When predicting future travel patterns, it is critical to first have basic knowledge of a persons travel determination and what is motivating those to pursue travelling to destinations they have decided on. As Pearce, Morrison & Rutledge (1998) have identified tourist motivation as "the global integrating network of natural and cultural makes gives value and course to travel alternatives, behaviour and experience".
Each tourist is motivated by different motives that determine their travel choices. These selections can be for new experiencing, culture fascination, recreation, pleasure and relaxing and shopping. Although what motivates visitors to travel varies, but there's always recurrent themes growing. For instance, a person might want to travel and get away from their regular place of living and chooses on taking on a holiday for different surroundings and rest, to explore new things, places and folks.
Many have looked at motivation as a major determinant of the tourist's behaviour. Theories of desire is the idea of needs and they are seen as the causes that arouses motivated behaviour and to best know very well what motivates people, it pays to to find the needs they have got and how these needs can be fulfilled. Maslow's hierarchy of needs theory is the best known motivation ideas. The press and pull concept is another line of travel desire, while Plog's allocentrism/psychocentrism model will help explain phenomenal rise and semester of travel places.
Cohen (1972) in his early on studies, draws focus on the fact that all tourists would like some element of novelty and strangeness while, at the same time, most also need to keep something familiar. How travellers combine the needs for novelty with familiarity can in turn be utilized to derive a typology. According to Johns & Gyimothy (2002) Cohen distinguished traveler using sociological guidelines into organised mass traveler, individual mass holidaymakers, explorer and drifter.
In this essay, we shall discuss different author's strategy for travel motivation and typologies of tourist's behavior and shall critically review and compare these theories and typologies.
Travel Motivation
Travel inspiration includes two factors, the push motives factor which represents the necessity for exploring, relaxing, and interacting socially in the getaway decision. While draw motives is the fascination induced by the destination to the individual, these factors include view finding, and historical attractions and sites. Force factors are known to form a desire to have travelling, and take factors are recognized to explicate the decision of vacation spot. Crompton (1979). Drive factors can also suggest avoidance of work and stresses at home induced culturally or socially. And pull factors suggest simply seeking trip, freedom, get away from, leisure and play. Seaton (1997)
Maslow's theory involves five needs developing a hierarchy, in a pyramid condition from lower to higher needs. Maslow explained how when the lower needs Physiological needs (basic life needs- air, water, food, shelter, ambiance, sleep, sex), Safe practices needs (safeguard, security, low, boundaries, stability, order), Owed and love (family, love, relationships, work groups) are achieved the individual would be encouraged by the needs of another two levels Esteem needs (success, status, responsibility, reputation), Self-actualization needs (personal growth and fulfilment).
Although Maslow's theory has been criticized as the basic five needs stay ambiguous, although some feel that it has provided relevance in how human being actions are understandable and predictable.
The travel and leisure industry has borrowed a whole lot from Maslow because he provides a convenient set of containers that can be relatively labelled. Maslow's hierarchy of needs in addition has produced a good tool for understanding psychological motivational factors in travel and leisure. For example, a person might want to happen to be visit friends and family, but the actual psychological desire may be helped bring by the necessity for belonging and need to reunite family links.
Iso-Ahola (1982) mentioned that when vacationers are on getaways their roles as time passes may be turned and various needs will emerge. Sometimes an individual motivation may not always be the key factor for travel, if while on christmas and the original needs are satisfied, other motivations might go up. It really is congruent with Maslow's ideas of must argue that when there is a primary dependence on relaxation while on holiday, the satisfaction of relaxing will create a fresh need such as discovering the spot to enable procedures of self-actualization to take place.
The four motivational needs Beard and Ragheb (1983) mentioned derive from the work of Maslow (1970). These components help in assessing the degree to which folks are motivated to participate in and get excited about activities such as learning, sensing, exploring and imagining; the public component assists with assessing the level where folks are taking part in leisure activities for public reasons. Friendship and interpersonal interactions is one of the essential needs, as the second need is the esteem of others. While the competence-mastery component assesses the level of which individuals engage in leisure activities in order to accomplish, get better at, task and compete. These activities are usually physical in characteristics; it is escaping and getting away from overbearing life situations. It drives individuals to get solitude, unwind, break and seek out peaceful conditions to avoid sociable contacts.
