Mervyn S Jackson

Determining hiking experiences in nature-based tourist destinations

Abstract Visitor experiences in natural landscapes are considered integral components of visitor satisfaction research. Many studies have considered satisfaction as a cognitive process leading to an emotional state (J. Travel Res. 34(1) (1995) 11; Outdoor Recreation Benchmark 1988. Proceedings of the National Outdoor Recreation Forum, January, Tampa FL, pp. 422–438). Such emotional states are multidimensional and multisensory manifestations that are exhibited in numerous forms. At the same time they are influenced by preferences, values, beliefs and attitudes or in other words, social cognition of a visitor. Numerous techniques have been used to collect data showing the state of emotions/experiences. Techniques range from simple questionnaires administered in situ, to maintaining diaries of individual activities and experiences, to experiential sampling methods such as those adopted by Hull and Stewart (Environ. Behav. 27 (1995) 404). Recently, more expensive but effective instruments have been used such as video (Monitoring and Management of Visitor Flows in Recreational and Protected Areas. Conference Proceedings, pp. 296–301) and sensors using counters (Monitoring and Management of Visitor Flows in Recreational and Protected Areas. Conference Proceedings, pp. 258–263). The purpose of this paper is to document research currently underway, which is attempting to identify the underlying dimensions influencing visitor experiences through natural landscapes. This paper uses the generic term “experience” to cover a wide range of subjective meanings such as moods, emotions and feelings of individuals moving through natural landscapes. The study has conceptualised and empirically created constructs that underpin the character, magnitude and attributes of visitor experiences in natural landscapes. In situ measurements of feelings and experiences were determined via a questionnaire administered to a group of university students hiking along the Pinnacle walking track in the Grampians National Park in western Victoria, Australia. The study has applied two commonly used multivariate techniques, multidimensional scaling and principal components analysis to create constructs that model the nature and magnitude of the visitor experience in natural settings.

Understanding community attitudes towards tourism and host-guest interaction in the urban-rural border region.

Abstract An improved understanding of both community attitudes toward tourism and host–guest interaction is vital for the sustainable development of tourism. However, there are significant research deficiencies and gaps in these two related research areas. This conceptual paper looks into these glaring research gaps through a review of literature and attempts to provide solutions suggested by an ongoing research project being conducted in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. In particular, while this paper addresses the impacts of personality and ethnicity on community attitudes toward tourism and points to the urgent need for a well-established theoretical framework in order to understand and predict host–guest interaction, it also highlights the above issues in the context of the urban–rural fringe, the bordering region connecting neat ‘urban’ and ‘rural’ areas.

Tourism experiences within an attributional framework

Abstract This paper reports on a conceptualization of previously reported data by the authors. Using the critical incident technique, tourists were asked to recount their most positive and most negative tourism experiences. These qualitative data were reduced using the attribution theory. This framework allows researchers to determine which of four causes (ability, effort, task ease/difficulty, and luck) they use to explain their experiences. Results showed an attribution bias where tourists are more likely to use internal (dispositional) attributions for positive tourism outcomes compared to more external (situation) attributions for negative experiences. Tourists perceive less personal control for both positive and negative experiences. Implications for the industry, tourism education, and tourists themselves are discussed.

Understanding Resort Visitors through Segmentation

Tourist hotel resorts have been considered as indispensable elements in the major tourism industry component of accommodation for several decades. Tourist hotel resorts are sought after by various segments of domestic and overseas tourists all over the world for various holiday purposes. There have been several focused tourism research contributions over the last two decades about their location, life-cycle stages, service quality and management. Few researchers, however, have focused their research on the resort hotel guests resort selection preferences, satisfaction by resort service, opinion on resort holiday and preference for quality of resort guest activities. This paper tries to fill this vacuum in the resort tourism literature by exploring the visitors views on resort selection, satisfaction, opinion and preferences. The research attempted to profile 776 visitors holidaying in resorts in selected resorts of Australia through a well-structured, four-page questionnaire divided into five parts containing 18 questions focusing on their reasons for resort selection, resort satisfaction, resort opinion and resort preferences under subtitles. The research also focused on their gender, age, level of education, occupation, life-cycle category, residency, nationality, postcode, years of patronisation, intimate selection choices and willingness to recommend their experiences. An attempt was made to profile the resort visitors through a cluster analysis in order to understand the underlying dimensions on the basis of the above-mentioned factors, segmenting them into identifiable groups. Four discernable clusters of resort visitors and their distinguishing characteristics were identified on the basis of their demographics. Further, through a one-way ANOVA analysis the clusters are compared with each other for further understanding and clarity. The results shows that the gender factor does not have much influence whereas life-cycle, education and age have considerable influence in segmenting the resort clientele. The four clusters were correlated with the selection, satisfaction, opinions and preferences. The results will be discussed in terms of future resort developments, themes, generating resort activities focusing on young families and service quality.

