• Some see Antarctica as `last chance' des

    From ScienceDaily@1:317/3 to All on Tuesday, April 12, 2022 22:30:44
    Some see Antarctica as `last chance' destination; for others, it's a
    backdrop

    Date:
    April 12, 2022
    Source:
    North Carolina State University
    Summary:
    Travel to nature-based destinations to socialize -- to celebrate
    anniversaries, honeymoons or to spend time with family for a
    holiday - - is a growing trend in tourism, and it was a significant
    motivator for travel to Antarctica before the pandemic, researchers
    found in recent study.



    FULL STORY ==========================================================================
    In a new study, researchers found a significant reason why many people
    travel to Antarctica is to socialize -- to celebrate anniversaries,
    honeymoons or to spend time with family for a holiday -- rather than
    because of a particular interest in the land and its wildlife.


    ==========================================================================
    The finding raises questions about the effectiveness of the conservation appeals and educational efforts for this emerging group of Antarctic
    tourists.

    "Some people go to Antarctica for learning and experience, some people go
    to fulfill a lifetime dream, and some people go there as an adventure --
    they have been to many places, but they haven't been there," said study co-author Yu-Fai Leung, professor of parks, recreation and tourism
    management at North Carolina State University. "The social bonding
    group's motivations were interesting.

    They didn't mention anything about penguins or seeing other wildlife
    as a principal motivation; they're going for a vacation, birthday or anniversary celebrations, and they chose Antarctica as the backdrop." Researchers launched the pre-pandemic study on tourism to Antarctica as
    travel to the continent has grown and diversified. The pre-pandemic,
    2019-2020 tourist season saw more than 74,000 travelers -- double the
    number of travelers seen five years prior. While tourism can be a tool
    to inspire people to become ambassadors for conservation for Antarctica
    -- a fragile ecosystem facing crumbling glaciers, invasive species,
    and wildlife diseases -- it also can create challenges.

    "During the last two decades, a lot of new, different activities have
    been introduced in Antarctica that are drawing the interest of a bunch of people," said the study's lead author Daniela Cajiao, a former visiting
    scholar at NC State and former graduate student at the Universidad
    Auto'noma de Madrid.

    "There are also new ways of traveling there. This is diversifying how you
    can access Antarctica, but also the profile of the tourists who visit."
    To understand tourists' motivations, researchers surveyed people before
    and after they traveled by ship or airplane to Antarctica during the
    2019-20 season. They found four main motivations for tourists traveling
    to Antarctica: experience and learning (31%), social bonding (28%),
    adventure (23%), or to take a trip of a lifetime (17.5%).



    ==========================================================================
    They observed people in the "social bonding" and "trip of a lifetime"
    groups who saw Antarctica as a last-chance tourism destination; a finding
    that researchers have also documented with other sites endangered by
    climate change, like the Great Barrier Reef and the Arctic.

    "Now that we have more people traveling to Antarctica for adventure
    or social bonding, how do we think about communicating with these
    tourists?" Cajiao said.

    "They may not want to attend all lectures. We need to think about how we
    can better deliver conservation and environmental messages so that any
    changes in people's environmental concerns or behaviors last in the long
    term." When they analyzed whether tourists in certain groups were more
    or less likely to have learned something from the trip -- or perceived
    they learned something -- they found tourists in the "trip of a lifetime"
    group were more likely to have higher perceptions of learning. Tourists
    in the "experience and learning" group had the highest overall average
    score for actual learning.

    Surprisingly, they also found there was a relationship between tourists' perception of how much they learned, and their intentions to change
    their environmental behaviors.

    "We found that it's not just about whether you actually learned facts
    or lessons about Antarctica, the continent, or the ecosystem," Leung
    said. "It's also about how much you feel you learned. This suggests that perception means a lot to people; it's part of the experience.



    ==========================================================================
    "If you feel you got something from the learning experience, then it
    will more likely change you and what you do after the trip. That has
    important implications for educators, communicators and tour operators." Researchers said getting a large or representative sample on Antarctic
    tourists is extremely difficult, and this study was no exception. They
    want to extend their study to continue to examine tourist types and relationships.

    They also said they want to study actual behavior changes in future
    work, as well as look at Antarctic tourism after the pandemic slowdowns
    and closures.

    Leung said that while tourism may not have full recovered to pre-pandemic levels yet, they expect it will.

    "We are curious to see how this shifts again after COVID," Cajiao
    said. "Maybe people see the world a little bit differently." The study, "Tourists' motivations, learning and trip satisfaction facilitate pro-environmental outcomes of the Antarctic tourist experience," was
    published in the Journal of Outdoor Recreation and Tourism. Co-authors
    included Lincoln Larson of NC State and Pablo Tejedo and Javier Benayas
    from the Universidad Auto'noma de Madrid. The study was funded by the International Association of Antarctica Tour Operators (IAATO) as part of
    the Fellowship Program for early- career researchers awarded in 2019-2020
    to support Cajiao's scholarly visit to NC State.


    ========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided
    by North_Carolina_State_University. Original written by Laura
    Oleniacz. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


    ========================================================================== Journal Reference:
    1. Daniela Cajiao, Yu-Fai Leung, Lincoln R. Larson, Pablo Tejedo,
    Javier
    Benayas. Tourists' motivations, learning, and trip satisfaction
    facilitate pro-environmental outcomes of the Antarctic tourist
    experience. Journal of Outdoor Recreation and Tourism, 2022; 37:
    100454 DOI: 10.1016/j.jort.2021.100454 ==========================================================================

    Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/04/220412141055.htm

    --- up 6 weeks, 1 day, 10 hours, 51 minutes
    * Origin: -=> Castle Rock BBS <=- Now Husky HPT Powered! (1:317/3)