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| A COMPARATIVE STUDY ON RESIDENTS' PERCEPTIONS AND ATTITUDES ON TOURISM IMPACTS OF WORLD HERITAGE DESTINATIONS——A Case Study of Pingyao and Lijiang Ancient Cities |
| HUANG Yu-li1, LONG Liang-fu2, WANG Yu-qiong1 |
1. School of Tourism & Culture Industry, Chengdu University, Chengdu 610106, China;
2. School of Zhongshan, Electronic Technology University, Zhongshan 528400, China |
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Abstract Residents of the World Heritage destinations have witnessed the development process of World Heritage tourism. Therefore, to survey the residents is a good way to understand the impact that tourism industry has caused. In foreign countries, there are many scholars who have conducted a large number of empirical researches on residents' perception and attitudes toward tourism and resulted in many amazing findings. With quantity research method, the authors made empirical survey, handing out questionnaires on the spot to households and interviewing some residents, employees in tourism enterprises and the department concerning tourism. The questionnaire was made up of tow parts: the former part was the main body of the questionnaire and a 25-item scale of resident attitudes toward tourism was administered to households of the two ancient cities. The latter part was the information about residents' demography and other statistics. Three hundred questionnaires were sent to two destinations' households and 283 questionnaires and 279 questionnaires were drawn back respectively. Mean and T test were made using SPSS 1.50 to analyze and understand residents' perceptions and attitudes toward tourism impacts. The authors found that there are instinctive difference of residents' perceptions and attitudes between Pingyan & Lijiang. The findings reflected that nowadays there are some unfair phenomena in the tourism revenue distribution system from the perspective of residents. During the development of tourism, developers and business operators realized their maximum benefit and tourists also realized their greatest satisfaction while local residents saw benefit from tourism. But they have to endure the most negative impacts caused by tourism. The decision and policies of developing tourism are made by local governments who seldom consider residents' benefits. Resident is one of important stakeholders and their receptiveness to both visitors and tourism development plays an important role in attracting and pleasing visitors. Only by concerning with residents' benefits and letting them share the tourism benefits can the World Heritage tourism make its sustainable way and economy, socio-culture and environment finally realize harmonized effects.
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Received: 18 January 2007
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2008, Vol. 23 
