Religious Tourist Motivation in Buddhist Mountain: The Case from China

Abstract

This study aims to develop a measurement scale assessing motivations of tourists traveling to religious sites within the Chinese context. Deploying quantitative methods in relation to Putuo Buddhist Mountain – one of the most visited Buddhist destinations in China, this study depicts 20 motivation attributes. Accordingly, the scale dimensionality of tourist motivation in the context of religious tourism is first revealed by an exploratory factor analysis and further validated by a confirmatory factor analysis. Consequently, three resultant constructs entailing religious belief, cultural enjoyment, and mental relaxation exhibit acceptable levels of reliability. Construct validity, including discriminant and convergent validity, is satisfactorily established. Furthermore, this study examines how tourists’ past experience and degree of religious belief affect the derived constructs that define the motivations of religious tourist. The results suggest that past experience significantly affects tourists’ motivation to achieve religious beliefs, while degree of tourist religious belief has a great impact on both their motivation to achieve religious beliefs and mental relaxation. Finally, according to motivation theory, religious beliefs and mental relaxation can be classified as push factors, while cultural enjoyment and one item belonging to religious beliefs are pull factors.