Model for combining the qualitative emic approach with the quantitative derived etic approach

Good cross-cultural research should involve researchers who are familiar with the culture they are studying. One way this can be achieved is by conducting qualitative research. The aim of this article is to review the cross-cultural research published in the two journals of the Australian Psychological Society over the last 20 years. The review used five coding categories. Results indicated that the majority of first authors were located in Australia; the range of research was diverse; the majority of articles were atheoretical and problem-centered; there were no articles that solely used a qualitative methodology; and the majority (89%) used an imposed etic method. After describing this research a nine-step model for conducting more effective cross-cultural research was proposed.

Marketing regional tourism: How better to target and address community attitudes to tourism

In the past two decades there have been more than 70 published articles that have segmented tourist samples into clusters. The principal aims of such research are to understand tourist characteristics better; to identify key variables that predict tourist behaviour; to assess the value of tourism to an area; to provide knowledge to help develop facilities in designated areas; and to allow tourism marketing to plan strategies such as promotion and product development. In contrast, researchers have appeared to assume that the host population is homogeneous and has a uniform response to an increase in tourist numbers and to future sustainable tourism within the community. This research study used multivariate analyses such as factor analysis and cluster analysis to segment the host community into four distinct cluster groups on the basis of their positive and negative attitudes. Demographic variables constituted the cluster base. These four cluster groups differed from each other on gender ratio, age, life-cycle stage, education, migration status, occupation and current involvement with tourism. This research highlights differing attitudes present in various community groups, and explores implications for the tourist industry.

Development, refinement and future usage of the scale: “Attitudes toward learning in pregnancy”

Given the continued lack of research and evaluation in relation to antenatal education and the real concern for early parenting influences on childhood development, this research surveyed 705 midwives. Their attitudes were analysed and categorised into six themes which were associated with antenatal education, learning and decision making during pregnancy and the midwifes role in antenatal education. The initial finding was that a sizeable minority (up to 30%) of registered midwives has negative attitudes to the womans ability to learn during pregnancy. In response to this finding, the data were factor analysed and refined. Three factors resulted from this process and were named: cognition, motivation and professional issues. The 30-item ATLIP questionnaire accounted for 36% of the total variance. Professional and further research issues arising from this research were discussed.

Strengthening Australian Families: Socioeconomic Status, Social Connectedness, and Family Functioning

Abstract Social connectedness has been promoted as one factor that may facilitate optimal functioning for families experiencing economic adversity. Using data from 218 Australian families, the current study explored the relative importance of social connectedness to the functioning of economically diverse families. Overall, results indicated similar levels of social connectedness and family functioning across low- and high-income groups. However, important differences were identified with regards to the relative contribution of social connectedness to the functioning of families across the economic spectrum. Clinical implications arising from these findings include the potential benefit of exploring social connectedness as a routine part of clinical assessment and ongoing intervention for families experiencing economic vulnerability.

Choking under pressure: Illuminating the role of distraction and self-focus

ABSTRACT Two dominant explanations of choking under pressure – self-focus and distraction – have been enduringly presented as competing mechanisms of motor skill failure under performance stress. Dual-task experiments designed to simultaneously assess both mechanisms have often favoured self-focus, whereas qualitative research and examinations of gaze behaviour suggest that distraction plays a role. Though both mechanisms remain plausible, several reviews of the choking literature have side-stepped how autonomous motor skill failure would play out under a distraction-based model or a dual-mechanism model. In this discussion, we contend that persistent experimental focus on the brief moments of motor execution, without adequate consideration of diverse preparatory cognitive activities that also characterise sporting expertise, has delayed understanding of distraction’s involvement. With an expanded scope in mind, we critically review the evidence for both mechanisms and describe how distraction alone or distraction in combination with self-focus might derail an expert motor skill under pressure. Different suggestions are made for self-paced and externally paced sports given their different attentional challenges.

Barriers to Sustained Return-to-Work Reported by those Returning to Work Post Traumatic Spinal Cord Injury Rehabilitation

Aim: The first aim of this cross-sectional survey was to assess the reasons given by people with traumatic spinal cord injury (tSCI) for leaving a job that they had secured after sustaining injury. The second aim was to examine the extent to which these reasons were compatible with a previously-developed framework for understanding organizational behaviors such as leaving a position of employment. Method: Thirty tSCI patients who left a position of employment which had been secured following the injury were interviewed, and asked to report the factors associated with their withdrawal from that position of employment. Results: A large number of factors were reportedly involved in the withdrawals. These factors mirrored were those which have been identified as influencing organizational behavior among the general workforce (characteristics of the individual, of the job, and of the wider environment). The ratio of factors involved was, respectively, 8:8:1. Within the environmental factors, micro-level factors were more prevalent than macro-level factors (in the ratio of 2:1). Conclusions: As many of the individual, job, and health-related reasons are essentially immutable, the environmental factors offer more promise for the development of preventive interventions to minimize unnecessary job loss. Prominent among these environmental factors targeted in interventions would be the workplace-related factor of social support.