded.
should
recorded. attract
happy
more with
visitors.
local
tourism
planning. 1. “Tourism
Attitude
means
available
for
2. “Providing
more
local
leisure
facilities
are
people.”
tourist
facilities
is a burden
on the
rates.” 3. “Ordinary tourism
people
4. “Tourists ment 5. “The Profile
don’t
feel
any
benefits
from
at all.” interfere
of their town
1. Personal
own
with
the
residents’
enjoy-
town.”
is better
kept because
of its tourism.”
connections
with
industry.
from
tourism
2. Age. 3. Length
of residence.
4. Occupation. 5. Distance
of residence
focus.
response being tempered by the seasonality and dominating aspect of the industry. The most positive attitude is expected in York, where its short-stay emphasis provides a more balanced tourism development that can be integrated into the local economy.
Results The discriminant analysis results indicate that the three tourist centres can indeed be differentiated on the basis of their community attitudes toward tourism development. Furthermore, the stepwise procedure makes it possible to identify the relative importance of individual variables in this differentiation process (Table 2). The variable which accounted for the largest separation of the three tourist centres was whether or not the respondents were happy with their existing level of tourism planning. Awareness of tourism and the need to plan this activity is apparently a major consideration in the minds of the respondents and confirms the importance of tourism management in all three selected centres. Happiness with tourism planning differentiated York from both Torquay and Windsor (significant F ratios of 13.16 and 11 a22 respectively), but it failed to distinguish statistically between Torquay and Windsor (insignificant F ratio of 0.08). This indicates the York residents were more favourably disposed to their tourism management than were the residents of Torquay and Windsor. The entry of the second variable (industry connections) permitted a successful differentiation of all three centres. Its importance is probably attributable to the way in which tourism permeated the Torquay community far more than that of Windsor or York. The third variable entered was whether or not tourism leads to a better kept town. This illustrates the importance of appearance to residents, and again York can be distinguished from the other two centres. Checks of the raw data revealed both Torquay and Windsor had more negative responses towards this variable than did York.
International
Journal
of Tourism
Management
September
198 1
191
Community
attitudes to tourism Stepwise
Table
2.
Step
Variable
discriminant
entered
analysis Between-group
Wilk’s
F ratios
Lambda
with
tourism
TorquayYork
0.08 *
13.16
1 1.22
0.856
5.52
12.87
5.61
0.819
3.69*
10.87
6.66 5.71
0.925
Windsor-York
1.
Happy
2.
Connections
3.
Better
4.
Ordinary
people
0.793
4.39
8.28
5.
Number
of benefits
0.761
5.21
6.83
5.23
6.
Interfere
0.74 1
4.55
6.73
4.64
7.
Attract
0712
4.16
7.10
4.38
8.
Occupation
0.691
3.86
6.36
4.65
with
planning
Torquay-Windsor
industry
kept
more
people
9.
Number
0665
4.03
5.64
4.94
10.
Burden
on the rates
0643
4.38
5.20
4.67
of residence
0626
3.97
5.06
4.73
0.609
3.63
5.09
4.70
0.598
3.59
4.68
4.54
11.
Length
12.
Distance
13.
More
of disadvantages
from focus
leisure
facilities
N = 283. *Nor significant at p = 0.0 1.
Overall, two observations can be made about the results in Table 2. First, a successful differentiation of the three centres required many variables. Of the fourteen variables submitted to analysis, all but “age” were entered into the final equation. Second, each area of investigation examined in the research design was represented in the first three variables, indicating the significance of each area. These observations reveal the complexity of community attitudes toward tourism, but the analysis can assist in our understanding of these multifaceted relationships by identifying the major underlying functions that account for the differentiation. The final equation produces two discriminant functions (Table 3). These can be identified using the rotated standardised coeffcients of the thirteen variables to provide a description of the generated functions. Table 3 shows the first function has been identified as an aesthetics function, since it is positively associated with a better kept town (0.581) and negatively related to the desire to attract more visitors (-0.505). The second function can be described as community impact because the three highest absolute loadings were on community and economically related variables. Confirmation that these two functions successfully differentiated between the three tourist centres is indicated by the between-group F ratio they generated for the three towns (Table 3). York has been significantly differentiated from Torquay and Windsor, with respective ratios of 4.68 and 4.54. Torquay and Windsor have a weaker but still significant separation of 3.59. This comes as no surprise, given the slow separation process that unfolded for these two centres during the stepwise procedure. Another method of determining the success of a discriminant analysis is to examine the degree to which it successfully locates individuals in their original subset (tourist centre) using the two generated functions as the sole selection criteria. The aesthetics and community impact functions correctly classified 63% of the respondents, which is a satisfactory result for social science research
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1
Community Table
3.
Discriminant
Rotated
standardised
Community
attitudes to tourism
functions
and
between-group
coefficients
on:
Function
analysis 1
Function
2
status
Number
of benefits
-0.2
Number
of disadvantages
-0.305
Attract
more
Happy
with
11
-0.505
visitors tourism
0.214
0.233
planning
-0.469 -0.371 -0.219
Attitude More
leisure
Burden Ordinary
0.214
facilities
on the
0.122
people
0.306
Interfere Better
0.581
kept
0.319 -0.434
-0.120
rates
0.412 -0.310 0.026
Profile Connections Age Length
with
industry
-0.335 * 0.407
of residence
0.445
Occupation Distance
from
tourism
Between
group F ratios
focus
Windsor
Torquay
0.315
0.406 * -0.009 0.335 -0.128
Windsor
3.594 (0.000)
York
*Variable solution.
not entered
into stepwise
4.678
4.536
(0.000)
(0.000)
where there are so many extraneous factors. This indicates that the tourism attitudes and concerns of the majority of residents have been identified, and can now be examined in terms of future management implications.
