Tourist Behavior Analysis for Sustainable Tourism Policy

Abstract

Tourists’ travel decisions usually involve a number of choices made over time and across space. Because tourists face many aspects of choices and must deal with spatial and temporal constraints, it is expected that there will be interdependences in their behavior. Accurate representation of such interdependences is essential for improving understanding of their behavior and consequently may provide insights into tourism marketing and policy decisions. This chapter investigates interdependences among several aspects of tourists’ travel decisions, aiming to provide behavioral foundations for the development of an integrated tourism model system. It introduces two studies concerning integrated tourist behavior modeling. The first study jointly analyzes tourists’ three interrelated choices by using a nested logit (NL) model. In the second study, tourist’s time-use behavior, involving multiple activities, is analyzed using a multiple discrete–continuous extreme value (MDCEV) model. Application analyses are conducted using data collected in Japan. The findings have important practical implications for both destination management and policy making.