Sefton and Burton (1987) has replicated these four motivations to create the foundation with their Leisure Motivation Scale. However the original Ragheb and Beard Range, included items such as to use and develop physical skills and expertise. This attitude is associated with competition and keeping yourself fit, others have proven that competency and mastery can be founded in ways such as intellectual pursuits. Other research workers have also determined four sets of motivations, which can be linked to Maslow's ideas. These ideas include physical motivators such as health and less tension; cultural motivators such as religious beliefs, art and traditions; interpersonal motivators such as going to relatives and buddies; status motivators such as self esteem and personal development.
Hudman and Hawkins (1989) made a set of ten main motivators that stimulated tourists. These ten motivators are anywhere from activities to physical inactivities. They are really curiosity, athletics, health, natural resources, man made facilities, visiting friends and family, business, religion, self esteem and physical inactivity such as simply sunbathing and soothing.
Similarly to these, six combinations of motivations were grouped and the six combinations included; educational and social which be the eye of traditional sites, relaxation, adventure and pleasure, health insurance and entertainment, ethnicity and family. This contributes to the been-there-done that factor to a tourist.
The Iso-Ahola's theory signifies that what motivates tourism is the assertion of personal break free whereby overcoming bad feelings and changing the rate of your every day life, personal seeking whereby boasting about your experience to others to feel good about yourself, interpersonal get away is whereby you avoid the nerve-racking environment you are in and steer clear of connections with others, and interpersonal seeking is being with individuals with similar interest and to meet new people. Snepenger et al (2006)
Another seven components of vacationer motivations were discovered by Dann (1981) and his motivation elements included; venturing as a response from what is desired, vacation spot pull in respond to a motivational press, desire as a illusion whereby participating in activities that are regarded undesirable in their culture and home environment, inspiration as a grouped goal such as going to family and relatives, motivational typologies, motivation and holiday experience, and inspiration as an auto-definition and meaning including the way in which a traveler will explain their situations and react to them.
The Travel Profession Ladder is another travel motivation and it consists of five elements developed by P. Pearce (1988) these five travel determination elements vary from motivations of leisure, stimulation, relationship, self-esteem, to development and fulfilment. A holiday motivation can be an ever before changing process and moving up the ladder while progressing through the many life-cycle changes. The model Pearce developed proved that motivations are split into two categories. The necessity may be self-centred for case relaxation may be done solo and the holiday maker seeks a tranquil restful time by itself, or the necessity is directed at others for example it could be leisure with other individuals and springing from the need for external pleasure and desire to have novelty.
More examples of self-centred needs and needs directed at others are; self aimed needs springs from the concern for own safety, romantic relationship can be self-directed which means offering love and love and maintaining relationships, self-esteem and development maybe self-directed like development of skills, special interests, competence and mastery, fulfilment is another exemplory case of self-directed needs, as if fulfils and understands oneself more and experience serenity. While needs directed at others can be directed toward others arising from the concern for other's security, or it can be fond of others by means of receiving affection and also to be with group account and it can be fond of others like prestige, and glamour of traveling.
Seaton (1997) criticized Pearce's travel motivations. For instance, as Pearce argued that excitement may be grasped alone a sizing of risk and safe practices of oneself or of others, it could be argued that there is a unique difference between these two motivations. A problem about the safety of others might indicate placing yourself in danger to help others from threat. The willingness to get this done depends on the certainty of a person's mental maturity.
It has been recommended by Pearce & Lee (2005) that in the Travel Job Ladder framework, the word career indicates that many individuals orderly move through some level or their travel motivational patterns are predictable. As some may influentially tell the Travel Profession Ladder, others may stay at a specific level, typically depending on opportunities and other limitations such as health insurance and financial situations.
