Dublin Core
Title
Residents’ Perceptions towards Sustainable Tourism Development: The Case of Alanya
Abstract
Sustainable development approach is of utmost importance for the future existence of tourism destinations. Therefore, enabling tourism development based on sustainability principles economically, socially and environmentally is considered to be a necessity. All stakeholders of the tourism sector have important roles in this development process. Especially, the inclusion of residents to this process and their involvement in decision-making mechanisms represent a focal point in sustainable tourism development. Any tourism development that does not take into consideration the needs and expectations of residents does not have much chance for success. There have been many studies made about residents’ perceptions and attitudes towards tourism and tourism development in tourism literature. However, only a few studies use sustainable development perspective in order to determine residents’ perceptions towards tourism development. Therefore, this study was conducted to determine the residents’ perceptions towards sustainable tourism development in Alanya, an important tourism destination of Turkey and Mediterranean region. Data gathered from 134 residents in Alanya were analyzed using factor and correlation analysis, t-tests and ANOVA. Results presented a four-factor perceived sustainable tourism development measurement scale: environmental sustainability; perceived social costs; maximizing community participation; and perceived economic benefits. Findings have shown that there is a significant correlation between perceived economic benefits and two of the other three factors, which are environmental sustainability and maximizing community participation. Another main finding of the study is that residents are not fully aware of nor have much knowledge about the concept of sustainability and its principles, yet they still have shown positive attitude towards its principles. Keywords: Alanya, Residents, Residents’ Perceptions, Sustainability, Sustainable Tourism Development, Sustainable Development, Tourism.
Keywords
Conference or Workshop Item
PeerReviewed
PeerReviewed
Date
2012-05-31
Extent
1365