A Study of Factors Affecting Travel Decision Making of Tourists

Abstract

Tourism is considered as one of the major sources for creating employment opportunities, generating revenues and supporting culture and entertainment. Travel and tourism plays a vital role by associating themselves with other industries of Pakistan which leads to rise in foreign investment, opportunities of trade, investments in private, local development, and public infrastructure. This study aims to explore the influence of the factors (travel decision making, media, perceived risk, terrorism and safety & security) tourists’ decision making of tourists residing in Pakistan. This is a quantitative study, data was collected from 50 people using questionnaire at 5-point Likert Scale. Data was analysed using descriptive statistics and regression method. The results of this study depict that role of media, safety & security, and terrorism have significant impact on travel decision making. Within the context of Pakistan terrorism is always a highlighted area on which every tourist think a lot while making a destination choice. Particularly negative media coverage also has significant importance on travel decision making of a tourist. In Pakistani context, this study found that risk perception was supposed more than the actual risk because travel decision to a new place is always riskier somehow, therefore, it has no effect on travel decision making. Tourist develops an insight that what factor is more significant in travel decision making. This study recommends that media, safety and security and terrorism policies are critical for Pakistan to cater the number of tourist by helping them in travel decision making.