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Article
Socio-demographic characteristics affecting sport tourism choices: A structural model
Acta Gymnica
  • Nataša Slak Valek, Zayed University
  • Mike Shaw, University of Canberra
  • Jakob Bednarik, University of Ljubljana
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
1-1-2014
Abstract

© 2014 N. Slak Valek et al. Background: Effective tourism management in the field of sports tourism requires an understanding of differences in socioeconomic characteristics both within and between different market segments. Objective: In the broad tourism market demographic characteristics have been extensively analyzed for differences in destination choices, however little is known about demographic factors affecting sport tourists’ decisions. Methods: A sample of Slovenian sports tourists was analyzed using data from a comprehensive survey of local and outbound tourist activity conducted by the Statistical Office of the Republic of Slovenia in 2008. After data weighting the information for 353,783 sports related trips were available for analysis. The research model adopted suggests that four socio-demographic characteristics (gender, age, level of education and income) significantly affect a tourist’s choice of sports related travel either locally within Slovenia or to a foreign country. Furthermore the destination (local or foreign) has an influence on the choice of the type of accommodation selected and the tourist’s total expenditure for the trip. For testing the first part of our model (the socio-demographic characteristics effects) a linear regression was used, and for the final part of the model (the selection of accommodation type and travel expenditure) t-test were applied. Results: The result shows the standardized ß regression coefficients are all statistically significant at the .001 level for the tested socio-demographic characteristics and also the overall regression model was statistically significant at .001 level. Conclusions: With these results the study confirmed that all the selected socio-demographic characteristics have a significant influence on the sport-active tourist when choosing between a domestic and foreign tourism destination which in turn affect the type of accommodation chosen and the level of expenditure while travelling.

Publisher
PALACKY UNIV
Disciplines
Keywords
  • Regression model,
  • Slovenia,
  • Socio-demographic factors,
  • Sport tourism,
  • Tourism expenditure
Scopus ID

84930581565

Creative Commons License
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
Indexed in Scopus
Yes
Open Access
Yes
Open Access Type
Gold: This publication is openly available in an open access journal/series
Citation Information
Nataša Slak Valek, Mike Shaw and Jakob Bednarik. "Socio-demographic characteristics affecting sport tourism choices: A structural model" Acta Gymnica Vol. 44 Iss. 1 (2014) p. 57 - 65 ISSN: <p><a href="https://v2.sherpa.ac.uk/id/publication/issn/2336-4912" target="_blank">2336-4912</a></p>
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/nataa-slakvalek/3/