Abstract
The service quality and safety perception of urban forests are important factors that influence tourists to choose them as recreation destinations. This study aims to propose a theoretical model of multivariate relationships to explore the relationship between service quality (including visual quality, facility completeness, and accessibility) and safety perception to examine whether visual quality, facility completeness, and accessibility on tourists’ safety perception in the urban forest and to explain the specific reasons for the impact. We collected sample data from many urban forest green spaces in Fuzhou through a two-stage field survey (N = 891), and controlling for potential confounders, a structural equation model was used to estimate relationships. Safety perception was divided into safety environment perception, control perception, and safety emotion. Visual quality of an urban forest positively affected safety emotion. Traffic accessibility positively affected control perception. Facility completeness had a positive impact on safety emotion and control perception. Both safety emotion and control perception played an important intermediary role in improving the perception of a safe environment in the multivariate model. Visual quality, facility completeness, and accessibility all had a positive impact on tourists’ safety perception of urban forests. The findings suggest that improving the service quality of a green space can effectively improve tourists’ evaluation of the safety of the urban forest environment. Specifically, tourists’ psychological tolerance to threats and their self-confidence in survival can be enhanced by improving the service quality of a green space.
Highlights
An urban forest refers to the natural forest area within or near a city [1]
The results showed that the critical ratio (CR) values of all items were between 18.965 and 28.039, or greater than the minimum reference value of 3.000, and the significance test probability p-value was less than 0.001
This study has discussed the relationship between service quality and safety perception in an urban forest, constructed the theoretical framework of safety perception by evaluating the previous research results on green space safety perception, and compiled a simple safety perception measurement scale
Summary
An urban forest refers to the natural forest area within or near a city [1]. Their geographical advantages and natural environments make them attractive places for recreation.A forest has a unique aesthetic value compared to a park. An urban forest refers to the natural forest area within or near a city [1] Their geographical advantages and natural environments make them attractive places for recreation. As a kind of natural therapy, has been shown to promote physical and mental health [2] This activity is persuading more and more visitors to undertake forest recreation and promoting the development of forest tourism in regional economic growth. Compared to landscape parks, forests, as a wilder natural area, are often considered to be more dangerous. For this reason, some tourists restrict their travel choices, and few select forest environments, especially for outdoor parent–child activities [3]. It is important to eliminate tourists’ worries and prejudices about the urban forest environment
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