Discussion The varied tourism development of the three study areas and their community reaction can provide some direction to future strategies involving destination area management. Despite the complex nature of the industry and its community interactions, the analysis was able to simplify community attitudes into two over-riding concerns. The aesthetics and community impact functions confirm the importance of physical and economic impacts and indicate, furthermore, that relative performance in these areas can be used to distinguish between various centres. None of the tourist centres investigated was in the ideal position of being positively related to both discriminant functions, and their relative position in Figure 1 provides an opportunity to test the hypothesised interrelations for the three centres. York and Torquay are in a relatively good situation, being positive on one function, but Windsor, as predicted, is in the worst situation, recording a negative association for both functions. Thus the predicted pattern is partially correct, but the results reveal all the centres require some improvement in community attitude. The management implications of these results suggest that York and Torquay need to improve their community relations in certain directions, while Windsor must
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Community
attitudes to tourism
L-
I
Function 2
:’
-3
I
I
Torquoy Wmdsw
- - -
York
.
I
Figure
Function
1.
-
-
-
-
.
I
I
-3
-2
Group
I
-I
centroids
and
I
1
I
I
0
I
2
3
dispersion
for three
tourist
centres
consider major strategy revisions if it is to develop a more positive community attitude toward the industry. York’s tourism has focused attention on, and thus aided, the city’s heritage and appearance. Hence its positive rating on the aesthetics function comes as no surprise. But its residents are evidentIy concerned about the degree of community return York is receiving from the industry. Their negative score on this function, and comments added to the questionnaires, reveal widespread scepticism concerning the economic benefits. Unless you are either a hotelier, cafe proprietor or shopkeeper, you derive no benefit (financial) from tourism. But I stifi like them! As far as York is concerned, tourism is a burden to the ratepayer. We subsidise many of the activities. Such personal observations and the statistical analysis suggests more attention should be given to demonstrating the city’s economic benefits from the industry’s contributions to taxes and employment. In contrast, Torquay’s economic dependence on tourism and its more seasonal business makes its community impact more obvious, although not always popular. While the majority of respondents were positively disposed toward the industry, one who refused to answer the questionnaire still acknowledged its economic significance. Of course tourism affects us all - but mainly it keeps the vast majority of us on our knees . . . The mere mention of tourism gives me a pain in the neck. I’m disabled, I don’t live on Social Security - but Torquay and the tourist industry make sure that I keep my place and that I and many more like me are kept in reserve
for any low paid jobs that may come with the season.
Despite this economic significance, many residents are questioning the industry’s impact on the quality of their life. The penetration of residential areas by spot development, such as guest houses and fast food outlets, and problems of rowdyism and vandalism. were some of the concerns expressed in the questionnaire responses.
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Community
attitudes to tourism
I am only too happy visitors should enjoy our beautiful country, but I am not happy with their late night noise, and behaviour, litter and conjestion [sic] of our roads, Too many of the younger and rowdier generation with too little respect for cleanliness, good manners and the Older Generation, Loud noise and vandalism outside my previous address forced me to sell up and move. Evidently tourism development in this community needs to pay more attention to local life-styles. Firmer controls over business intrusion and operating hours could help to alleviate friction and preserve the aesthetic beauty of this area. Windsor’s residents were unhappy about both aesthetics and community impact. They disliked the concentration on the Castle, which brought about excessive congestion, litter and change to the town centre. Tourism in Windsor brings nothing but nuisance value to the town. Tour operators seem to be interested in the Castle, not in Windsor. Furthermore, they cited price gouging, the loss of local food stores, and the Castle’s monopoly of the tourist revenue as major negative impacts. Local people shop in Slough because of poor parking, congested shops and souvenir and antique shops which are of little use to Windsorians. The Castle is the major attraction. It brings them in, but Windsor doesn’t get any rates [local property taxes] or income from them. Here a strategy of diversification could help both problems. The spreading of tourism business to other attractions (such as Windsor Safari Park, The Household Cavalry Museum, Clivedon House, and Eton College) could disperse the crowds and expenditures more evenly throughout the community. Promotion of more attractions would encourage longer stays and provide added impetus for more tourist accommodation and amenities. While such observations and suggestions should be ragarded as preliminary generalisations, due to the limited sample sizes and focus on only one aspect of tourism management, it is still felt that the discriminant analysis has provided a more objective means of appraising and comparing community attitudes towards tourism than the previous reliance on researcher observations. The results show residents develop identifiable attitudes towards tourism, and that these can vary according to the type of development undertaken in their town. Identification of the aesthetics and community impact functions indicates residents are primarily interested in two features of tourism: the ways in which it can develop local amenity resources and provide additional income for the community. The results, however, demonstrate that each function is a two-edged sword which will require appropriate management and control if development is to present benefits rather than problems to the community. Future management strategies should consider not only the general issues of aesthetics and community impact, but apply any proposals on a contextual basis, relating remedies and developments to specific community desires and resources. For after all, if tourism is to develop within a community, the hosts of the ‘host industry’ must become willing partners.
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