Typologies of Holiday Behaviour
Cohen (1972), in his early studies, draws attention to the fact that tourists would like some aspect of novelty and strangeness while, at the same time, most also have to maintain something familiar. How travelers combine the needs for novelty with familiarity can in turn be used to derive a typology. Cohen (1972) the sociologist, discovered four types of travelers:
The organizational Mass traveler who buys visitors plans or all inclusive trips in order to go to classical mass tourism areas, where everything is predetermined in advance and has a low degree of contribution and engagement in the travel seek out information. There is no sense of excursion or exploration. He/she belongs to an institutionalized kind of tourism where the connection with the organizers of travel and leisure industry is a consistent.
The individual mass tourist is similar to the organizational mass visitor, however this one is flexibility on his/her decisions and want to participate more along the way. The tourist firmly will depend on the travel and leisure industry but want to try some new things out of the finished and predetermined deals.
The explorer is more adventurous, he desires to find his/her own experience participating actively in this decision choice. He arrange most of the elements of the travel by himself/herself, however sometimes he/she must turn to a travel agency or tourism pros to get some comfort or security amenities.
The drifter looks for intensive experience and he want to feel immerse in local communities. He/she completely get away from his relationships with the institutions of travel and leisure systems planning everything by him. He applied a non institutionalized kind of tourism.
With this classification of holidaymakers Cohen established a fascinating link between your need of living unique experiences and the necessity of the perception of security. The better a tourist needs to feel, the greater he will trust on travel and leisure specialist and thus he'll live less unique experiences (more standardized). Stanley Plog (1974 cited Plog 1991) developed a similar psychobiological model made to explain what type of people favor what type of destination corresponding to its psychographics characteristics. To the writer, tourist society could be divided into a continuum of personalities distributed along the Gauss curve; from psychometrics, person vacationers whom look for the unexplored, in one extreme to allocentrics, mass tourism travelers, in the other.
After Cohen and Plog, researchers such us Dalen (1989), Smith (1989) or Urry (2002) for cases; they have attemptedto create new categories of tourists based on their subject of research. It has to be pointed out that all the models suggested until now they are simply just descriptive rather than relevant to the general tourism demand. These are just focused in one area of analysis rather than in the larger dimension where in fact the holiday is immerse.
In addition, they also fail in a similar thing: they don't look at the factors which determine the different types of travellers (Sharpley, 1999). These factors might be grouped into demographic and socioeconomic factors such us age group, life cycle, gender and income; and structural communal factors such as the existence of non holidaymakers and capitalist tourism (Sharpley, 1999). Therefore, every person runs trough different levels in life, and with respect to the get older, familiar circumstances or income visitor will change from one typology to another. Moreover, in these classifications it isn't always the holiday who can determine what tourist is likely to be, but it is the society who's going to classify you (Swarbrooke and Horner, 2007)
Conclusion
To better plan and market holiday destinations, a better knowledge of motivation is vital. Travel motivation theories can help us know very well what desire is, and what elements must be looked at to comprehend it, and then interpret the several findings to comprehend the determination of a certain type of tourist. What motivates a person to travel may vary in one seeking adventure to 1 visiting a family to feel a sense of owed or whether they are affected by the Force purpose or the Yank motive. Therefore it is difficult to distinguish the different individual motives of travel and folks often might not constitute to the real reason of travel. However, understanding travel drive and typologies of vacationer has allowed and explained why certain travel and leisure destinations tend to be more developed and successful than others. All the theories discussed above are used as tool to get knowledge about what is driving tourists to travel and why are they choosing the places they may be travelling too. Travel motivations important in tourism and it is very important to development. The desire that reveals a tourist's behaviour can show how people place their goals on the vacation spot with their choice and it'll show how these goals reflect their choice and their travel behaviour. Last but not least, after executing this research, understanding the motivations and the typologies of an tourist is the key success to the tourism industry.
