A New Tool for Smart Tourism Destinations: Indicators of Sustainable Intelligence

Yaiza López-Sánchez (), Juan Ignacio Pulido-Fernández () and José Luis Durán-Román ()
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Yaiza López-Sánchez: University of Jaén
Juan Ignacio Pulido-Fernández: University of Jaén
José Luis Durán-Román: University of Jaén

Chapter 9 in Sustainable Tourism, 2024, pp 175-196 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract The emergence of smart destinations (SDs) as a new planning and management approach for tourist destinations adopts sustainability as a crucial part of its agenda. Indicators are a fundamental tool for destinations in their progress towards a more sustainable development of tourism and the application of sustainable tourism principles and policies in real contexts. This chapter introduces some novelties in the dialectic between smart destinations and sustainability. In order to incorporate tourists in the analysis and progress of the sustainability of SDs, it is necessary to evaluate and measure tourists’ level of commitment, attitude, knowledge, and behavior regarding sustainability. This is defined as a novel concept called sustainable intelligence within the framework recently named smart sustainability. The relationship between SDs and sustainable tourism indicators has been extensively studied, but there is a lack of information regarding the incorporation of tourists themselves as a factor from the perspective of sustainability and its measurement through indicators. Considering this gap in the literature, we propose “Indicators of Tourists’ Sustainable Intelligence” as a fundamental tool in the incorporation of tourists in the progress towards the sustainability of SDs. Recent literature defines tourists’ sustainable intelligence as the ability of tourists to apply their experiences and knowledge regarding the effects of tourism on the environment in which it is practiced, developing proactive behaviors towards sustainable tourism, from the perspective of both consumption and production. From a statistical perspective, sustainable intelligence is a latent variable (not directly observable); therefore, it has to be quantified by indirect indicators, which, to a greater or lesser degree, are related to the latent variable. This chapter presents the results of a two-round Delphi survey conducted into expert opinion on the development of Indicators of Tourists’ Sustainable Intelligence to define and measure the different tourist sustainable intelligence dimensions, related to the commitment, attitude, knowledge, and behavior of tourists with sustainability. This useful tool incorporates the demand perspective for the sustainable management of SDs as a key factor in the move towards sustainability.

Keywords: Smart tourism; Destination; Innovation; Smart tools (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-3-031-43528-7_9

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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-43528-7_9

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