Tourist motivation and satisfaction of Chinese senior tourists on day trips

Abstract

Purpose: The study explores the tourist motivation and satisfaction of Chinese senior tourists on day trips. The purpose of this study is to identify the model of tourist motivation and satisfaction for Chinese senior tourist on day trips, thereby filling the theoretical gap in the field of day trips in China.

Design: This study proposes a conceptual framework of the tourist motivation and satisfaction for the Chinese senior tourist on day trips based on the literature in the field and analysing the tourism motivation and satisfaction of Chinese senior tourists on day trips by using the quantitative research method of the positivist paradigm.

Findings: This study validated some of the previous research results in this field and confirmed most of them. Similar to some research results, this study found the most important push motivation category for Chinese senior tourists on day trips is “knowledge-seeking”, and the most important pull motivation category is “advantages of the scenic spot”. For tourist satisfaction of Chinese senior tourists on day trips, the three most important influencing factors are: “scenic security”, “attractive scenery”, and “service quality of scenic service personnel”. The study also found the demographic characteristics of senior tourists have an impact on tourist motivation and factors affecting tourist satisfaction. For example, fitness is an important reason for people aged 50-55 travel, but it doesn't important to people over 55 years old. Senior people with more knowledge will be more concerned with the needs of intangible cultures. For male seniors, the most important factor affects tourist satisfaction is “attractive scenery”. But for the elderly women, the first important factor affecting tourist satisfaction is “scenic security”. Furthermore, the results identify as tourism motivation becomes higher, the Chinese senior tourists evaluate the tour quality better. Similarly, as the tourism expectation becomes higher, Chinese senior tourists evaluate the tour quality better, which increases tourist satisfaction. Tourist satisfaction affects the future behavioural intention of the Chinese elderly negatively. Meanwhile, the mean value of tourists' future behavioural intention shows that as the tourist satisfaction of the Chinese elderly becomes higher, they tend to recommend to their friends. The lower the tourist satisfaction of the Chinese elderly, the more they tend to complain to their friends.

Originality and Value: This study has proved some existing theories about tourist motivation and satisfaction of senior tourists can also be applied to Chinese senior tourists on day trips. The academic contribution of this study is the model of tourist motivation and satisfaction for Chinese senior tourists on day trips that has been identified. This empirical model is a new theory for the Chinese day trips field, which fills the theoretical gap in it and it can be used for many other works. Meanwhile, this study can also help other researchers in other related research work. The study may be able to provide some related materials such as research data etc. The findings of this study will help Chinese tourism practitioners responsible for designing tourism products and providing services. This study can help tourism practitioners to understand more about the needs of senior people participating in tourism activities, thus can design suitable tourism products for the senior people.