Abstract
Purpose Adventure activities have become the core products of many tourism destinations. Hiking, which is known to be a soft adventure activity, represents an especially important product for many tourism destinations around the globe and in the European Alps. However, little research has explored hikers’ underlying motivation and experiences, which are expected to differ from the hard adventure context, as mountain hiking provides a low risk, but high immersion. This paper aims to determine and explore the underlying dimensions and dynamics of mountain hikers’ soft adventure motivation (SAM). Design/methodology/approach A concurrent mixed-method design that builds on a quantitative survey (N = 379) and qualitative interviews (N = 14) was used to explore SAM factors. This study combined exploratory factor analysis and regression analysis with semi-structured interviews and template analysis. Findings The quantitative results provide six SAM factors and emphasize that “relaxation,” “socializing” and “discovery” contribute to hiking satisfaction, while “recognition” has adverse effects. By triangulating these findings with hikers’ experiences, this study underlines the associated recreational meaning of hiking and provides an in-depth qualitative discussion of SAM factors and the subordinate role of “recognition.” Originality/value The contribution of this paper is a refined understanding of SAM in the hiking context by emphasizing the recreational meaning of mountain hiking. As a result, this study adds an important missing link to previous outdoor tourism and leisure studies by showing the special composition and dynamics of SAM. The findings also support the creation of tailor-made touristic products.
Highlights
Hiking is a popular recreational activity that provides positive impacts on health and wellbeing and constitutes a core tourism product around the world (UNWTO, 2019; Gross and Sand, 2019)
This study aims to provide an improved understanding of mountain hikers’ soft adventure motivation (SAM) and discusses it in the light of associated experiences
exploratory factor analysis (EFA) lead to the identification of six motivation factors that explained 68.20% of the variance (Table 3)
Summary
Hiking is a popular recreational activity that provides positive impacts on health and wellbeing and constitutes a core tourism product around the world (UNWTO, 2019; Gross and Sand, 2019). In addition to the benefits of outdoor activities such as hiking for the general well-being (Abraham et al, 2010; Sand et al, 2019), the UNWTO emphasized its contribution “to better engage with local people, nature and culture” As a tourist activity hiking, shows less negative environmental impact compared to other intrusive activities (Thongdejsri and Nitivattananon, 2019). This is reinforced by permitting several day tours and offering various options with corresponding services along the route contributing to sustainable tourism (Raya et al, 2018). Hiking represents a pure sporting activity, while others favor it as a social event, an immersive natural experience or as an amalgamation of these aspects (Den Breejen, 2007; Pomfret, 2006, 2011; Rodrigues et al, 2010)
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